I tried to write this yesterday but was exhausted. This post deserves so much more than the half ass paragraph I was going to write so I decided to wait and type it out tonight. Its times like this i wish i was fabio and could narrate an incredible story. I dont have that gift so please bare with me. My dog Socrates ( Socko for short) was the absolute best dog in the history of the world. I'm not joking, although I feel sorry for people who say it about their dog. I guess I have to start at the beginning.
I was dating this chick in high school and was in love and all that BS, she was younger than me so when I went away to college we had some problems with the distance. Mainly neither of us not being able to not F#*= other people. So we bought a dog, that seemed like a good idea at the time. My brother had a pug and it was a good dog, so we decided to get one. We went to a breeder to see the last puppy from the litter, he was 14 weeks old. He was a black pug, which was different but didn't bother us. We met with the breeder for a couple minutes in the driveway, then walked to words the house. Someone opened the door and he ran out at mach 2, right to me where he rolled over and demanded I pet his belly. That was how Soco picked me.
14 weeks is very old for a puppy to be sold, and his name there was Lucky so I figure he had some sort of problem. Probably major, which was never revealed.
Soco grew to be a tall and slender pug, which is abnormal from the short fat stereotype. He was a ball of energy, absolutely loved me, but had some quirks that were becoming apparant. His ribs constantly showed ,but despite any expensive food, he didn't give care about eating. Finally, a year into owning him I discovered that if I rolled his kibble across the floor one at a time he'd think it was a game and eat it. I did this for a couple years, although his slender figure never gave way. He also cowered when people would pet him, which was outputting because they thought he was beaten. I had to explain many times that hebhad a great home, it was just something wierd that he did.
At college he was the absolute best. He had a charisma about him, people I knew my whole life that hated "toy dogs" were won over by him. Idk what it was, he was just special. One time in the boredom of college we decided to try and capture him in our living room. We set up a laundry basket, complete with a prop stick, and string tied to that stick. Loony toons style. We sat for 3 hours laughing hysterically at him pawing and howling at the ham we put under the basket. He never went in, but had a healthy fear of laundry baskets after.
Midway through college my GF and I broke up (shocker). We had a bit of a custody battle over Soco, but worked a deal out where we would both keep him part time. It was during this period that he became the greatest wing man I'd ever known. Ladies couldnt resist his charm. That dog was solely responsible for many late night cardio sessions. Sometimes he'd lay on the floor, other times he'd sit in bed and high five me. One of his 2 tricks.
Enter my wife, the best woman I've ever know. He was jealous of her at first, and when her and I would cuddle on the couch he made sure to get between us. This lasted a couple weeks before he accepted her as his. After that he protected her. He chased a 120 lb black lab showing his teeth and growling. No lie. He went after a blue heeler once too but i grabbed him so he wouldn't get killed.
If any of you have been around pugs you know they all have their own quirks. He had many. The food one was very strange for his breed. Even after we got over the hate of food, he never ate to excess. He was the kind of dog that had a full bowl at all times and would nibble when he wanted. And when I say nibble, I mean take a mouth full of food, run to me, spit it all on the floor and eat it one by one. Another odd thing was that he would watch tv with us and wait for an animal to appear. Once it did, he would fly 90 mph at the tv and try to jump in it. Any animal, it didn't matter. Horses were the worst though. How can dogs distinguish different animals? Idk. But he hated them all on tv.
When my wife and I got our house, he lived next door to real horses, cows, sheep, chickens, etc. He loved to walk over and check them out. Bucky the bull (Texas Longhorn) liked him and would lick him. The horses that he hated so much on tv? He was pretty scared of them in real life. But he always went to the fence and would sniff noses with them. He had a great time during this stage. My wife often took him for walks, one time she was by a fox den and a fox puppy came out. Soco looked up and was nose to nose with it, she said they both froze, sniffed once and the baby fox booked it back into the hole. Which reminds me of another quirk. Soco had an incredible nose, for a breed that doesn't have a nose. He had it to the ground constantly, and could track the fox that would come in our back yard.
Part of my job is being out of town for long periods of time. When I was single my parents would take care of him. He loved my mother, she was his #3 favorite. Me being number 1, my wife 2, and my sister in law 4. He was very specific. When he stayed at my parents he would walk himself downstairs at night and go to sleep in my water bed. In the late morning, when he felt like getting up, he'd walk upstairs to be let our. He could no lie hold his bladder for 15 hours, which was great for a lazy guy like me. Another quirk, he loved my dirty socks. It wasn't why we knock named him Soco, just a coincidence. One time I counted 27 dirty socks that he collected from the laundry and put on the bed. He was sleeping in the middle of them.
Now for the sad part, but what I find the most incredible part of his story as the years go by. He was in good health right up till the last year. He started to walk slower, run very little, and his eyes got cloudy. I saw it happen and knew he was fading. I had to leave for work in late March and wouldn't be home for a couple months, I was worried I wouldn't be there for him when he passed. Sometime the end of April my wife called and said he was in a sort of coma. He was snoring like he was sleeping, but wouldn't wake up. She took him to the vet, who is a family friend and she couldn t find anything wrong. He snapped out of it but we scared of everything. I finally made it home the Thursday before mothers day, 3 years ago. He cried like he always did when I got home, we sat by the fire place and all caught up. We went to bed, my wife woke up to got to work and Soco and I stayed in bed. I woke up a couple hours later and he was still snoring away, I tried to get him up but he wouldnt wake up. I took him back to the same vet and she found a large lump in his abdomen, she figured it was cancer. It was one of the first places she checks so she knew she didn't miss it the first time. I brought him home, and my sister who is a vet tech put him to sleep. It was terrible but peaceful at the same time. The friggin guy waited for me to get home. I'll never forget him and I don't want another dog because I only judge them against him. He was one of a kind.
Thanks for making this post, I enjoyed writing about Soco. I remembered a lot of things that had slipped from my memory. I hope you all get a dog like him once
I'll add some photos of the dude soon, it's not working right now
Last edited by 86T3; 05-09-2018 at 12:15 AM.
Looking for a Bassani silencer for a 2nd gen tecate, the style with the movable mount. 1st gen will work