Missy was 6 months old when she was evicted along with her 9 sibling-brother-mother-lover family from their council house den of inequity. Either there was some serious interbreeding going on or Missy is just plain unlucky that she looks like an old man gurning in a tyre. She sure as shit doesn’t look like a Chihuahua. She’s solid and muscly, more like a miniature pit bull. I should have known! On the plus side she matches the furniture! Puggy Matches the kitchen. It’s an important part of the selection process, that and them being in desperate need! If I ever rescue a Weimaraner Pointer it is going to have to live in the bedroom, thats grey!

I was told she was a puppy. I was thinking new shiny puppy without serious psychological baggage. I know I bang on about rescue dogs but there is something special about the smell of puppy breath and paws. I wanted a puppy but I would never buy one. In truth I didn’t want another dog at all, but I did want a puppy. Lots of people have this approach and dump their puppies when they morph into grown up dogs whose breath is literally to die from rather than to die for. Missy’s breath was already on the turn when we got her.

I was convinced by people who have fallen into the ‘glutton for punishment trap’ of adopting a pack of dogs that she would be company for Mr Pigglesworth and it would help him socialize.  I was once told that two children were better than one too. I should have known better.

At 6 months old Missy was not only beyond sweet puppy breath, she generally smelt like the rancid teenager she was. But it was too late. I’d seen her. My sister who came with me saw her brother (who we later found out was her dad and would have been the father of her children had we not rescued them). My sister adopted Bertie Big Balls and had them chopped off. I took Little Missy home.  

Her name extended to Little Missy Pissy Pants for good reason. It’s her show name if she was Crufts material. She had clearly never been handled and turned into a star fish whenever she was picked up. She was utterly terrified and shook perpetually. It was 3 days before Christmas. I picked her up the same day I picked up my Christmas present. A shiny black convertible. She shat in it. Once home, she would not go to the toilet and would hold it in for hours and hours. The second I took my eyes off her she would wee in some corner… or anywhere really. Her puppy toilet training in the chi farm clearly hadn’t been a positive process. She had learned, out of fear, to pee in secret and it was a hard habit to break. Christmas day was great fun. We never shouted and patience won the day but even now, on walks, when she wees she looks up at me pitifully and fearfully, showing me the whites of her eyes, like I am about to beat her. Too late I realized that she would not be socializing Pigget and he would have some unwanted influences on her.

Missy and Piggy seemed to get on ok. He was indifferent to her and she was indifferent to his indifference and followed him everywhere. It was all ok for a short while. As she was 6 months old I was advised to wait for her first season before getting Missy neutered. Poor Pugily! His indifference disappeared and was replaced by frantic fanaticism. Who knew that neutered boy dogs could still do the business! Missy behaved like a bitch on heat (insert laughing emoji here). My first panicked reaction when they got stuck together was to throw water on them. It didn’t work and as the children began to cry I googled what to do. It said “DO NOT THROW WATER ON THEM”! It said I needed to keep them calm. I talked to them gently and stroked their panicked little faces and when I had finished calming the children I did the same to the dogs (mainly puggy was panicked – he was trapped good and proper).  Eventually they relaxed sufficiently to separate.

I’m a tiny bit sad that the outcome of that trauma wasn’t little baby Puggy and Missy Puppies. They certainly would have had the better start in life than their parents!

Read on next time about Missy’s criminal activities