R.I.P. Precious Puppy Thompson 1998-2011

Rescued by us in that most eventful summer of 2000, this big ol', sad-eyed, wrinkle-faced doofus of a dog really was precious to us in so many ways.

The original goal was not to give the poor abused dog a name but instead to leave that to the folks who would give him a good home eventually. Thus we simply loved on him and told him he was precious. In time we realized we WERE the good home he would have and he simply WAS Precious.

He always met us at the door barking "Oh, you're home, you're home! Huzzah!" One time however, a year or two after we got him, we came in from somewhere and there was no jumping at the door. No barking. I turned the key and we stepped inside to see Precious lying on the couch. He had pulled one of the back pillows from the couch down and was sprawled on top of it rather non-chalantly. The look on his face that one time was more, "Oh. Hehe,...Hi. You're early." Underneath the pillow he was on we could see his twenty pound bag of dog food. Then we saw the rather incriminating trail of same that led directly back to the corner in the kitchen where it had been stored. Apparently, he had chewed through the bottom of the bag in there, decided that was too much trouble and so dragged the whole leaking bag into the living room for munchies. It was way too funny to scold him! If only we'd had a cell phone then.

It was determined that he was part Basenji (he would bound through the back yard in deer leaps!), part Shar-pei and part German Shepherd. The Vet also estimated he was about two when we got him. WE would find out that his original. abusive owners, had called him Tigger because of his bounding leaps. We nursed him back to health and he stayed healthy until cancer and then other problems hit him just in the past couple of years.

The picture below was taken this afternoon in the car. Precious never had enough car rides in his life. Sometimes he dreaded them. He whined and moaned and shed al over the car seat. Other times, he loved them, dutifully climbing up into the vehicle with a "C'mon, let's go!" attitude! Sadly he didn't feel up to really enjoying this one last car ride.