I haven't spoken much in a while about our dogs....but I feel like today I really must.

I want to tell you the story of how we met....the dogs I mean.


See I had wanted a boxer for years...ever since I had met Rich and Elise Cognetti's dog Brutus when I was like 16 years old.  My parents, just like the infamous pony bribe of '84, promised me that when I owned my own home they would buy me a boxer.  Deal.

So in 1998, right after we purchased our small home down here on the Berkshire, we decided it was time.  We read up on Boxers and decided they were in fact the breed we both wanted.  I had already picked out their names...Rocky and Adrian (Balboa of course...they're boxers!)  We decided on two...his and hers.  We wanted a fawn and a brindle fawn.  Typical Michelle and Brett though, there was no shopping around...we found two different litters in the Want Ad Digest and set out to get our little dogs.  My mom came along so that she could buy mine for me...like promised.  (the Cramers are good for their word)

We arrived at a small trailer in Fulton with a run full of kennels out back.  This woman was a breeder...? it was questionable.  There were a lot of dogs though, and judging by Rocky's grandmother and how her boobs touched the ground when she walked, this woman was breeding to make money, and make money only.  Rocky however, was not actually what I wanted.  I hoped for a light fawn brindle.  He was dark with fawn stripes.  She had only two boys...both dark.  One had a full white collar which I knew I didn't want, so I picked Rocky who had just a patch of white on the back of his neck.  That I liked.  He had a full white belly and legs like I wanted and he was very, very cute, so we would not be leaving him behind.  His sire was in a building across the street and we never got to see him.  We paid the lady in the trailer and set out for Mexico!  Heading for the border!  No silly...Mexico, NY.  I held Rocky tight in my arms in the front seat and whispered his name 37 million times in his ear, so that he would know it.

Next we arrived at the KOA campgrounds in Mexico.  This is where we met our little Adrian.  She and her only brother came bounding down the stairs of the camp ground's store and then ran around the aisles in delight.  Both her parents were there as well so we got a good look at them.  Adrian looks like her mom, but Jr. (her son and our third dog) looks like his maternal grandfather....just like Scooby Doo...if Scooby Doo was a Boxer and not a Great Dane.  As we chatted with the nice family and laughed at how wrinkly her chubby brother was, Brett excused himself to the latrine outside the store.  As he found his way to the outhouse, a cute little fawn puppy was hot on his heals.  Adrian already knew he was the one for her.  We went there for her, but she, it turns out, picked him and from that moment on she has never left Brett's side.

We introduced our new girl to the scared little boy that waited in the crate in the back of the Jimmy.  We then put them both in the back seat with Mom on a pillow and we headed home. 

They spent that first night in the small crate together.  The next day Brett and I would go out and get everything they would need.  They have been together ever since.  Common law marriage rules apply I'm sure.  In February of 2000 they had their first three children.  That following Fall, September 27th to be exact, Adrian once again gave birth.  This time to 7 adorable pups.  All healthy but one.  One that looked exactly like the perfect merge of his parents.  Adrian's fawn color.  Rocky's white makings on his belly, legs and back of neck.  His belly button pulled off right away and bled for some time causing me some concern, but healed over nicely.  The perfect blend of mommy and daddy....Brett would call him Jr. and beg me to keep him.  I would defiantly say no. 

Jr. it turned out had a congenital liver disease.  He had a liver shunt that earned him three invasive surgeries at Cornell University before he was 5 months old.  The type of surgeries that Cornell would later ask us to use in a book that the doctor was publishing.  The type of procedures that cost us (and my parents) a boatload of cash....I won't give you numbers because I don't want you to fall out of your seat....this story is going somewhere and you need to reach the end.  Jr. however has survived long past what the doctors predicted and is now 8 years old and thriving...bigger then both his parents in fact.


We have a happy family of dogs.  We have a happy home.


This morning the Waterville vet's office called about Adrian's blood panel they drew yesterday. 



She is in Kidney Failure.