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| Name: |
Boomer
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Age: |
Seven years old
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| Gender: |
Male |
Breed: |
Basset hound, Golden Retriever
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| Home: |
New Hampshire, USA |
Boomer
is a fantastic companion! He's funny, great with helping dog sit other
dogs, cat friendly and is super patient with kids. (Or in general, since
clearly he allows his human to dress him up all pretty for no other
motivation than a good belly rub and nose kisses.)
He has short stumpy legs like a Basset with all the retriever friendliness!
They should make this a breed of it's own!
One picture is Boomer at four years old next to a nine-month-old Great Dane
puppy. He helps me pet-sit people's dogs on occasion. He is quite the fast
guy considering that his legs are half the length of a regular retrievers!
Another picture is him with his litter-mate Daisy, and there is one of him at
a nearby lake. He lets me practice my photography on him, and the last
picture is of him with my God-Daughter Kaylee. She was nearly two in the
picture. She's his baby! After a long day of playing in the pool (with Boomer
watching her closely) she needed a little rest, but wouldn't lay down and
settle down. Boomer laid down next to her, ended up putting his face near her
hair, she rolled over, snuggled him and fell sound asleep. He's a great babysitter.
Daisy was the runt of the litter, and Boomer was the second. Daisy was
actually still there at the breeder's house when we picked up Boomer. It was
two boys and a girl left, but she had a heart problems and needed some extra
time. Boomer was a little special with teeth jutting out in weirdish angles;
the vet said that it would not hinder him at all, but it made him a discount
puppy! (How sad!) I knew I wanted a boy because I find that boy dogs are much
sweeter. The other boy was bigger. He was more wiley (And not just nippy, he
bit hard.). She handed me Boomer and my heart melted and I knew he couldn't
go home to anyone else. We put them down to play and he was hopping sideways,
tripped over his ears and I knew that that goofy dog fit the name Boomer.
They also turned on the tv and he and Daisy instantly sat down and watched
the television screen. (TOO CUTE.)
When I brought Boomer home my neighbors loved him so much they instantly went
to the Breeder's and picked up his sister Daisy! (She's happy, healthy and in
a house with four little kids and a new puppy! She still comes for playdates
and they get along like two peas in a pod, but she howls and Boomer doesn't.)
The picture is interesting because she wasn't supposed to be in my backyard!
They moved across town (across a highway and Main street!) and one day I saw
both dogs in my backyard, chased her down to see her tags (just to make sure,
I hadn't seen her in two years). Her owners used to drop her in our yard when
the mom goes into labor (they have several children), as the grandmother is
allergic to dogs so can't take her while the family spends a few days in the
hospital, so she comes to hang out with us. So I had thought that was what
happened here. I called her tag just to wish her owner good luck and it
turned out she had been missing since five am. She had dug under the fence
and ran away. The kids were heart-broken, they had been convinced she got hit
by a car. But she ran more than five miles to her old home, and to my fence
(when they ran away previously they only went to each other's houses) and my
other neighbor thought Boomer got out so let Daisy in the yard. Thank goodness!
Boomer is actually my third dog. I had a chocolate lab when I was born who
died when I was five, named Mickey. And then I had a beautiful pure-bred
Rottweiler named Rocko, from age six to sixteen. (He was an awesome dog.)
With Rocko's death my parents were convinced not to get another dog because
Rocko took our hearts with him when he passed, but I worked on my dad for a
full year. We had a cat named Moesha and then at the end of my junior year in
07, I got Boomer and then six months later we got his best friend in the
whole world, Chewey. My Red Mackerel Maine Coon cat. They cuddle and groom
each other.
He is obsessed with me more than anyone else in our family. He dotes on me
like crazy. He has to be leaning some part of him on me for more than half
the day. I can no longer use the rest room with the door closed, he likes to
sit there with his head on my knee so I don't have to pee alone. He actually
doesn't bark unless he is playing with other dogs or you command him to. He
has the basset howl and it scares him when he does it, so he doesn't do it.
We gave him stuffed animals when he was a baby so that he would get used to
my scent, and he never tore them up. He still has one of them because Daisy
destroyed his other fluffy. (He would only cuddle them) He makes this purr
sound that we call his crocodile growl, he makes when he is super happy. (Or
play growling.) He is a worry wart. When we would go swimming, he'd sit on
the ledge and whine till we got out. (He nearly drowned his first week with
us. I went in the frozen pool after him. Forgo snow. He fell on the pool
cover and slipped under his little legs too small to pull him up.) So now
unfortunately no matter how much we use positive reinforcement he refuses to
swim. Which is a pity cause he has perfect feet for digging and swimming. He
has a wirey like guard hairs of the basset, and a soft face like a lab.
They are diggers though, and require rocks to fill their holes. They also
cannot be without a leash, as their noses get them in trouble! They also are
stubborn, and if they do not want do something, forget it. He knows sit,
down, (can't do paw because he falls, too little legs) roll over, crawl, "Say
please" (Bark command) "Say it quiet" (quieter bark) he knows stay and come.
He also does this trick where you put your thumbs and pointer fingers
together in a shape of a triangle. You say "Triangle" and he sticks his nose
in the middle and holds it there. You can move your hand he will jump up to
reach it etc. This was originally going to be the "Seek" command. I had
trained my Rottweiler to "Come heal" and he would walk without a leash with
his nose pressed to my palm so I knew he wouldn't move from that spot, I was
trying to do something similar, but all Boomer decided was to use the
Triangle trick. Like I said, super stubborn though really easy to train with
a food motivator. Cheese and Cheerios have always been the easiest training
tool I used for my dogs. He also will spin on command (but he's so lazy he
pretends to forget it.) And "Shake Shake Shake" Which is he just shakes his
head and flaps his ears around on command. It serves no purpose but it was so
cute when he was a baby, his ears were bigger than him! If you put a towel
down half way on the floor and tell him "Dry your face" He puts his face down
on towel and rubs his face off. Helps when you are trying to get him dry
after a rainy day!
He should have been named Sheldon from Big Bang Theory, because if you are
sitting in his spot, he cries and stares at you until you move. His favorite
game is figuring out how to annoy us the most. He flaps his ears against his
collar for my dad to get annoyed enough to wake up, he huffs at my mom. Like
when you ask him to say please he goes "huff huff huff" which is like a
whisper bark. And now he's learned that I will come out of my room and heft
him into my queen-size temperpedic if he smooshes his nose against my door
frame and snuffs against it as loud as he can. In a super dramatic way, like
"I FOUND YOU SNIFFFFFFFFFFFF". It is funny until its at four am, and he's
tired of being downstairs without me.
Well, that's Boomer for you :D He's my weirdo. Such a fun dog. :)
See more images of Boomer!
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