Our Furry Friend

 This is our Furry Friend Tracker!

 Tracker is a 100 pound Rhodesian Ridgeback.  He turned 4 years old last week. I am sure if he could talk he would say he feels much older.  We got Tracker in August 2007.  At that time he was the "only child".  Brian was still in the Marine Corp getting ready to deploy to Iraq.  We were very excited about our new puppy and spoiled him to death.  He got to ride on our laps in the car (unfortuneatly he kept trying to do this even after he reached about 40 lbs), frequent trips to the "spa", Saturday morning biscuits and gravy (bad I know), afternoon naps with mommy on the weekends, bones and toys galore, and of course he got to sleep in the bed at night.  Basically Tracker helped me keep my sanity during the hardest 7 months of my life and therefore, I treated him like a prince. He was even more spoiled once Brian came home.  I guess you could say Tracker was "living the life". Then about 17 months ago that all changed.  Tracker went from being the "only child" to the dog. 

Tracker went from sleeping in the bed and spa treatments, to a comfy pillow on the floor and the occasional trip to the groomer for a bath ( No way I am going to attempt to give this horse a bath).  I will admit he has done very well and as you will see from the pictures, puts up with a lot from Colin.  Sometimes they are the best of friends and other times they antagonize each other to the extreme.  It is actually a lot of fun to watch their relationship progress.  I will never forget those first few nights that Colin was home and screaming at 2 in the morning and looking over at Tracker with his head UNDER his pillow.  He never was a big fan of the crying. We always try to look for ways to include Tracker in what we are doing and always try to let Colin be involved with Tracker as well.  For Tracker's birthday we let Colin give him his bone.  Colin of course thought it was for him and did not want to give it to Tracker.  They had a power struggle which of course, Tracker won.  Despite his loss, Colin did not give up and continued to sneak up on Tracker throughout the day and would steal the bone back.  This of course sent Tracker into panic mode.  It really reminded me of the commercial where the dog keeps looking for places to hide his bone.  This is not new for us.  I have found bones behind the toilet, under my pillow, under the dirty clothes in the closet, etc.  Usually he hides it and he is done but not this time.  He frantically ran about the house putting it places, thinking about it for a few minutes and then moving it again.  This continues for about 30 minutes.  He even tried to "dig up " the carpet in hopes of burying the bone.  Finally, he settled for under the couch cushion :)  .

This is a rare photo of Tracker alone with the bone.

Now I have said sometime they are the best of friends.  This is usually around breakfast, lunch and dinner time.  Imagine that :)  Tracker can hear the peal of a banana from anywhere and he can tell when I have opened the cabinet with the peanut butter.  The dog loves food.  He has quickly learned that Colin loves to share.  He spends lots of time sitting under Colin's high chair praying for the next flying piece of food.  Colin loves the attention from Tracker and is ever so willing to oblige.  I have to admit there have been time when I have been really glad Tracker is there ,particulary on a green bean night because there tends to be less for me to clean up afterwards.

Tracker really does put up with a lot.  You can see him giving me the devil eyes while I stood cracking up at the two of them.  Colin loved dressing up Tracker.  This is just one of the many examples when I look at Tracker and say "Good boy".  These moments are often followed by cookies which is the reason I really think he puts up with it.

Now if you take a good look at this picture you will see that Colin is wearing Tracker's collar. You can really see he loves his "Best Friend". He is also holding a lion that he is calling "Oggy!" which means Doggy. Pretty much anything with 4 legs is an Oggy! right now. In fact pretty much anything other than a human. We went to petco a couple of weeks ago and the fish, mice, and birds were Oggies to.  Just so you can see how far we have come in 4 years, here are some pictures of Tracker when we first got him.