I can’t resist to write about my long gone dog, Billy Boy. He was a mixed breed between Labrador and Boxer and he certainly had the spirit of a Boxer. He was an extremely lively, healthy and happy dog with a lot of personality.

I got him when he was only eight and a half week old, full of life energy, which actually lasted until his death fourteen and a half year later. Full speed to the last moment! That’s why it was so hard to get any decent photos of him, I had to actually order him to sit or lay down to keep him still and when I did that, the lively “glow” he had just disappeared so the photos never showed his true energy.

He loved all man kind and they seemed to love him back, probably because of his happiness, it was so contagious. You couldn’t help laughing at him, when he was so playful and creative in his ways to get your attention. Sometimes he looked almost human in his face expressions. You could talk to him as he was a human, he understood so much of the words, voice and body signals. Sometimes too much, so you had to camouflage your sentences, so he didn’t get too excited for things we mentioned… But he seemed to learn that too so we had to shift the expressions used all the time.

He really kept me in a good shape, as it were on my responsibility to activate him. He could easily be running around for three hours or more and still have a lot of energy left when we came home! Then just before we went inside, he had this really crazy “running around like a maniac outburst” just to make sure that the last drop of energy were coming out.

He always was shining black, people always asked me what I was giving the dog because he had such a shiny fur. A lot of them asked if I was giving him raw eggs, they should only know that the once time I did, he was farting so heavily that we had needed gas masks! And the dog was the first one to stick his head outside the window to get some fresh air!

He was a smart dog when it came to certain things - he could tell the difference in the recipes of freshly baked bread, if they changed the amount of butter in it and so on. Then he just spitted it out… Of course I made him ate it anyway, but still, it was fun seeing his expression when he noticed the difference!

He was a good guardian dog too, I could feel safe around him. He defended me above all - even when we, my ex-man and me, was pretending (testing the dog) that we’re having some kind of fight, he always protected me before the ex-man. When I were out walking he never reacted about normal behaving people, just the strange ones or if I told him to. He never barked at the door - unless it was some strange noises there after we had gone to bed.

Actually it was hard to get him to bark, but we trained him to by giving him a pankake as a reward. It only took 2 pancakes for him to learn that, he was a fast learner. He always tried to cheat because he didn’t like to bark. He had a lot of other funny noises he did instead, he was talking with us that way and he was actually screaming sometimes when he tought that we were treating him unfair. Like the times we went swimming without him… He just loved to play in the water, making bubbles with his nose below the surface.

I remember that he always came with his toys to cheer me up the times I was ill and laying in bed. Sometimes when having a fever or something more bad, he could wait really long times before he was drawing my attention to that he has go out and do his business. That’s the big respect he showed me.

When he was about 12 years old, he got deaf, but it took me a while before I could tell. He was so smart so he read my body signals and figured out what I wanted from him, so how could I tell that he didn’t hear anything? I did noticed a slightly insubordination when we were out walking and he didn’t listen to me when I called him. That was of course because he had his back turned to me so he couldn’t read my lips or see my body signals. So he got some scolding reminders from me until I figured it out and oh boy, was I ashamed then….

Well, I shall not bore you with all the details, there is a lot of stuff to tell about his lifetime.

Just let me finished with:

For me a pet is a family member and just as important. They are extremely lojal to you an gives you their love without any hesitation. The lost of a pet is a great sorrow and I miss them for a very long time.

Billy Boy at work (or farting?)