My dog Monty

After my recent post picturing Monty, I had a lot of questions about him. I thought I would tell you a little about my favourite mutt.

Come closer, let me drool on you.

Montel was born in the middle of my sister's bed on a Saturday morning in May, 2005. His mom, Madison, was my dog and had gotten herself in the family way. (That was on my bed. Damn dogs.) I was out preparing for my garage sale when my sisters flew out of the house with the news that Madison was finally in labour.

Montel (and all his siblings) came out looking like a little black jelly bean despite his mother being an entirely white Cocker-Poodle cross and his father being a white and brown Shih Tzu.  He was followed by 5 other brothers and sisters throughout the morning as I ran back and forth between the garage sale and the house.

In my excitement and panic, I decided to sell the dining room table so Madison could have a birthing spot on lino instead of the bed.  I accidentally put the foot of the table through my front door window. It was an exciting day.

Montel as a puppy - about 2 months old.

We named all the puppies after talk show hosts.  Why? I have no idea. But we had Montel, Phil, Maury, Vicki, Dini, and Sally Jessie.  It was a gong show.  Madison had had 6 litters by this time, so had no interest in parenting, feeding, caring for them, or anything at all that involved puppies.  We all took turns feeding the puppies by bottle and trying to convince Madison she really wanted to do it instead.  She did not and showed this by flinging Monty against the wall.

I did not plan to keep any of the dogs. In fact, when we found out Maddy was pregnant we decided one of them would be for my Dad to keep him company.  He picked out Vicki because she chewed on his nose.  He decided she needed a brother, so Monty came with her.

Dad did his best to spoil the pups rotten.  Then, he met his wonderful wife and moved to Ukraine. He left Monty and Vicki with me. For a woman who had not planned to keep any dogs, I suddenly had 3. This led to me walking them through my neighbourhood and being approached by a little girl saying "Mister Lady, you have LOTS of dogs."

We think the probable brain damage just made him cuter.

Enter The Guy. When we started getting serious, he suggested that perhaps starting our lives with the dog equivalent of the crazy single cat lady wasn't the best idea. He said he would prefer if we had one dog. And he wanted Monty.

His sister came over to visit one night and took Madison home for a sleep over.  Madison never came back. Both Maddy and (my now) SiL fell in love and have had the most hilarious time ever since.  Then my little crazy Grandma needed a dog to take care of her and Vicki was it.  She went to keep Grandma in line.  Both were very happy.

That left Monty. I wasn't sure what I thought about him at first.  He wasn't my first choice, but I grew to love him like I haven't any dog before him.  He is easy going, a bit of a princess, and loves me more than any other creature on Earth.  It's hard not to reciprocate that kind of devotion.

Monty's favourite thing - ball. But don't touch it.
He doesn't want you to play. He just wants to show it to you.

I tease that Monty isn't smart enough to be bad.  He is what my Auntie Coral calls "good and kind".  Good for nothing and kind of stupid.  But I like him that way.