Dufey, the Duffenager
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Sweet Pea and I and three kitties were staying in a trailer park while waiting for our house to be built in 1991. One afternoon, I heard what sounded like a child screaming in terror. I rushed outside to listen and heard other doors opening similarly. The screaming continued until it became apparent it was a dog, not a child. Then I heard all the other doors shut. Sweet Pea and I ran up the street and Sweet Pea took me right to him. There was a little puppy stuck on top of a short chain link fence with the wires sticking into his tummy. I picked him up and went to the front door but no one answered. Sweet Pea and I walked back home. I put him down so I could open the door and he took off. "Come back here, you little Dufus!" I called. The name stuck. I left word with their next door neighbors, but no one ever came looking for him.
A few weeks later, we were checking on the lot to see how the new house was coming along. A couple with some dogs were walking one street over. I said "Hi" and the woman said "Oh George, puppies!" We became life-long friends. Dufey and Sweet Pea were spoiled rotten. I was a bad mom. George and Judy had a black lab mix named Dooley. Dufey had already decided he was the alpha dog at 3 months of age and lunged at the black lab and just hung from his throat while Dooley just ignored the pest hanging from his neck. George started calling him the Duffaneger (after Arnold Schwarzenneger). (Dufus was only my second dog and had no clue how to train dogs at the time.) Dufey was my constant companion. As long as I could get away with it, he'd go with me to class at UNM. He rode with me everwhere and he loved hanging out the window. This was before people got seat belt harnesses for dogs, but I quickly found one since he hit the windshield a few times when I had to brake for some freaking idiot in front of me. He loved his morning runs in the forest when we moved to New Mexico as well as their morning runs in the Mojave Desert after we moved there. I'd drive as many dogs as fit in the jeep for a run somewhere in the Sierras once a week.
A few weeks later, we were checking on the lot to see how the new house was coming along. A couple with some dogs were walking one street over. I said "Hi" and the woman said "Oh George, puppies!" We became life-long friends. Dufey and Sweet Pea were spoiled rotten. I was a bad mom. George and Judy had a black lab mix named Dooley. Dufey had already decided he was the alpha dog at 3 months of age and lunged at the black lab and just hung from his throat while Dooley just ignored the pest hanging from his neck. George started calling him the Duffaneger (after Arnold Schwarzenneger). (Dufus was only my second dog and had no clue how to train dogs at the time.) Dufey was my constant companion. As long as I could get away with it, he'd go with me to class at UNM. He rode with me everwhere and he loved hanging out the window. This was before people got seat belt harnesses for dogs, but I quickly found one since he hit the windshield a few times when I had to brake for some freaking idiot in front of me. He loved his morning runs in the forest when we moved to New Mexico as well as their morning runs in the Mojave Desert after we moved there. I'd drive as many dogs as fit in the jeep for a run somewhere in the Sierras once a week.