Happy Birthday Casey

Casey Jones Fitzgerald Neiweem Slop Jar Anthony.

Upon this Labor Day weekend, Casey turns a big 5 years old. Lately, he's been a bit depressed - seemingly from the move, but the more I think about it I think he's going through a mid-life crisis. I know I am.

Casey can be annoying. So can I. Casey is needy. So am I. Casey hates scotch. Okay, here's where the similarity stops.

On December 6, 2002 I drove to Richland Center, WI after seeing this dog described at a beagle on Petfinders.com. His name was Benny. What a stupid name for a dog. It sounds like a mafia-dog name. When I met Benny he didn't leave me alone. He jumped on me, begged me for petting. He was like a cheap date.

I paid my hundred bucks and we got into the car. On the way home, he kept biting me - puppy biting, but man he had sharp teeth. I kept using the "Donna from training school" technique of tapping him on the nose and saying "no bite." This dog obviously didn't speak English. He still doesn't speak English.

We stopped at Arbys in Dubuque on the way home. That dog wolfed down his sandwich half in no time! He can still eat anyone under the table. He'll eat anything that is under the table. He eats socks and underwear. That's an expensive story for another day.

When I brought Casey home (he & I picked that name on the way home from Richland Center) I took him to meet Caleb. Caleb acted weird around him - almost like he disliked Casey. I never could understand that. Months later, Caleb told me that Casey looked like Alan Colmes on Fox News. I felt bad for the right side of Caleb (I felt bad for Casey)!

For the first four months that we had Casey the vet kept telling us that he was 4 months old. I'd take him in for a check up, the vet would say - "Oh, he's about 4 months old based on his teeth." Finally, sometime around May I said, "I've been coming in here since December and you keep telling me that this dog is 4 months old! What gives?" The vet said he still had his baby teeth, so he must have been extremely young when I got him.

This scared me a bit because Casey had already surpassed the size of a beagle and was well on his way to shetland pony at this point - and we were definitely in "small dog mode." Okay, I admit his paws were big. But I just figured he was going to be one of those dogs that just had pancake paws. Not unusual, huh?

Casey finally lost his baby teeth in oh, about a year. Not really. But even though he lost his baby teeth he was still a biter. And obstinate! He would not listen. He heard - he just wouldn't listen. Worse than getting a kid away from Nintendo. This called for puppy training classes.

Puppy training was tough. Casey improved greatly but he had a long way to go. We didn't attend Training II, but I continued to work with him. Long story short, he can do everything he learned in class, but won't.

So now, Casey is 5. He's an adult. He weighs 93 pounds. He's a bit more mellow - doesn't bite anymore. He still craves attention like a moth craves light. But he's our Bud and even though he drives us crazy we love him.