^^^^^^^, one of my old dogs, Hogan the Great Dane, was born with a curved, twisted, arthritic spine, missing muscle groups in all 4 legs,, arthritis in most joints of his body, deaf as a post and dumber than his own $hit, but he never ever seemed to have any regrets or complaints, he was by far the most cheerful, loving dog i've ever met. i'll miss him til the end of my days
we still had his sister (Priscilla)after he went and she was deaf too and nearly completely blind by the end, but again, never complained about anything, just wanted to share whatever i was doing and never failed to offer total unquestioning love (if not obedience....)
she's been gone a while now but we just couldn't get by without a dog so we went out and splashed big bucks on a pedigree Dane, with the intention of getting a dog that at least wasn't broken when we got it. then we decided she was probably lonely in the yard on her own so we got another rescue. best move we could have made, Finn is the craziest, happiest, friendliest dog you will ever meet, he and Lei-Lani were best friends from the second they met, they absolutely love each other
i guess what i'm trying to say is dogs are indeed our best friends, unconditional, unquestioning and uncomplaining. being around them and 'owning' them has taught me far more than i would have ever believed it would. having seen what they can do and still get on with it sometimes helps me when the arthritis etc kicks in and makes just moving a fairly painful thing to do. just tell meself to shut up and get on with it......
anyway enough dribbling from me, heres some pics of the kids
this is Hogan, you can see how skinny he was, didn't matter how much we fed him he never put any weight on, people thought we were starving him
his siter, priscilla, deaf, blind and very sneaky......
Lei-Lani, the puppy version, she's a bit bigger now, closer to 60kg than the 20kg when we got her
and finally, Finn, the miniature Irish Wolfhound, got more love than he knows what to with