Where's Your Ball, Blue?

My husband, Jim went on a fishing trip with his friend, Lee. Then, In the truck, Lee's cell phone rang and he talked to his daughter, Jessica.

"No, we do not need another dog. Yes, I am sure he is a nice dog, but we don't need him. Honey. Honey. No. Honey. Here. I'll hand the phone to Jim. I think he needs a dog." Well, needless to say, she talked Jim into taking this dog.

Jessica worked at the Humane Society in northern Minnesota and this dog had been taken into custody. It was owned by a police officer, but apparently, the dog was known to be '˜rambunctious'. '˜They are going to put him to sleep!" she wailed. "He's such a nice dog!" she sobbed into the phone.

It was actually sort of funny when Jim came home from his trip, because he called me shortly after she talked him into getting the dog and said, "Um, hon-neeeey. Um. We have a new dog coming. Jessica talked me into getting a dog. She'll be bringing it over on Sunday, when we get home from fishing. Hope you are not mad, but we need to take this dog."

How could I be mad?

So, of course, when I first met this dog, I came home, and this '˜strange' dog met me at my car door. I looked at the dog, who was sniffing at me, and I said to it, "You must be my new dog, Blue. Huh?"

Good enough for him. He licked my hand and I scratched his ear. Then, he went to chase across our yard with our German Shorthair Pointer, Bertha.

It was funny to watch, since Bertha had been used to playing with Gator, an English Chesapeake. He passed away a few months ago. He was a good sport. Bertha would tease. He'd growl and give a start to chasing her. Then, he'd stop to catch his breath.

Not so with Blue. Blue could keep up with her. She moved. He moved. It was like she had developed this huge, brown shadow. He mimicked her every move. It was this muscular ballet in motion.

He was a big dog. He is a big, brown dog, not blue as the name suggested, but a deep, dark chocolate brown.

The humane society labeled him as 'rambunctious'. He was wearing some sort of harness that prevented him from jumping up.

I personally do not know why he needed it. I never saw him jump up on anyone and he never jumped up on me.

His only fault was that he was allergic to regular dog food. We found this out when we would bring Berta and Blue into the house at night to sleep in the basement at night, he would leave a large pile of dog poop on the floor downstairs.

I was aggravated! Every morning, I routinely took a shovel downstairs and removed the offending pile of crap and moved it outside.

I even posted it on my Face book page that I "have a new dog named Poo -- I mean, Blue. Who the heck talked me into getting this dog????"

My husband insisted that the dog did not mean to do it. That he seemed to be trained.

So we got different dog food that was free of soy, wheat and corn.

Bliss. The pooping stopped. The dog was now able to get outside to do his duty.

The other day, someone suggested that I find my bowling ball and let him play with it. I rolled it across our lawn. I said, '˜Get your ball, Blue" and the dog started pushing it with his nose and yelping. He worked that ball around the yard for a while. I can imagine that got tiresome after a while, but the dog was definitely a trooper. Pushing it and yelping.

We live in the country and our property is surrounded by an expanse of tall cornstalks. The dog managed to knock that ball somewhere into the farmer's eighty acres of corn.

"I better find that ball", I told my husband and I walked to the edge of it. Blue came over to check out what I was doing. He told Blue to find the ball.

"You'll never find it without the dog helping you, I imagine." He informed me.

"Find your ball, Blue. Where is it?"

He disappeared into the cornfield. After a few minutes, I could hear him making this yelping noise.

I walked towards the noise.

Sure enough! There laid the bowling ball. Way out in the cornfield, resting in a row.

Trust me. I would not have been able to just find that ball. I counted the number of rows into the field I was as I walked back to my house. Twenty-nine rows out into the field he located that ball.

Twenty-nine rows!

I would have never found it on my own. I really do not think the farmer would have appreciated the appearance of a fourteen-pound bowling ball in his combine later that fall either. I am definitely glad that he found it for me!