Meet Sam, Payton's new brother. He's about 10, hard of hearing [or possibly has selective hearing, I haven't completely worked that out], has cataracts that make seeing hard for him, but still has a lot of energy and playfulness for being such an old man. So far there's no hint of food aggression or much prey drive, but he hasn't met the chickens yet either, so we'll see how that goes tomorrow. He's also going to get a bath tomorrow and meet my 11 year old niece as the first test of how he does with children. So far he seems to love the idea of being a raw fed dog, and ate very politely on the towel I put down, though he wouldn't go into a kennel to eat. It's not a big deal, I was just seeing if he'd do it, since feeding in a kennel makes for easy clean up. We might try kennel games in the future, just because it's a good idea for him to like kennels, but we'll take it slow if we do. I'm also looking around for a collar that just vibrates to teach him to come when it does, that way if he's distracted and not paying attention to me I can still do something to get the attention of a partially blind/deaf dog.
I know he is not a papillon show puppy. I know that is what I have been wanting, but I also have decided that I am not quite to the point where I can make the right choice in getting the right pap, and have had the most horrible puppy envy. No, Sam is not a puppy, but I do think that working with him will destroy the puppy envy and keep me from making a poor choice when I do spend the kind of money I'm expecting to pass over when I do get the pap. Especially since the breeder in town has a litter that's almost ready to go, but I've decided I really don't want one of her dogs. I also wanted to take in an older dog no one else would want since I got my house, but held off because before my roommate moved out we had 5 dogs in the house. Now, with the addition of Sam, we have 4, 2 for me and 2 for my roommate. But mostly, I occasionally have poor impulse control and today it turned into the adorable old face I saw on the shelter's facebook feed when I woke up this afternoon.