April 10 - Spring Has Sprung
10th April 2019
What an eventful two weeks it's been for Blue!
First, as those of you who follow along on Facebook already know, Blue and I hit the trails for the last gasp of winter with a relatively short hike in Cuyahoga Valley National Park about 10 days ago. Blue was excited to get out in the beautiful early spring winter wonderland until about the last half-mile or so. At that point, he'd had about enough of cold mud puddles and snow falling on his head from overloaded tree branches. If dogs could drink hot chocolate, Blue would have consumed a gallon after we got back to the Humane Society transport van. (As it was, the human walking him - that would be me - made do with about 6 ounces of the stuff. Blue settled for a warm kennel lined with many, many blankets.)
This past Sunday, Blue and I participated in a new Humane Society of Summit County program, Dogs Playing for Life. This innovative breakthrough helps shelters around the country and all over the world create better environments for dogs like Blue and his friends who are waiting for their forever homes through creating safe playgroups where "dogs can be dogs".
No matter how many energetic and compassionate volunteers and employees any shelter might have, this will never be enough to wear out dogs who have to spend most of their time in kennels. After getting a full day of pretty rigorous training, the volunteers and employees of HSSC are now working together to make sure that as many dogs as possible can romp, tumble, and chase each other as often as they can.
The motto of Dogs Playing for Life is, "Every dog, every day". Blue and I are proud to be a small part of this remarkable new initiative, which you can learn more about by visiting the Dogs Playing for Life website: https://dogsplayingforlife.com.
Getting trained up for this exciting new adventure took Blue and I off the trails this past Sunday. However, Blue has done so well on his last two outings that we're both looking forward to busting through five miles this coming Sunday morning. We'll keep you posted on that in a Facebook update on Tax Day. And we'll see you back here toward the end of this month with Blue's monthly weigh-in and progress report. (And yes, mine too.)
In the meantime, please remember the real purpose of all this: to find Blue his forever home and to keep making steady progress toward our $5,000 2019 Pound of Cure fundraising goal. Blue and I, as always, greatly appreciate all of your help as we work together to accomplish both.
Thanks for following along!
Ted
