Newest Member of the Family

Ever since I was little, I have had a love/hate relationship with pets. I guess hate is too strong a word, but I had a problem with them. The reason - I'm highly allergic to animal fur. So where as I love dogs and cats, they make me sick, specifically trigger severe asthma, and thus it has never been very practical for for me to live with one. After I married and had kids the subject of owning a dog or cat would inevitably come up. I always would tell them that we couldn't have pets because they made me sick. Not that it stopped the kids from trying. This is where you could say the Internet is actually a good thing or a bad thing. As the kids got older and personal computers came into our home, they began to do their research. The coup de gras was when a neighbor, who also was Daughter#2's 4th grade teacher, told us how she had written this touching essay on how she would love to have a dog. Shortly thereafter, Ann and Daughter#1 spotted this cute miniature schnauzer as a local pet store and as they say the rest is history. They assured me that schnauzers don't shed as they have hair (and hence need to be groomed on a regular basis) and not fur so I would be fine and I was. So we had our first dog - Winifred or Winnie as we mostly called her. She was with us for 17 years before she crossed the Rainbow Bridge. Another good or bad thing (depends n your view) of the Internet was the formation of Petfinder.Com. Ann and daughter#1 spend way to much time on this site for animals needing to be adopted and the result has been two more dogs - Napoleon, another mini schnauzer and Rosie. He was with us only two years before he left us due to cancer. Next up was another senior - Rosie. She was advertised as a mini schnauzer also, but we think she is more of a schnauzer mix. We got her 5 years ago at the age of 9 and she is still with us. Ever since we took in Napoleon (both he and Rosie are rescues), we've had two dogs. With Winnie's passing a while back, we've just had Rosie and we've sort of fallen into a routine with just having her. Not that the dog surfing had come to an end. There were a few attempts to adopt another dog, but forever the reason things didn't just work out. That all came to an end this past weekend when we adopted Scruffy from the Homeless Animal Rescue Team (HART) located in Fairfax County. Here is the newest member of the family:

Scruffy is another senior dog. He's a 10 year old soft coated Wheaten Terrier. He's has been fostered for almost a year awaiting a new permanent home. He's a victim of a divorce. His owners divorced and neither party wanted him. That is so sad. How can you own a dog for 10 years and just abandon him?

So far he's settled in fine. He has met Rosie and after a few butt sniffs on both sides, things seem to be going well.
He's not a mini schnauzer so I'm hoping I don't have asthma problems with him You can't really row suffering from asthma. So far so good. The Internet assures me I will be fine and you can always believe what the Internet tells you, right? We do need to get him a bigger bed though. It's a tight squeeze for him to fit in Rosie's bed given he's twice her size. As an aside, the first dog I remember my family having when I was growing up was a cocker spaniel mix also named Scruffy. I think there is a connection there. Welcome to the family Scruffy.