Willa the dog is a year old now. She is not a good dog, exactly, but she's an enormously sweet one, a springy, exuberant creature who enters snort-filled, unseemly paroxysms of joy every time she greets a person or another dog.
She does 11 different tricks and responds to our commands probably 80 percent of the time. We can leave her unsupervised for long periods of time, although I still can't entirely trust her. After being allowed on the bed for months without incident, she chewed a big hole in my down comforter last night. God, what a bitch!
But also last night, after many treats and much manipulation, she lay quietly and chewed on her bone while the cat dozed on the other side of the room, something I was starting to think would never happen.
She's still uneven. But she's steadily getting better, and I already think she's fantastic.
All this is to say that Eric and I are completely in love with this goddamn dog. And like people in love, we sometimes do stupid things. In this case, we bought and administered a doggie DNA test for her.
I know they have a reputation for being unreliable junk, but our curiosity got the better of us.
Every time we take her out we field guesses as to what her mix might be: the girls at the pet store are convinced she's got Shar-Pei in her; someone said (ridgeless) Rhodesian Ridgeback; we've heard Boxer (no way); pointer (well, she does kinda point at birds, but...nah); shepherd (ok, but what kind?); and many others that I can't remember right now.
The only thing we know for sure is that she's a mutt. So we did the cheek swab, and now we are waiting for the results.
If you would like to take stab in the comments as to what her mix might be, feel free; I will devise some sort of (probably dog-related) fabulous prize for the person who comes the closest to the test results. Sound like a plan?