It all started as a gift........

Ok.. so once upon a time there was a small apartment in Louisville, Ky. that did not contain the sounds of small feet pattering across the vinyl flooring.  This was 4 years ago.  Those were lonely days.

My now husband G-Man (boyfriend at the time) used to own a pug.  For various reasons he was unable to care for it and had to give it to people who could.  I would buy him pug memorabilia such as stuffed pugs, figurines, etc. as gifts to somehow in my mind compensate for the earlier loss of his living, breathing companion.  I did this from the start of our courtship in 2003 up until November of 2006.  I wanted that Christmas to be special.  I decided to get G-Man a real pug. 

I knew it was going to be a big responsibility and a bonding opportunity in our own relationship, but I was feeling ready and excited for the task of raising a puppy!  Let me at this point remind you that as a child I had grown up without a dog, let alone a puppy.  My mom, Mama Red, was one of those mommas that didn't want a dog peeing in her flower bed or in her house for that matter; therefore, we were designated to the more refined term of "cat people."

Gender was never an issue.  Even though my family kept reminding me that "females make better pets," I knew I wanted a male for my G-man- just like the pug he had to give away in his younger teenage years.  I arranged for a lady to bring all her available male pug puppies (there turned out to only be 2) to our apartment.  I then wrote up a cute jingle on a card to my G-man about making sure to pick the perfect pug for him, tied ribbon through the card with the plan of tying the ribbon around one of the puggies' little neckies.  Once again my puppy iliteracy kicked in because I had not anticipated the puppies being so small that a card would weight their necks down, and weigh their necks down it did.  Ultimately, the card with the jingle just got handed to G-man once he realized what was going on.  Not quite the same dramatic effect as of one of the puppies actually walking up to him with a card around their neck.  I guess some things just sound better in theory.

When G-man walked through the apartment door after coming from work, we opened the dog crate and the puppies ran out.  One was immediately drawn to G-man.  My husband likes to say that he eventually claimed that one due to the fact his belly was red (it was told to us that it was red because he had been the laziest and stayed on the heating lamp the longest while in the kennel).  G-man's response: "that's my kind of dog!"  I like to say my husband picked that one because he must have been tipped off and told that he was more expensive due to a "special" marking on his left paw (a marking he eventually grew out of- what a rip!) and G-man wanted to make sure I paid off my debt for all of the dinners on his tab since I was buying this dog.  Either way, G-man did pick the "lazy dog" and we pondered on an appropriate name all night.  G-man named him Mason, but he also responds to Mater Tater, Big Boy, Made Tade, Mase, and a variety of other random words

This is the very first picture we took of our newest family member, Mason, the Friday night we got him