"You have reached the NEW home of Sarah, Toby and Maligne (special dog) ... ."
When Toby www.seetobylive.com and Sarah www.tobyandsarah.com began their relationship a few years ago, she made it very clear that it was a package deal that included Maligne, who is now a huge part of their life.
I guess Sarah inherited a love of pets from me. We had a succession of dogs ("Lady" in particular) and cats that met various untimely ends when I was a boy.
Sarah's first dog was a lively little Heinz 57 mutt that I acquired about 1981 while on assignment for the Edmonton Journal.
It involved a story about a Canadian Coastguard tug making its annual spring trip down the Athabasca River from Fort McMurray to Lake Athabasca and then down the Slave River to Fort Fitzgerald on the Northwest Territories border.
Large barges were then being operated out of Fort McMurray to supply the uranium mine and townsite at Uranium City, Sask. on the east end of Lake Athabasca.
The Coastguard tug Miskew would open the shipping season by going down the two rivers and marking problem sandbars with buoys. The crew would also stop at every bend to set out a navigation marker on the river bank.
When the trip ended at the Fort Fitzgerald Coastguard base, I saw a little black and white pup scampering around. The tug captain said to take him because he would only get caught in someone's trap, anyway.
Fitz (seen in the above picture taken in the Porcupine Hills, west of my parents' Claresholm home) was a much-loved part of our household while I was a single Dad. He and Sarah came as a package when Joan and I got married in 1986.
At the ripe old doggy age of about twelve, Fitz went to that place in the sky where delicious, stinky bones are buried everywhere.
When Sarah began living on her own, she went looking for a dog at the Edmonton pound and found Maligne, a sort of husky cross.
Sarah was then heavily-involved in whitewater kayaking and named her dog after the river that drains Maligne Lake in Jasper park.
Maligne has a kid's personality, curiosity and a lively intelligence . She always has a happy, tongue-lolling grin and turns heads and triggers smiles wherever she goes for a walk.
Sarah lavished affection on her, giving her obedience lessons, the best veterinary care and only high quality, pelletized dog food.
She takes Maligne everywhere, even kayaking and hiking.
I love to go for walks with Maligne who adores chasing cloth frisbees, tennis balls, squirrels etc.
When I took her with me on a couple of canoe trips last year, she would sit regally at the bow, calmly watching the scenery.
It's hilarious seeing her plunge into the water after a stick, coming out looking like a drowned rat before vigorously shaking herself off.
She knows some fine tricks, including "high five", shake-a-paw and roll over. But her specialty is chasing cloth frisbees. She goes racing after them, leaping and catching them in mid-air 90 per cent of the time.
I like to take her to the Crestwood School playground near our home. It's surrounded by a chain link fence which has three or four small openings for kids to use without having to go to the main entrance.
When I toss the frisbee into the playground, Maligne scoots along the fence until she finds an opening, leaps through and then goes looking and sniffing for the frisbee.
Sarah and Toby moved to Vancouver in July where they managed to find a dog-friendly rental house owned by a couple who are now out of the country.
Anyone who knows Sarah well knows she doesn't do anything by halves. To counter landlords wary of pets, she had prepared a " doggy resume" that listed all Maligne's good and bad points (very few of those).
Maligne, Toby and Sarah and they have fitted in very well in Vancouver. But there was one nasty surprise.
One of Maligne's bad points is that when she sees a cat, no amount of yelling will stop her from chasing after it.
A couple of months after the move, Sarah let Maligne out for a pee just before bed time. Maligne spotted a black and white 'cat' in the shadows and went for it.
You got it. It was no cat. The skunk gave Maligne both barrels right in the face and the household was soon in an uproar. There was a rush trip to an all-night vet centre where they got some enzyme product to deodorize her.
But apparently she still exudes a whiff of 'eau de skunk' if her fur gets wet. As the old Swede said, "too soon vee get old; too late vee get schmart!"
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