that’s life New addition to family loves football

By Tammy Keith

LITTLE ROCK — Ask and you shall receive - a dog.

The day my last column came out

talking about pet names and my grow

ing desire to have a dog - a little,

bitty one - there was a knock at my

door after supper.

It was a neighbor who had been

walking one of his dogs.

My husband and I had seen this

man while we were walking the week

before, and a small dog was following

him and his big dog. He said the little

dog likely had been dumped. It ran

and jumped on me, wagging its tail.

Its ribs were showing, and it looked a

little scroungey.

“Awww,” I said, “It’s little.” My husband said, “It’ll get bigger.

Let’s go.” The man said he’d take the little

dog home, feed it and take it to the

shelter the next day.

A week later, this man was on my

doorstep, asking if I wanted that

dog.

He’d taken him to the vet and found

out the dog was about 15 months old,

full-grown at 12 pounds, and prob

ably a mixture of basset hound and

rat terrier.

“I want him,” I said immediately.

My husband rolled his eyes and

went to fix the hole in the fence that

should have been repaired months

ago.

The man drove the dog over to us,

and he had it in a crate. A crate that

the man could barely hang onto, be

cause apparently there was a Tasma

nian devil in it. I remember thinking,

“Uh oh. What have I done?” The dog came out and went crazy

in our yard - crazier when he saw

Bacon, our black cat, who arched like

he was posing for a Halloween card.

My college son came home soon af

terward and gave the dog a small,

plastic football, which the dog put

in his mouth and ran with the rest

of the night.

We tried to come up with names

for our new addition to the family. We

went through about 150 - from Skil

let (to go with Bacon) to Turbo and

everything in between. My youngerson wanted to name him King Leonidas from the movie 300. And then he suggested calling our backyard Sparta. I vetoed that. I liked Buddy. My older son came up with Cowboy - for the Dallas Cowboys, and because the dog “has black and white like a cow and is a boy,” he said.

A friend at work suggested Blitz, so we tried that out, too.

We bought him a doghouse, and he made himself at home. He put his football and his chew toy inside.

And he likes to chew. We’ve lived in that house seven years with a screen door on the back door that Panda never bothered.

It took this dog about twodays to tear a big hole in it. I considered naming him Regret.

When it started storming and the tornado sirens went off, the dog was at the door, and when I opened it, he shot in through the hole in the screen and tore through the house.

He ended up climbing in the bathtub, even though his legs are only about 3 inches long. Smart dog.

After calling him a different name every day, I finally came up with Rudy, named for the small Notre Dame football player in the movie Rudy.

As Rudy looks at me through the back door, his little head cocked to one side, holding a football in his mouth, I think it’s perfect.

Thank you, neighbor.

Next week I’m writing about how much I want a new car.

River Valley Ozark, Pages 137, 141 on 09/21/2008