Dog Day Afternoon

Yesterday afternoon my sister and I set out for Brooklyn to interview with a dog, as mentioned below. I have to tell you all about the place that we went to do this. It was a lot more interesting than we could have imagined.

All we knew was that we were going to see a beautiful cream color 2 and a half year old Shar Pei that we’d found on Petfinder at a privately run shelter in Brooklyn. On Saturday afternoon the Windsor Terrace neighborhood where Sean Casey Animal Rescue is located was pretty quiet. Except in the immediate vicinity of the shelter.  Two regulation size storefronts seem to comprise both the shelter and Hamilton Dog House, which sells pet supplies. The pet supply store part also serves as housing for a few cats, birds and reptiles, including at least 3 free range Sulcata tortoises, the smallest of which has a shell at least a foot square. They wandered around the place at will and everyone was careful to step around them. And by everyone I mean a lot of people. The activity spilled out onto the street.  People and pets occupied the bench out front, were conversing on the sidewalk and an alleyway next to the building was being used for a training session. There was an impressive amount of staff, including volunteers and there were people buying supplies, adopting animals and I think there were some just stopping by. In the center of this controlled chaos was Sean Casey himself. At the time we had no idea that he and his shelter were kind of famous. Turns out they’ve sent three dogs to the Animal Planet show, Underdog to Wonderdog. I’d even seen one of the episodes, but I didn’t remember anything about it until after we got home and I saw the links on the shelter’s website.  We had no idea at the time we were having a brush with celebrity.

We did meet Violet, the dog we went to see and she was just as beautiful as her photo and I fell in love immediately, but she’s not the one we went home with. We were also introduced to Lola, a six year old Shar Pei. Given the totality of our situation, including Stevie’s condition, the quieter, older dog seemed the better choice.  It was my sister who came to that conclusion first, but I could see she was right. It was hard to leave either of them behind and if anyone, anywhere near Brooklyn is looking for a gorgeous blonde Shar Pei, Violet will make a wonderful addition to someone or some family’s life.

Sean Casey works fast, but thoroughly. Once we’d decided what we wanted to do we were given an application to fill out. Three personal and at least one veterinary references had to be given. And they called every one of them.

Lola bonded with us on the way home by showering us with kisses, putting the car in neutral twice while it was moving and somehow or other undoing my sister’s seatbelt. We didn’t get home until about eight last night. Lola met Mr.Yenta. He was sound asleep when we got in, but Lola didn’t feel that was any impediment to getting acquainted. Once he was fully awake he pronounced her the perfect dog for us. When it comes to the cats she seems to be willing to play with them, but since they don’t seem so inclined that’s OK too. We’re still learning about her. She’s well behaved but seems to know absolutely no commands. She does respond to “No!”, thank God, but sit, stay, lie down – nothing. She just looks at you like, “I’d like to help you out but I have no idea what you’re trying to say. So far, everything’s going well, for us, for Lola and the cats.

We had a hardly used dog bed. She likes it.

You can’t really see it well here, but she has a pink camouflage collar. We thought it was feminine and yet little edgy. There’s a matching leash, of course.