(click the picture to view a Flickr set of pics)

The house has just been too quiet since Maxx passed on. Julie and I agreed we’d wait at least until the end of summer before we thought about bringing a new dog into our lives. We had a great time, doing a lot of walking and some bike riding and enjoying a freer schedule. We also spent a lot of time looking at all the poor animals on petfinder.com — currently over a quarter million of them — looking for a good home. Late last week we saw a boy we both really wanted to meet. Here’s the story as posted on petfinder by Katherine from Save R Dogs Ohio (the rescue organization):

This 9 month-old lab mix loves to play with kids and other pets. He is one happy boy! Currently he weighs about 55 pounds. Watching him chase down tennis balls is pretty funny - he has these big paws so he sorta reminds you of Scooby Doo.Shadow (or Tuxedo as his foster home calls him) has the best time at the dog park meeting new doggie friends. He is playful but isn’t hyper at all.I found this sweetie walking down the street. He was trying to follow some teenagers who turned around and started throwing rocks at him! If you could have seen the poor guy trying to dodge the rocks and the look on his face, poor fella. He was so confused! But he was more than happy to hop in my car where he sat in the front seat like a little gentleman.Tuxedo has been updated on all his shots and has been neutered. He is currently being fostered in Cleveland Heights.

So, Julie contacted Katherine and set up a meeting for last Saturday morning with Shadow, aka Tux. He took to us right away without being aggresive or overly rambunctious. We even took him for a test drive! Er…walk. We spent a good 45 minutes talking to Katherine and to Nora, the woman who was fostering Shadow. At the end of our time together, Katherine asked a little timidly what we thought; when Julie told her with no hesitation that yes, he would be our dog, Katherine burst into happy tears and rushed to hug the both of us!

We had to wait until today for our schedules to mesh with Katherine and Nora’s; Save R Dog’s policy is to bring the dog to the adopter’s home so they can see the kind of home their rescues are being placed into. I was at a video shoot, so Patti was really great and came over to be with Julie when Shadow arrived!

“Living the life of Riley” suggests an ideal life of prosperity and contentment, possibly living on someone else’s money, time or work. Rather than a negative freeloading or golddigging aspect, it instead implies that someone is kept or advantaged. The expression was popular in the 1880s, a time when James Whitcomb Riley’s poems depicted the comforts of a prosperous home life, but it could have an Irish origin: After the Riley clan consolidated its hold on County Cavan, they minted their own money, accepted as legal tender even in England.

So now you know why we’ve named him Riley. He doesn’t answer terribly well to Shadow yet, anyway. He’s pulled out every toy Maxx ever owned - they’re spread all over the family room and kitchen, it looks like daycare in here - and he’s already been on three walks today. He’s also met several neighborhood children and a couple of the adults, too. I think he’s going to be a star like Maxx was.

He’ll be going to work with me whenever I know I’m going to be in the office all day. We don’t like the idea of leaving a puppy (a really BIG puppy) locked in a crate or running free in the house for nine hours a day. James’ chihuahuas are going to have a bit of an adjustment, but Riley’s friendly to other dogs, so I have faith it’s going to work out well.

During this process, we discovered something we’d never heard of before: Black Dog Syndrome. We’d never heard that black dogs are hard to adopt or sell, but then I’m partial to dark dogs. I’ve never had interest in a white dog.

We are guessing that the general public is not aware of how doomed black dogs are when they are brought to a pound because black dogs, particularly black labs or lab mixes, are euthanized at a horrifying rate at many pounds & shelters because people pass them up for lighter colored dogs. If you are thinking about adopting a dog please don’t overlook black dogs because they are just as loving & wonderful as lighter colored dogs! ~Martin County Animal Shelter, Fairmont,MN

This ‘black dog syndrome’ may be one of the reasons Katherine was so happy we’d take Riley. She told us that if she had 10 light-colored dogs and one black dog available for adoption, all 10 light dogs would likely be gone before that black dog. It just sounds really odd to us. I mean come on! The light dogs show the dirt faster!

Anyway, that’s it. Life moves on. Now that summer is drawing to a close - and a gloriously beautiful summer it’s been here, compared to the rest of the country - I’ll probably be writing more. Now if I could just get LazyJoe to do the same.