a joyful life

A food-item (Waffles, Peanut)

A color (Pinky, Hazel)

A real-life person (Marilyn, Paris)

A fictional character (Eevee, Simba)

A type of flora (Rosie, Willow)

Animal-like (Kitty, Gator)

A trait (Lucky, Buddy)

Something else

If you have more than one pet, choose the most applicable listed (ex: you have three pets named Cookie, Cream & Rocky, so you choose the “Food” option). Also, would be interested if you reblogged your pet’s name(s) in the tags and the reason why you chose it ^^

I was driving through Vermont with a friend, and we pulled over at a tiny shop offering Maple Items. We were on the state highway, not the interstate, so "pulling over" meant "squeezing my tiny car into a parking bay the size of a broad highway shoulder."

As we got out of the car, an older woman emerged from behind the building where she had been pruning her roses. She introduced herself as Tammy.

Her shop offered the promised variety of Maple, but also a number of small antiques and a plethora of dog figurines, plaques, and clearly-hand-stitched garden flags.

A huge purple ribbon hung on the wall behind the register, along with many pictures of small dogs. This was no county fair ribbon. It was the size of my torso. The material had the soft sheen of actual silk.

As I placed my purchases on the counter, I asked, "Do you... Breed dogs?"

Yes. She does. She has bred Yorkies for the last 40 years. Her mother bred Yorkies before her. The purple ribbon was from her national championship winning Yorkie.

You may be expecting that the infodump was going to be about Yorkies.

It was not.

It was about 40 years of drama in the Yorkie breeding community. Where – you must understand – the judging at shows is often about who you're in with, not about the dogs. This is especially true when Tammy's opponents win anything.

And Tammy's mother! Well. Phyllis has been on the Yorkie scene since Yorkies were invented. Because of this, many women of equally venerable age hold deep grudges against Phyllis. The sort of grudges that result in episodes of Midsommar Murders.

This led to deep injustices against Phyllis on the part of judges and prevented her dogs from winning so often she retired from the scene. Judging is all about who you're friends with, after all.

After 20 years in hiding, Phyllis – the One True Queen of Yorkie Breeding – hatched a plot. She may have been out of the show circuit, but she was still breeding dogs. She entered an absolutely perfect bitch in the national competition, but sent her with a handler rather than go in person.

None of the usurpers knew who this dog belonged to, and in dog-breeding circles this Does Not Happen. This could have resulted in further injustices, but Phyllis was crafty. She knew this tournament was being judged by a man from the UK, who knew naught of the drama in the US Yorkie Empire.

With these advantages – and being the best dog there – Phyllis's bitch won the highest honor at the show.

Incensed by this insult to their ill-gotten supremacy, the other owners descended on the handler after the show, demanding to know for whom he was working.

"Phyllis," said he.

The name of the overthrown queen evoked horror in the usurpers.

"PHYLLIS!? She's still ALIVE!???"

Yes, Phyllis yet lived, and this bitch – the dog, not the woman – went on to mother Tammy's current dogs. One of whom, Lucy-Fur, is the reincarnation of Tammy's sister (also Lucy). This is certain for two reasons.

Firstly, Sister Lucy absolutely went straight to Hell upon her death, and Lucy-Fur the dog is positively as evil as Sister Lucy was.

there’s sixteen Colorado counties that their most searched was “wolf furry”, plus thirty-odd counties (not counting either Arapahoe or any of the ones marked here as “Insufficient Data”) which may well have had plenty of searches for “wolf furry”, just fewer than for whatever they’re labeled here

and “skunk furry” searches in Arapahoe County outnumbered “wolf furry” searches in the entire state of Colorado

Just assume all other parameters are neutral. It's a friendly enough dog, you're not in a rush, etc.

