Look at that mug?  Isn’t he just adorable!?!  Seriously how can you not love that?  I have a Riggins themed story to share with you.

Owning a big dog. Riggins is a “big dog” although he technically is medium-sized his personality, color, appetite, teeth size and constant need for attention make him a BIG DOG!

Riggins big dog status is never more true than when I’m shopping for my baby at Petco or a similar pet supply company.  I grab a cart … always.  I’ve made the mistake of not grabbing a cart and find myself trying to juggle in arms and on hips, oversized bags of bones, food and dog toys.   Does not work!  Then I pass all the frilly costumes and cutie stuffed toys.  Both those items will last exactly 15 seconds near Riggins.  I stopped buying him stuffed doll style toys years ago.  All that happens is my house is that, within seconds, it turns into a stuffed toy CSI crime scene.   Gruesome!

I make my way to the food section to grab a bag of grub.  Now as his appetite far exceeds his size I buy “healthy weight” food.  My theory is that he can then eat more, which will make him happy.  He isn’t overweight and is extremely active so there is a good chance that my little theory isn’t actually the best thing for him but I’m sticking with it.  Then, like a crazy person, I look for the “large breed” bags and if I can’t find them (which happens a lot) I start going to the other brands/bags feeling them to try to figure out the size of the food nugget.  Once I bought a GIANT bag of teeny tiny little food nuggets and it DID NOT go over well.  I can’t blame Riggins for being grouchy about it.  He could floss his teeth with those tiny things and I think he was unsatisfied and his inability to easily crunch them up and instead could just suck them down whole.

Once that little issue is solved I head to the rawhide section.  Again skipping over any puny little stick or bite size piece.  What’s the point?  That isn’t going to last more than seconds.  I rummage through the bone pieces for a hoof or two.  Hoofs tend not to shred and come off in small pieces until the very end when you can grab them from Riggins to keep him from choking.  The bones easily splinter under Riggins super jar strength and bone slivers are bad news.  As an extra bonus hoofs really gross people out which make me giggle.  I try to tell them that it is good for the animal that we are using every single part of him/her but it doesn’t really help out the “ewww factor”

No hoofs?  Then off to find the biggest bag of rawhide strips one can find.  These work well as they take about 5 minutes (vs. seconds) for Riggins to consume and he is pretty good about not choking on them … pretty good … but still needs to be watched.   They will satisfy his need for a “treat” which keeps him from giving me that look (see picture above) while I’m trying to enjoy an episode of NCIS with a nice glass of wine.  Nothing takes the buzz out of a relaxation time-out then having a dog sit in front of you lookin’ all sad and whiney!

Then, if I take Riggins with me, I have to make a wide arc around the open buckets of treats Petco (and other such places) put in a common area.  It’s like the buy by the pound candy/nut section in your grocery store.  Only Riggins doesn’t speak English and doesn’t understand the need to purchase prior to consuming.  I have, more than once, had to physically push/pull him back with all my weight as his head is in one of those buckets chomping along in perfect bliss.  All he sees is a giant OPEN BUFFET — ALL YOU CAN EAT sign and he is going for it!

He is a BIG DOG.  All teeth, lots of love and the cutest most adorable baby anyone can have!