Hello, Humans! My name is Orion LoBiondo, the youngest offspring
of the LoBiondo Family. I have been
wanting to write a Guest Blog for my mom for a long time, I have so much to
say! I am what humans call a “dog,”
although I prefer the term “canine offspring”.
I am half lab and half pointer,
I was “bred” (can I tell you how offensive that terms is …. Ok, save it for a
later Blog) to hunt. I remember being a
little puppy in a pet shop for a long time in Pennsylvania. Many humans looked at me and said I was
cute. But no one bought me, so I was
sent to a shelter in Pennsylvania. I was
scheduled for a Trip to Never Never Land, when someone said, “What a shame for
this beautiful dog to be destroyed, let’s see if another shelter can take him.” A nice lady made a lot of phone calls, and
then they drove me to the Middletown Humane Society.
That’s when
I started sending messages to my REAL mom (you guys call her Mrs. Lo) by
ESP. “Come and get me, Momma, I want to
come home,” I would mentally telegraph to her.
“I really want to come and snuggle with you guys and you really need me
to protect the house from those evil, plotting squirrels.” This
was 35 years ago. Oh sorry, right, I
should use human time, this was 5 years ago in human time. Finally, Momma came out to the Middletown
Humane Society, she had searched for me on the “Splinter-Net” and had a
printout of a photo of me.
As soon as I saw my mom, I was
delirious with happiness, “Momma, Mom, Mom, Momma, Mom, Momma,” I kept calling
to her. (To you guys it just sounds like
Woof, Woof, Woof, but that’s because you only speak Human). “Ohhh, you have such soulful eyes, I love
you!” said Momma. “Ok, let’s go,” I said,
and I tried to get in the car with her. But
of course, she had to get Daddy’s permission to adopt me. The next day, Daddy came out with my brother
and BFF Christian. I jumped right up on Christian and licked his
face. We were BONDED already. He had already been dreaming about me. He put his arms around me and refused to
leave without me. Daddy tried to be all
stern and say, “Son, I know you really want a dog but you know you have
allergies. What if you’re allergic to
dog hair?” (He’s not) “Plus, we like to go on vacation, who will
watch the dog, let’s be practical, and blah blah blah.” So, I knew I had to impress Daddy with my
Skillz. I peed all around the perimeter
of the place and sniffed his butt real good.
Even though he said, “down, boy, down!” – you could just tell, he was
really impressed.
So that’s
how I became a LoBiondo. All the other
dogs around here are like, “Wow, what’s it like being a LoBiondo? Does your mom really cook that much, is your
dog bowl lined with gold, do they feed you meatballs all the time?” Listen, it’s awesome being a LoBiondo, having
a Mom, Dad and two great brothers, but I have a lot of work to do around here,
it’s not like I just lie around and nap all day. OK, maybe I do nap all day but I definitely
have one eye open while I’m napping. I
have to -- it’s like the DMZ out here, Dude! First of all, I have to protect my mom’s
Garden at all times. You humans call it
a garden, but you know what the critters call it? Yup – Lunch.
This neighborhood is infested with critters – groundhogs, raccoons,
squirrels, woodpeckers. Well, the other
houses are, not My House, though.
When I first got here, my humans had
a woodchuck living in a hole under the House.
Oh heck no, not in my house, Son!
I barked and barked and flushed that little Chubster right out of
there. He was so chubby from eating Momma’s
vegetables, that he could barely run. He
was easy pickins. I was bred to hunt,
remember? Don’t worry, he lived. Why?
Because just when I had him in my mouth, Momma yelled at me and
distracted me. “No, no, Orion, don’t eat
the woodchuck, no, Boy, no,” she was yelling from the porch in her fuzzy pink
bathrobe. OK, Momma, chillax, I was NOT
going to dispatch him, I was going to bring you an early birthday present, but
that was her loss. Still, it is my sworn
duty to protect this House and my humans, and I’ll be darned if any critters
are going to get past me. All day long,
I bark at those evil, beady eyed squirrels.
And as soon as Momma comes home and lets me out, I chase them right to
the end of my stupid electric fence (which I really dislike but I guess we can’t
have everything).
Also, it is
my sworn duty to retrieve the newspaper. Dad trained me to fetch the newspaper every
morning and bring it in the house. This
is especially important, so that my parents don’t have to go out in the snow
and the rain to get the paper, and my mom doesn’t have to be seen in her pink
bathrobe (are you noticing a trend here?)
However, I got really confused a while back because the newspaper
stopped coming. I was a little depressed
to be honest with you. I mean, this was
like taking away my stripes when I did nothing wrong. Dad said he couldn’t stand that newspaper, it
was too “Lib-A-Rull” whatever that means.
So I communicated to my Mom with a soulful look in my eyes and she got
the message. “Please, Momma, make the
newspaper come back.” So Momma made some
phone calls and now the newspaper comes once a week on Sundays. The newspaper carrier likes to make my life
difficult and throws it in a big snowdrift every time there is a
snowstorm. But that doesn’t stop
me. If that paper is out there, I will
find it, pick it up in my teeth and bring it in the house with my tail wagging
like nobody’s business. Daddy promptly
throws everything except the comics in the recycling bin and says something about
“Paw-La-Ticks.” Momma doesn’t like any
news – newspapers or TV news because it’s always bad news. She only reads the Sentinel and the Mid Hudson
Times and the Hudson Valley Press but they all come in the mailbox. Don’t even get me started on the new Postal
carrier. Bob used to bring me milkbones
but the new guy only brings mail! So I
bark at him, of course. And he’s afraid
of dogs, which just makes me nervous and I bark at him more. I really wish Bob would come back.
But my most
important job is just being here for my family.
Especially Christian. There is
nothing like a boy and his dog. I love
all my family equally. OK, humans say
that, that’s not actually true. I love
Christian the best because he is my soul-human. He really understands me. We were meant to be together and he loves me
so much my heart almost bursts everytime he comes in the door. I show him this by licking his face and
dancing in a circle with my tennis ball. The first thing he does in the morning
is come down and feed me, pet me, and throw me the ball outside, even if it’s
raining or snowing. It’s the first thing
he does when he comes home from school too. I am awesome at catching the ball and bringing
it back. When Christian was 8 years old,
he could throw the ball OK but every year he gets bigger and stronger. Now, when we go to the park he can throw that
tennis ball super far. Momma and I always
thought he could be a Quarterback but the football people said he doesn’t have
the “Tail-Lent” to be QB. I don’t think
they know what they’re talking about but he likes being a Receiver. It’s kind of like what I do but instead of
catching the ball and bringing it back to the QB, he tried to get it to the End
Zone. This makes absolutely no sense to
me, but my family loves this game anyway.
And at night, after sports practices
and homework, Christian lays down next to me and we watch sports together. My mom had to get a special order extra large
dog bed so my brother could fit on it with me.
Sometimes we pray together. I can
hear the prayers of all my family. We
all thank God for bringing us all together.
My family prays for a lot of different people and causes. But, after I count my blessings, like Momma
taught me, I always pray for the same thing, “Dear Lord, please let all the
dogs in shelters find a home that’s even half as happy as mine, that is all I
ask for.”
Oh man, I
would tell you more, but right now there is an evil squirrel thinking about
coming on my property. I have to go bark
my head off. “How many times do I have
to tell you, not in My House, Son??!!”
-
WOOF!!!
For more information on the
Middletown Humane Society, visit: http://www.middletownhumanesociety.com/
For more of Mrs. Lo’s Blog, visit: www.lobiondopage.blogpsot.com
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