This is Thomas. He is a former pound puppy who found us one day when we were walking through our local pound a few months after having lost our 9 year old cocker to cancer.

We had been in there once before, a couple of weeks earlier and saw this same strange looking little dog in the room with the HUGE dogs, but he looked weird and he ran from us when we tried to talk to him. This time, when I bent down on my knees to talk to him, I opened the door to his cage just a bit and he quick as lightning found his way up my chest and around my neck. That my friends, was all he wrote.

Thomas came out of the "adult doggy" section. We were told he was part chihuahua and full grown. A very sweet and compact 10 pounds.

Thomas has been with us for one year now. Several things we have learned about our local "pound"...they are clueless about the age of doggies! Since coming home with us. Thomas has grown to a sturdy non-compact 33 pounds. He may be part chihuahua, but the other part must be Rottweiler.

Thomas is also my first little boy dog. The choice of having a male dog just never came up. The other two I had in my adult life sort of came to me and they happened to be female. The first one was a mini dachshund and she was 12 when I had to have her put down. Lady, the canine before Thomas, was part setter - part cocker and the perfect "Lady".

I was a little wary of having a male, since when you adopt an "adult" male you who knows if he already has that bad habit of "standing to pee"? (What is this anyway....? Is every male animal incapable of sitting like a normal person and avoiding that drip-drip-drip problem!?!)

Male or no, "ugly" or beautiful, I have found a true friend in this little guy. So what if he thinks he is a chihuahua, or that he sees himself as "just a small lap dog". So what if his loving and joyous leaps into my lap and up my body to give me kisses causes extreme pain to my boobies. At least he doesn't care that they no longer look outward and upward.