Certifiable

It is confirmed that being retired makes you impulsively a bit off center. Since we picked up Ranger, aka Pup 1, we have discussed that having a second dog to grow up with him was a good idea, but we have a July trip to Florida planned to visit daughter and family, taking grandson 1 with us and all going to Disney world.

Ranger has spent the past weeks riding around in the mountains with us in the car so that he continues to like the car rides and will go with us. Daughter has a vet friend with a new practice, hospital, and boarding facility and the plan is to board their golden and Ranger for the couple days we are in Disney. So far the plan is workable.

Last week, when Ranger had his play date, we realized that he is a rough and tumble player and that waiting until he is 6-7 month old to get another puppy
might not work, that he might totally intimidate a puppy. We discussed what kind of second dog we wanted, vacillating between another mastiff and a German Shepherd. I grew up with two shepherds and have a fondness for them. After checking with daughter to see if we could bring two young dogs with us and getting an affirmative, we started our search, looking at both mastiffs and shepherds. We found an Amish breeder in Lancaster, PA with two 14 week old female shepherds, AKC registered, for a very low price and gave them a call at their family owned hardware store, confirmed that they still had one of them and set off yesterday with Ranger, to check her out. Because she is two weeks older than he is, she is similar in size, though not as heavy and seems more agile, so we are hopeful that the adjustment to each other is quick.

We are now on our way back to SW Virginia with Meeko, a 14 week old female GSD and Ranger, the 12 week old male OEM in the back, her in a travel kennel until they are better acquainted and him loose in the back where he prefers to travel. He wanted to play when he was out of the kennel and the space is too limited and she was still a bit intimidated by the whole process.

The trip was interesting as Lancaster is still very Amish populated outside of town and we saw many open and closed horse drawn carts, a 6 draft horse team plowing, and lots of dairy farms.