Meet Frisco

Here are a few photos of the newest addition to the family.. Frisco.

Frisco was adopted from the Oregon Humane Society on September 21, 2008, about three hours after I left for San Francisco (hence the name).

Frisco is a year and six months old, and appears to be an Alaskan Eskimo breed. There isn't any firm assurance that the dog is a pure Eskimo, but if not, he's very close. His fur is white, and he has a very sweet demeanor.

I was initially very against a dog - mostly due to puppy behavior issues and our general lack of follow-through on things we promise to do. Our last dog, Cairo, was a dominant puppy and was next to impossible to train. We gave him up to Basenji rescue soon after Garrett was born.

Honestly, I'm not really sure what changed my mindset. I guess most of the issues I had with a dog were eliminated with him. His age, his size, the characteristics of the breed, maybe the picture on the Humane Society web page. All those facts made me suggest to Marie that she should check him out. It was sort of like when Marie suggested "you should build a layout", and $4000 later I had a train layout. When I got to my hotel there was a message on my cell phone regarding the "new addition", my reaction was "oh boy, what have I done?"

Frisco has lots of good characteristics. He is only 19 months old, 15 1/2 pounds, neutered, and is past most of the puppy stage. He is already showing signs of understanding some basic commands. He is house-trained (at least so far), sleeps in a crate at night, is very comfortable in the car (he stays in the back seat), and has shown a nice calm submissive behavior. He doesn't bark much (except when playing or somebody comes to the front door), and doesn't seem to shed much. We do have his hair cut quite short, a status we will probably maintain.

He does also bear a real similarity in physical appearance with Cairo. Almost the same size, similar curled up tail, long nose and runs really fast.

The adoption papers do not indicate any behavioral issues. If we can believe what we read, he was a great dog, the owners for whatever reason did not have the space to keep him.

Even though I was not here for the acquisition, the dog has showed no issues towards me, and is acclimating himself into the family very well. The dog has not quite bonded totally with the kids yet, and seems almost a little afraid of me. He is certainly friendly with them, but hasn't really become snuggly with them. I'm sure it will come because he certainly likes the attention.


Tags: Family