(I am chucky in this scenario above)

Chihuahuas are tiny but mighty and I would think their tenacious attitudes would be a net positive. I will address how MANY chihuahuas i think you would need to = the pulling strength of an Iditarod team below but I want to address some other factors a hypothetical chihuahua musher would face with this...unique team makeup:

1.) Chihuahuas need small frequent meals most of the time due to their size while arctic breeds tend to use the same amount of food more efficiently. Obviously we are going to need MORE Chihuahuas than a Alaskan Husky Iditarod team (16 dogs at max capacity), but they will also probably need to eat more food per pound than the huskies not only because of the husky ability to need less food per pound, but also because Chihuahuas are a breed that was developed for warm weather they have much shorter hair and lack the double coats of even Alaskan Huskies so they will also spend more nutrients keeping warm. Iditarod sled dogs consume an average of 12,000 calories per day and the race takes about 10 days more or less to complete at a competitive pace.

2.) Chihuahuas are actually pretty good at pulling stuff and several compete in weight pull, so pulling is a good outlet in a non hypothetical scenario with the right precautions. SOME. VIDEOS .

Adorable.

3.) A dog's ethical "working load" for longer distances can be determined by a % of its body weight and scaled for conditioning and breed size. A larger dog is typically going to be able to pull more weight per pound, but little dogs shouldn't be counted out. For small dogs up to 25 pounds it is typically said that 10-20% of the dog's body weight can be safely pulled (for large dogs it's usually more). In a weight pull scenario like above, which is very short distance, dogs can pull up to 3x their body weight (sometimes more but not often).

Okay let's do math (which i'm bad at, but calculators exist so thank god):

The Chihuahua standard says that dogs must NOT exceed 6 pounds/2.7kg and Alaskan Huskies are often not more than 60 pounds/27.2kg and less than 35 pounds/15.8kg (for reference my smallest Alaskan Malamute is 75 pounds/34kg and my largest is 110 pounds/50kg....)

Loaded with gear an Iditarod sled weighs around 200 pounds/90.7kg.

Most Iditarod dogs are not at the maximum size/weight range, mostly closer to 45 pounds/20kg on average. For the purposes of this exercise I will use 5 pounds/2.2kg for the Chihuahua. I will assume that these Chihuahua's are at their maximum strength and conditioning much like sled dogs and use the 20% metric for the amount of weight they could pull. Because our average Chihuahua is 5 pounds in this scenario it makes the math easy. 20% of 5 is uh.....1.

So to conclude it is likely that you would need a team of 200+ Chihuahuas to pull an Iditarod sled (and omg the amount of food...). That paints QUITE the visual.

Here is Jeff Deeter from Black Spruce Dog Sledding, an Iditarod kennel, running a 29 dog team for reference of what a large amount of dogs in harness might...be like?

anyways whose gonna make a visual of the hypothetical chihuahua team bc i would like to see it

- I dreamed of you. - You said that. At the inn. - Did I? Well, my dreams are not like yours. Mine come true. An impressive talent for an unimpressive man. Another one of life's little ironies.

• Multiple strangers have told me about how their dog could use King as a chew toy. In violent detail as some "friendly small talk". This one happened again just yesterday.

• Person followed me all the way to my car and cornered me just so they could tell me King was cute. Scared the shit out of me, I was alone.

• "Aww cute he reminds me of my dog that died" the stranger then went into graphic detail about how their dear fluffy died. This one happens way too often.

• "Can they meet?" -person with a giant dog that had been looking at King like he was a tasty squirrel. Stranger then tried to let them meet after I said no

• Strangers followed us and took pictures of King. I don't mind photos but please ask and don't follow me!

• Whole ass adults have tried to pet King without asking. These whole ass adults were then offended that King was scared of them.

• Stranger picked King up and pet him without asking. This stranger then proceeded to chit chat with me while holding King as if this was a very normal thing. King and I were equally horrified.

Goldens have two main head types, Block and Cone (sometimes called slender but I digress). Blockheads have the big blocky heads and coneheads are more pointy. Two examples below.

As far as I'm aware, its just an aesthetic thing and has no impact on their health.