zelda

zelda, originally uploaded by allyzay.

this is zelda. she is one of many german shepherds my family has had throughout my whole life. if i remember this all correctly, she was a couple-years-later replacement for roxy, who was given to people who owned a farm (FOR REAL, GUYS) because we lived in a small condo and the dog was too hyperactive--it was cruel to keep her there, she spent her days herding me, basically. when we moved to a larger place, we got another one.

a few years later (maybe less time? it's funny what years of drinking does to your memory, isn't it?), my mom comes across a german shepherd, actually from germany. he was a police dog who was being rejected from the force for being "too silly." that is a straight-up translated actual quote. so my mother, always with dollar signs in her eyes, takes him with hopes of producing adorable german shepherd puppies. i have serious misgivings with my mother's obsession with breeding dogs starting and ending with the word "overpopulation problem," but that's not really the point of this post so i'll just stop there.

anyway, multiple sexy time attempts later, my mom is informed by a dog gynocologist (how does one find themselves in this profession?) that zelda, who is nearly twice the size of a normal female shepherd and almost as large as the police dog, now named zeus, is not really a girl dog. she's a hermaphrodite!

my mother then exasperatedly purchased a different german shepherd, kali--a real lottery win for my dad, at this point, who loves shepherds and has now found himself with a veritable bonanza of them--only to quickly find out that kali is very much against the idea of sex with boys, and zeus is too interested in playing and acting like a kid out there (he gives piggy back rides to the smaller dogs, for real) to really force the issue. this brought a final end to the german shepherd breeding saga.

zelda was a very sweet dog who loved to have her photo taken and be cuddled and petted. she had a stroke two days ago, which made it hard for her to keep her head up, resulting in the constantly tipped, quizzical head she's sporting in the above picture. her condition got worse and she was put to sleep yesterday, the end. my dad and mom and two sisters took her picture a bunch of times and cuddled with her and fed her a hot dog (?? i don't know what this is about and don't care to ask, some kind of voodoo i'm assuming) and zelda always loved car rides so at least she went out pretty happy.

and of course my mom chooses this time to inform me that zeus will also have to be put down soon too, on account of him developing the infamous german shepherd hips. it's a wonderful week, everyone! zeus, enjoy the hot dogs, whatever that is even about, while you can.