Itzl

We rescued a small puppy last week.

A very small puppy. He’s 6 inches tall and according to the postal scales, weighs 14 ounces.

The breeder set up a truck in a parking lot to sell his culls – the puppies he couldn’t sell as show dogs or as breeding stock. Some were too genetically inbred (those poor pugs with noses so squashed in they were gasping for each breath), some were accidental crossbreeds, and some, because they were judged “unfriendly” or not “pretty” enough.

This puppy looked exactly like the dog I’ve been telling my children for decades would be my “old lady” dog – down to the sword shaped white mark on his chest and the white goatee. The rest of him is black, with tan paws, eyebrows, and cheek flares.

He acted very enthusiastic to see me, and settled quickly when I held him. The breeder, however, called him a difficult puppy who was unfriendly and anti-social, whining and howling if anyone held him.

We left him at the truck after we saw him, and drove off to do errands. We didn’t leave him because we thought he was unfriendly, we left because the price was beyond our financial means.

That evening, the truck was still there, and we stopped, just to see if the puppy was still there.

He was.

The breeder said any puppies left by 5:00 p.m. would be euthanized as unsellable.

It was 4:30.

He was surprised that the puppy seemd calm around me, and allowed me to hold him without biting or whining. Eventually, he halved his asking price, placing the puppy barely in our financial reach, so we bought him.

And discovered the breeder lied about his age. The puppy wasn’t 8 weeks old. He was 4, maybe 5 weeks old.

He was weaned, but he’d been weaned to a paste he could lick up, not to solid food, even moist solid food.

I spent all last week teaching him how to eat moist food (cooked buffalo and chicken, Wysong’s Archetypal Diet).

He decided he was my dog, even before I met him, and ever since, as long as he can see me, he’s thrilled to meet new people and play with them. Which is a good thing, as I get close to a hundred visitors a day at my desk.

Yes, he gets to go to work with me every day. He has a bed, food bowls, and toys at work, on my desktop because he’s really too little to go anywhere else. His bed isn’t much larger than my pencil cup.

I’ll bring the camera to work tomorrow and take a picture of him sleeping on my desk.

We named him Itzcuintl (Itzl for short). That’s Aztec for Obsidian Dog, so calling him Itzl is an Aztec way of calling him “Blackie”.

I’ve had him a week now, and he’s learned a few important words: his name, of course, but also “bed” which means he needs to sleep now, “ouch” which means he’s biting too hard, “pad” which means where he potties, and he’s learning “I’ll be right back”. That last is very important as he has a severe case of separation anxiety, and I need to nip that in the bud. There will be times and places where I can’t take him, and he’ll have to stay either at home or in a carrier until I return.

But for now, I can take him to work, and I can take him into most stores.