This is our little Ms. Giz (Gizmo, Gizzy Girl)... One look at her ears and you can probably guess why she was named Gizmo!
(click any photo to enlarge)
That was her name when we adopted her, at age 8, from a rescue group in Maine and this is what she looked like... a pair of ears with a dog attached!!
(Gizzy on an inflatable plastic chair)This photo has an almost "alien"
("Take me to your leader") look about it! She was such a funny little dog! She loved me unconditionally
(yes, I was her favorite) and she tolerated everyone else in the family
(she actually did love them; her tail would wag furiously as she growled at them and acted feisty! Like I said, she was such a little troll!!!)
(She and my boy, Blackie sitting at the slider)Gizzy, true to her (mixed) terrier heritage, ruled the roost from the get go. It didn't matter to her that our three cats had been living here for years before she came along, or that her big brother (lab/shepherd Mr. O'Malley) outweighed her by 60 lbs.... She let everyone know she was the boss from day one!
(a favorite place to sun herself - on the back of the couch)This story has a hero, and his name is Vaughn. He, along with another rescuer named Sharon, drove from Maine to the New York City pound several times a year. Their mission: to rescue as many small dogs from the pound as possible, take them back to Maine, and find homes for them. The NYC pound takes in about 1,000 animals
every week, yet only about 100 of those are fortunate enough to find homes; therefore, about
900 of the 1,000 are put to sleep ... every week. The number are staggering, aren't they?
While finalizing paperwork to adopt the dogs, Vaughn happened to wander into a back room where he spotted Gizmo in a cage. When Gizmo saw him, she immediately got up on her hind legs, clasped her two front paws together and kept thrusting them back and forth while barking furiously... Vaughn later told me that it looked to him like she was praying for her life. He went back to the front desk and told them he wanted to adopt the little blonde dog in the back room, too.
But the pound told him she was too old to be adopted
(at 8 years). She was an "owner turn-in" and was scheduled to be put to sleep that afternoon, as the shelter was overcrowded; therefore there was no room for her, and again, because of her age she was deemed 'unadoptable'. Vaughn told them he really wanted to add her to the group of dogs he was taking back to Maine, but once again they told him, "No." Vaughn told them that she was 'praying' for her life in that cage in the back room and that he had no intention of leaving without her...
(Gizzy, sleeping in my office... )
... so the pound finally backed down and agreed to draw up the additional paperwork to release Gizmo to him...
I don't know where Gizzy spent her first 8 years, but I know wherever she lived, she must have been loved very much. It was impossible not to love her. My guess
(since she was an owner turn-in) is that she may have had an elderly owner who passed away or went into a nursing home. Perhaps it fell upon relatives to decide her fate and they turned her over to the pound...
(If only dogs could talk)...
As Gizmo aged, she developed a severe eye infection that required her right eye to be removed. But as you can see from her smiling face, she didn't let it get her down...
She eventually went totally blind in her remaining eye, but again, she lived each and every day joyfully, with a wagging tail and a crooked toothed smile... Nothing got her down.
She had also developed diabetes
(a contributing factor in her eye infection). Part of her treatment was me giving her insulin shots twice a day, once in the morning and once at night. Again, never a whimper. As long as she had her family
(especially me), a bowl of food and fresh water, she was as happy as could be. She was a little girl, but she had a BIG appetite!!!
We lost her a year ago on March 22nd, at 16 years of age, so I've been thinking about her
(and missing her) a lot this weekend... She truly was a one in a million dog...
I'm so thankful and grateful for the 8 years we shared. By watching her, we all learned more about living life with joy, dignity, and without complaint.
And I'm so thankful and grateful to Vaughn for refusing to leave the pound without this little girl... Vaughn and Sharon are no longer doing rescues or I'd definitely send people their way... But wherever you live, you can be sure that there are local rescue groups, pounds, and shelters filled with animals, all in desperate need of good homes.
I have several pet adoption sites listed on my sidebar where you can adopt everything from puppies to purebreeds to good old mutts!! And don't forget one of the major benefits to adopting an older dog - they're already housebroken in most cases!!!
Wishing you and all your fur babies a wonderful week!
I love you, my little Giz...
Donna
We brought him home so our two girls, who no longer live at home, could come and say their goodbyes. And the past few days while on the pain killers he was sent home with, he did really good. He stopped sneezing and getting bloody noses, a good thing .
We knew his days were numbered, and that his cancer was aggressive and not treatable, but while he was still wagging his tail and enjoying life (and food), I was not ready to say that final goodbye. 
