November 14th 2009. I was 3 months pregnant, and I was visiting The Burlington Humane Society. I was there strictly to gather information for a blog post I was writing. I even brought Tom, my husband, to be sure I didn’t go home with a dog.
Perhaps it would have been better to bring someone who didn’t like dogs because we ended up with Angus. Almost 100 lbs of drooling love.
We crate-trained Angus, and then 5 months after we got him, I was on mat leave. Angus no longer had to be crated, and he enjoyed having me home. He could come in and go out as he please...and he did. Some days I felt like opening that door was a full-time job, well, along with changing diapers, feedings, and trying to nap from time to time.
Angus really became part of our family.
Once the baby came, the time for walking the dog became less and less. I would take him every so often if it fit nicely in the baby’s routine, but she would fall asleep in the stroller and nap time was a great time to clean or try to nap myself.
Tom took him in the evening sometimes, but he wasn’t getting enough exercise. He was really good about it. He never chewed anything, he wasn’t hyper (unless someone came to the door), but he wasn’t as happy as he had been.
When I returned to work, poor Angus got less and less attention.
One busy weekend, we decided to send him up to Tom’s brother’s house for the weekend. Allan is one of Angus’ favourite people, and Allan loves dogs. At his house, Angus would have another dog to play with and 50 acres of land to run and exercise.
He was gone for two days, and we missed him. When he came back, Angus seemed even less happy. He started chewing things when we were out, which led to having to put him back in his crate. Then he started trying to escape from his crate; he cut his nose.
After Christmas, Angus went for another visit up north to Tom’s brothers, and when we got this picture, we knew what we had to do.
Angus lives full-time up north where he runs around on 50 forested acres with his best bud, Ace. He sleeps in their king bed (something he wasn’t allowed to do here), and he has someone home with him most days.
We have visitation rights.
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