so lets talk about phoebe....

here is her story..here is what i think about her...and here is how i at saints manage her. other folks might do differently..but then they also do not have 50 other animals living with her in the same house with many different people traipsing in and out of that same house every single day, day in and day out 365 days a year...and finally phoebe cannot actually be fixed by anyone else when she still happens to be here.

i first heard about phoebe 6 years ago. i was called by the spca and she had been abandoned outside their shelter in a small crate on a cold and snowing christmas eve night...they found her christmas morning. everyone felt so sorry for her...she spent a a little bit of time in the shelter and then was sent out to foster care. her foster mom did not like her..phoebe was a disruptive royal pain in the ass. but she had some weird autoimmune health issue thing and was currently on prednisone for the time being. unfortunately she had contracted ringworm while she was in the shelter so with her being on steriod treatment, the fungus went nutz and over night phoebe was a total ringworm disaster. her foster mom took this opportunity to whip her right back to the shelter. they took one look at her and her massive contagious plague and listened to her foster moms tales of woe on what a difficult and unadoptable dog she was and promptly considered euthanization.

now they did not really want to euthanize her but they also did not want that hyperactive disruptive, neurotic and ringwormy dog in the shelter either...so they called me and told me she was a min pin who needed into rescue asap.

i had a visitor at the time who sometimes worked with min pin rescue..she made a phone call, the rescue agreed to take her and she picked up phoebe from the spca on her way back into town. hey..i was happy... big problem is suddenly solved.

min pin rescue took her and continued treating her ringworm which really did not want to go away. mia ran the snot off that dog by taking her roller blading every day trying to tire her out. a couple of weeks later i got a courtesy call that the rescue had decided to euthanize her.. and by the way, she is not a min pin..she is in fact a PB german pincher...hmmm....really?..i had to look her up on the computer to see what she was cuz i had never seen one before.
anyway...she was biting and being a total hag and they just could not responsibly or safely adopt her out to anyone so the hard decision was being made.

now i feel responsible for this pain in the ass ringwormy thing that i have never seen..so shoot me in the head now...but back then i said..oh no don't euthanize her..i will take her at saints. and so she came...and so she drove me insane..but i did make her ringworm totally go away.

i had a trainer living on site who followed ian dunbars training philosophies and she took phoebe in as a foster dog. she did obedience, and agility training.. in the next several months... i never saw phoebe get any better... she still looked like a pain in the ass to me....but what do i know..i know nothing and care less about any kind of training.
when she moved out she took phoebe with her and said she was going to keep her.
hey..i am not stupid, i did not want that dog and she obviously did..so this was totally fine with me.

about 6 months later i get a call from some guy way up north...apparently he had adopted phoebe from the trainer several months before...HUH???

anyway..he was also a trainer and he trained animals for the movies...he said had trained tigers and pitbulls but his hands and arms were covered from scars she had made and he had never seen such an utterly vicious dog as phoebe.

HUH again?..i knew she was a pain in the ass and i knew she could bite both human and animal..but i didn't exactly consider her vicious...just a royal pain in the ass.

anyway..i told him to bring her back and mo and i drove to meet him part way. she was happy to see us..i was glad to have the brat home again but she continued to drive me insane.

i have placed her in two more homes...both well educated and aware of her issues. she got kicked out of the first one within a week cuz we had a big snowfall and prissy phoebe does not pee outside in the cold and the snow.

the second home i placed her in came all of the way from edmonton to meet her. they so knew her problems, they were so prepared to deal with them. they had just lost their highly aggressive doberman to very ripe old age and they had capably managed him and his issues for his whole life. i think she lasted about three or four months or so before the call came and i paid to have her flown back to me...shoot me in the head again please.

so phoebe is a sanctuary dog...she is vastly better in all ways now than she was 5 years ago. i will not keep sending her out to other people who simply cannot manage her. she IS a pain in the ass dog..i am not lying about this. she is a VERY difficult dog..and...she is not always a very nice dog.... i am not lying about this either.

BUT for whatever reason..not only do i happen to love that little red whirling hag...i am also the only single person in all the places that she has ever lived in (and my count that i know of is seven) who actually keeps standing there ready to catch her when she pushes everyone she lives with into booting her out of the door.

quite frankly i am tired of catching her...i think she has been sent back and forth with all of the good intentions, all of the promises of training and rehabilitation more than enough for any dog. and i do finally believe that phoebe is NOT rehab-able...i do not believe she will ever be a "normal" dog who can live in a "normal" home.

and so..unless the god of dogs himself walks thru my door and promises her a forever home with all that she ever needs.... NO MATTER WHAT!...phoebe is not going to get less than that..she already has a great deal less in little old reliable me but for her it has to be enough.

now...about her closet...i am pretty damn pleased. i went shopping on my lunch break and bought her a carpet, a chair, a curtain with beads, a very soft special blanket, a small artificial pot of flowers, a poster, a little plastic dresser for her many coats and a pretty picture frame so she can have a picture of herself in her room. i have set the whole thing up for her and she is currently curled up in her chair having a nap...it is a very nice private phoebe place and i do think she really appreciates my effort to make it nice for her when she can't be watched.

so for now...compassionate management of phoebe continues at saints and until someone great actually can give her something a heck of a lot better..this is quite simply what she has got.
and i will continue to periodically think about murdering this little pain in the ass dog because once in awhile she does still does drive me totally nutz...there is not a single person who really knows her (the good and the terrible) that thinks for a second the answer to phoebe is any kind of simple or easy.