Puba in her bed 
  Originally uploaded by ceonyc.

My dad just called.  We had to put our family dog, Puba, to sleep.  I'm going to go for a walk or something soon, but for now, I'll post.  I just put up a Flickr badge on the right with Puba photos as a little blog memorial.  Feel free to trackback or comment with your little pet stories or whatever if you'd like.

We had Puba for 14 1/2 years.  She was a bichon-frise (white fluffy ball of fluff) and she was the best dog ever... hands down.  I've never met another living thing that loved to be loved as much as this dog did.  She'd lay on her back and let you rub her tummy for an hour.

Originally, I wanted a rabbit.  Brian's dad raised rabbits and it seemed like rabbits would make cool pets.  Of course, I really wanted a dog, so by asking for something ridiculous like a rabbit, I got a dog.  We got Puba from a private owner in Staten Island named Bob Amato.  Maybe he'll Google himself or Google Puba and we'll find out, because we probably don't have their contact info and I'm sure they'd want to know.  Puba was about six weeks old when we got her, and she was the runt of the litter.  Her mother had abandoned her and the Amato's had to bottle feed the dog and she almost didn't make it on her own.  A few weeks after we got her, they called us up and offered us a new dog plus $1000, because they missed her.  My dad was ready to take the deal...   funny how yesterday, he was thinking about how different and sad his mornings will be now, because he spends so much time with the dog in the morning when my mom's at work.  Of course, it wasn't long after that he good hooked on her, too.  I think letting the dog lick his face was pretty much the turning point... plus the few grand he needed to put down to get the dog cataract surgery.

She had cataracts before she even turned six months old. In fact, she was kind of a lemon.  She had a small trachea, too...  they all do, so she'd choke sometimes.  She also had two ACL surgeries (you'd think she would be doing more than sleeping and eating to sustain such injuries), a skin allergy, and an overbite.  Three months ago, she fell down our basement steps.  She also fell down the front steps, too, when she was younger.  And stepped on?  Oh, I'm sure we've stepped on her a hundred times.  She didn't know any commands.  My mom swears she knew "stay" but I think it was just pure laziness.  Sometimes, she'd sit for a cookie... but only for a cookie.  She'd also require a cookie to do her business in the backyard.  I wish someone gave me a cookie every time I had to do my business.

She loved my grandmother, too... she'd wet herself as soon as she came in.  (The dog, not Nana, although Nana got pretty excited, too.)  Yeah... the bladder didn't work too well either.  One time, my parents were away and I was dog-sitting.  She wouldn't climb stairs... only fall down them, so she sat at the foot of the stairs and whined for me to come down.  I dragged my blanket down and went to bed on the couch with her so she wouldn't be lonely.  It wasn't too long before I felt warm and wet...   I suppose my blanket didn't have her scent, so she need to make it her own.  Some thanks.

I never fed her from the table, though, but I'd always give her unsolicited food at random times, so she wouldn't learn to beg rudely.  She liked grapes and she'd like a plate of leftover omelet for an hour.

My parents are pretty crushed... obviously they spend more time with her after I went to school and moved out.  In fact, I'm pretty sure they love the dog more than the love me, but then again, the dog probably has a better disposition than I do anyway.

So that's it.  Puba died...   I guess there isn't much more to say.

Oh wait... actually, there's one more thing.  When she was younger, she'd run around the house like a wild woman if you riled her up.  She'd run in circles and behind our couch (the day she got too big to do that she got stuck back there) and then through the fabric skirt and under our couch in the porch.  Then, we got a new couch that went all the way to the floor and that was a surprise to her as well, but a lesson learned quite quickly.  Its going to be really quiet in my parents house now.