Now that we were out in the country, we decided to get a big dog. Buster was half husky – half collie. He was a good dog. The kid's loved him. One day he showed up limping real bad, and we could tell he had a broken leg. We figured a car must have hit him. Well, the kids were crazy about Buster, so we took him to the vet. He put a pin in his leg, and he told us we had to keep him confined tightly for several weeks. We had a pen, but Buster had other ideas. He would just chew his way right through the gate. Time after time. Well, finally, we figured the bone should be healed, so we let him out. A day or two later, Corey started backing up his car, (before reverse went out) and Buster was underneath. When he heard Buster scream, he stopped the car, but Buster was under a wheel. I was not there, and it took all three of them to push the car off him. We took him back to the vet, and he put a pin back in his leg. A couple of weeks later, we let him out of the pen. A couple of days after that, he was not feeling good. Wouldn't eat. He walked up the sidewalk toward Barbara and Kinley. He looked up at Barbara and Kinley, the light left his eyes, and he fell over dead. We figured he had just had more trauma than he could stand.
Midnight was building a bad reputation. He was a high powered lover. Some of the neighbors had purebred females, and they didn't want a mongrel like Midnight around when the females were in heat. They penned them up. But that didn't stop Midnight. The next morning, he would sometimes be in the pen with the female. Another neighbor had a female in heat, and I tied midnight up. He chewed the rope in two and still got to the female. After that happened a few times, Midnight just disappeared one day. We never knew who. But we had a pretty good idea who. Actually, I now know for sure. And just let me take this opportunity to call you a sorry, egg-sucking, #!**@&^ch!
Another small dog just showed up one day, half starved. We took him in. Since he was brand new, Barbara named him Booker Brand New. We got that from a classmate of Corey's, Booker. Booker showed up at school one day with brand new tennis shoes, and all his friends teased him about being "Booker Brand New." That phrase just stuck in our family. Anyway, Booker Brand New had obviously been living on his own in the woods for a long time, and he had a ton of strange hang ups. Booker Brand New stuck with us, though. Must have had to do with being able to eat regular for a change. We soon learned he could not be fastened up in the house. One very cold night, we “did him a favor” by letting him hang out in the laundry room. The entire vinyl floor was torn up the next morning. His hangups just caused him to go crazy, We never again intentionally allowed him in the house. "Having more hangups than Booker Brand New” became another catch phrase.
Barbara wanted city water and cable TV, so I spent ten months at hard labor building her a house in town. We sold our house in the country.
We were in the process of moving out. While loading up our stuff on our pickup, Booker Brand New must have sneaked in, unseen, and hid in the house. We locked up and hauled that load. When we got back, Booker Brand New had torn the vinyl floor up down to the concrete around to the front door. We found one small piece of left-over matching vinyl, just large enough. Our friend who had put the floor down in the first place matched it up and did a great job of repairing it.
Corey and Christi had now married, and they needed a house, and the people who bought ours sold their house to Corey and Christi, and one day we all just counted "One – two – three – GO!!" and we all moved. The people who bought our house agreed to keep Booker Brand New, as he was in no way, shape, or fashion a dog that could be penned up. Or live in town. That was good. We didn't have a fenced yard, anyway. After we all got moved and settled a little, our buyers called us one day. Booker Brand New was just not compatible with their dog, with all his hangups. We had to find a new home for him. Well, Kinley's friend agreed to take him. He lived in the country, and it seemed everyone was going to live happily ever after. Kinley and I took Booker Brand New out to his new home, introduced him to his new owner, and said goodbye. I told the new owner, "Might be a good idea to hold onto him until we get gone. He may try to follow us." After we had gotten a long way down the road, we could see a dot in the distance, chasing after us. I told Kinley, "Well, lets just outrun him, and he'll go back to his new home." When we got back to town, we called the new owner. "He never came back," he said. So we went out and looked. And we looked. Around the new home, around his old home. But he was never to be found. Booker Brand New was never to be seen, or heard of, again. I still have nightmares about that little tiny dot, in the distance, chasing after us as hard as he could. We did Booker Brand New bad. Really bad
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