A Visitation

So, today we braved the torrential downpours and gale-force winds (I'm exaggerating, but not by very much) to go and meet the dog we first saw online as "Gizmo". Having met him, I can agree with the current fosters that "Gizmo" might not be the right name for him, but neither is the "Winston" they've been trying to rename him to. For now, I'm thinking that if he ends up our, we'll probably call him "Dubz" (or "Dubzy"), as his fosters are, sometimes referring to him as just "W". Look at the picture, below:

Happy-daig

He seems like the kind of dog that may spawn a thousand names ...Much as Puckett did.

At any rate, today's trip seemed like it was a very good meeting. We walked both dogs, side-by-side, throughout the store, outside and back in again. Initially, they mostly ignored each other. Then they exchanged sniffs. Then a few more sniffs. Then the full on doggy greetings. Then back to ignoring each other. Then more sniffs and greetings. There was a little bit of "am I the alpha?" posturing from both, but neither got too revved up and both quickly disengaged without prompting. 

I didn't want to stay too long, because, not yet knowing how well he'll do with our cats, I don't want to fall in love and be disappointed.. The shelter that the fosters had gotten the dog from had indicated that he'd passed basic cat tests, but, we won't know how he does with ours until he comes to our house for a visit. Hopefully, he does well.

On the plus side of it all, while some of his pix made me think of Puckett, meeting him removed my fears that he'll be too much like Puckett. He's very much a different dog. Still, he shows signs of being in a similar class of awesomeness that Puckett was in. I really hope this works out.