Happy Birthday Buster my Boy !!!

So, today is Buster’s birthday.  He’s a Cocker Spaniel.  We had a Cocker before but we lost her in May 2010.  She became diabetic in September 2009 but that wasn’t really a problem.  We handled it.  We took care of her but she then just kind of went downhill slowly.  It was so sad and painful losing her but we knew it was the only choice we could make.  She was 11 ½  so we think she done well to last as long with an illness.  After we lost her we said never again.  No more dogs.  It was so sad to lose her we couldn’t go through that again. 

Within 2 weeks we were talking of getting another dog.  The place was so quiet without her.  HE was wandering around with nothing to do as he used to take her for at least 2 good walks during the day.  We felt so guilty even thinking about getting another dog.  Just looking at pictures of other dogs made me feel guilty.  We didn’t want to replace her.  We just wanted another dog.  So we decided. 

I phoned my friend.  She is the breeder where we got our first dog from.  I believe our first dog was from her very first litter.  We put our order in with her.  We said we wanted a boy this time.  We wanted the colour to be chocolate roan if possible or just chocolate.  Our last dog was a blue roan.  So that was it.  We waited patiently.  We did go to her house for an afternoon just to see her dogs and to make sure we really did want another.  It might have been too painful for us but we knew that we’d find that out when we got there.  It was a definite decision.  We WOULD get another.  There were probably 3 litters all on their way.  Each time the puppies were born we waited.  No chocolate roan.  No chocolate.  We’d even picked out the name of Buster before he’d even arrived.  We had a girls name of ‘Dizzy’ just in case we did have another female but we thought it was very doubtful.  We waited for the next litter.  None of the right colour again. 

Then ...  1 year ago today.  I’m asleep.  It’s about 6am and I get a text message on my mobile phone.  It was my friend saying the dog was maybe about to have puppies because she was walking round in circles.  Within an hour or so I got another text message to say a puppy had been born.  It was the golden colour and a girl.  Hmm.  No good.  Then about 20 minutes later I get another text message with a picture of the next chocolate puppy out with the word ‘Buster’ underneath.  That was it.  He was here.  There was another chocolate boy and a black boy born after him.

When my nan died in 2008 she left me £2,000 (long story).  We had already decided to use some of this money to buy Buster.  She’d have liked that idea.  We went to see Buster twice before we were able to pick him up to bring him home.  Obviously the first time we went was to pick him out and make sure he was the one we wanted.  I think he was about 2 weeks old when we first saw him.  This picture is of him in my hands.

He was definitely the one we wanted.  His sister and brothers were cute, but he was the one.  The most 'manly looking' of the lot of them.  You might know which one he is in the next picture.  Yep - the one on the far right.  Already looking for trouble !  The day we brought him home would have been my nan’s birthday.  That seemed very appropriate as it was her money that paid for him.

Being a boy, we were told that house-training Buster might take a little longer.  The vets were saying 5-6 months was about average for a boy.  Great.  To be honest he done well with that.  He was pretty much house-trained after just 3 months.  Admittedly he did then have one very bad week and decided the hallway carpet was the best place for a wee, but after that week he was back to being trained again.  We say he is lucky to still be here because at the age of about 4 months he just ran around constantly chasing my feet.  I couldn’t walk anywhere without this puppy being attached to at least three of my toes.  It really got me down.  We think we might have fixed the problem by shaking a tin of coins at him.  At one point I think HE was all for walking him back to my friends (a 30 minute car journey).  It might have taken him a while to walk there !  Buster also used to have a mad half hour at about 7pm each night.  We would bring him into the lounge and he would just run round the sofa, constantly.  We couldn’t catch him, we just had to let him run.  We still have a little problem with him growling at night when we put him to bed, but apart from that he’s a good boy.  We went out today and bought him a birthday present.  We think it’s either a lion or a leopard.  Who knows.  It just has very long dangly legs and he’s already chewed the ear off it.  Happy Birthday Buster !