| Guest |  Zaphod and Trisha [long]
Hey all. New to the forums and I saw this section.
My remembrances aren't new but I thought I'd share.
Growing up in my parents' home, we had Dobermans, Zaphod and Trisha. Their names were taken, of course, from Douglas Adams' The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (though my mom or dad made an error when writing Tricia's name down, and so she became Trisha).
We got Zaphod just before I turned 5, and Trisha some 5 years later.
Zaphod was my childhood companion and an... eclectic dog. A very large Doberman Pinscher (100+ pounds large), he used to siddle up to me as a kid and hip-check me, then walk away to go eat spiders. He was a clever dog, using the pedal to open up the garbage can, etc. He used to play volleyball with balloons and, if you let him keep it, he'd walk around with the balloon for days, carrying it by the knot and then lying down with it and placing his paw on it so hard you'd swear it would break. But it didn't, and when it eventually popped 2 or 3 days (days!!) later, he'd look so mortified and sad... until the next one came along.
He'd lay just outside of the kitchen while we ate because he knew my dad didn't want him to come in. But as soon as my dad moved his chair back because he was finished, he'd come bolting in like black-and-tan lightning. Strangely, he wouldn't do it if my dad was trying to bait him and move his chair back prematurely. The dog was Zen, it was amazing. His hearing must have been something else, because he also knew whenever anyone opened the fridge to get meat. You'd open the fridge and, if you were lucky, you'd hear him come down the stairs. More often than not, you'd turn around and BOOM! He was there. He wouldn't do it if you went for salad or anything, but if you went for that salami, he'd appear like a ninja.
He caught a blue jay once, as it was swooping along; he dropped it right away, looking really mortified, but it died of shock, I guess.
He was always grinning that little Dober-grin, always happy, always friendly. Big suck, Z was.
There are other memories: turning my dad's Uninterruptable Power Source on and off with his nose, him rolling around in fish whenever you looked away while we walked on the beach up at my grandparents' cottage, him bobbing for rocks and holding his breath, his general love affair with water... Zaphod passed away, oh, 7 years ago I think, but his memories are strong and fun.
I remember once my parents went away and I went to my grandma's place for a week or so and they boarded Zaphod instead of taking him along. When we went to get him, Z gave my parents such a look like you've never seen and was grumpy with everyone but me for a week.
Trisha was an interesting little girl. A red Dobe, we got her when Z was around 5 or 6 (and let me tell you, losing her best friend changed her for the rest of her life; dogs grieve, no question about it).
She was always feisty, a lot more aggressive than Zaphod and not so good around children, which was unfortunate. She wasn't treated any different or with any less caring or gentleness but she wasn't socialized as well as early as was Zaphod (or has Baxter been), which was our fault. Still, she was great with adults and awesome with us. Can you picture a 75-pound lapdog? What's what Trisha thought she was. She liked to wrestle a little, so when I was smaller I used to oblige. When she was a really small puppy, she rested inside of her food bowl.
Trisha... I think the clearest memory I have of her before she started to grey at the muzzle was going away to Florida when I was 10 and having her be a puppy and coming back but a week later to discover how much she'd changed; longer muzzle, longer body, everything. It was incredible. She used to hide under the deck in our old house and get all muddy. I remember taking her for walks all over my old neighborhood, which was always fun.
All in all a fun, sweet dog. She used to be really happy paired up with Zaphod and it really took a lot out of her when he passed away. Having been really feisty before, it took a lot out of her, although I admit I got to spend more quality time with her after she calmed down a little. It's just sad that it had to happen that way.
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