A Harley Instead of a Road Trip

Well, I was pretty well set on the road trip idea, and then I logged into Freecyle – I’d offered up some household stuff and thought I’d see if anyone had responded. There it was; “Free puppy to good home, German shepherd /huskie mix.” Damn.

I think you all know how much I’ve missed Sebastian, and although Goldie the Cat is fabulous, she is very much a cat…and I miss having a big, fuzzy beast around the house. I thought about it, and figured getting a new dog his shots/neutering would cost me about as much as I had budgeted for the road trip – and give me 12 years or so of joy. So I responded…and waited. I checked my email obsessively for three days.

If you’ve ever used Freecyle you know its never a sure thing, the people giving stuff away can choose whomever they want of the respondents. So I waited, and waited, and waited some more – and finally on Thursday afternoon I heard back. I was the chosen one!!!

I drove out to Richland this morning and met Harley’s owners, who had gotten him three months ago and then, after all of their cars broke down in one way or another, found that they couldn’t afford vet care, or much of anything else for him. Not that I’m rolling in the dough myself – but with a healthy tax refund in my account I can afford to get his health care for the year set up, and keep him fed.

Harley handled the drive home pretty well, and Goldie didn’t kill him when we came in the door, although she hissed when he tried to galumph in her direction. Thankfully he was raised in a house with two cats and knows enough to keep his face away from the claws.

So far I’ve taken him for a long walk around the neighborhood (my neighbor’s dog barked at him from a second story window and scared the hell out of him!) and played with him in the backyard for about an hour. At a little under five months old he’s still in that adorable gangly stage where he’s just as likely to take off after a falling leaf as after the ball you just threw for him. He’s sniffed his way around the first floor of the house about eight million times and now he’s finally sacked out on one of the couches in the sitting room, and unlike Sebastian, he doesn’t snore. I think this is going to work.