Mary Ann's New Pup

Mary Ann's new basset hound. Not for sale.

My friend Mary Ann lives in South Paris, Maine, a lovely but very cold place. We worked together in the Norway, Maine, bureau of the Sun Journal, and we got to be good friends.

We found that we share lots of opinions, lots of leanings. One big one is that we both love animals. Mary Ann, at the time, had a basset hound named Bozzlee. He was a lovable cuss, but a badly behaved dog. One Thanksgiving, Bozzlee jumped up and pulled a piece of turkey off Peter's plate!

Bozz also never became fully housebroken. We were having similar issues at the time with Gus and Najim, two now-deceased males. Gus was a bichon, Najim a Pekingese. They struggled for dominance all their lives.

Finally, it got so bad that we began putting them in side by side crates when we couldn't keep a close eye on them. One day, I found them peeing on each other through the bars of the crates.

Bozz died last year, after ingesting a plastic shopping bag. Mary Ann was heartbroken, and his death was not the only traumatic event in her life at the time.

She's healing, and partly because she plucked up her courage and went out and got another dog. I can't remember his name, but I painted this picture of him, and his sweet droopy face.

Don't forget! If you're around on Saturday, stop in at Pet Supplies Plus in Groton from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. I'll be painting there, to promote the Art for Shelter Animals Project. I'd love to see you! You can find a map and directions to Pet Supplies Plus in the lower left corner of the home page of Jacobson Arts.