So, yeah. There’s a dog at the house. I have been stressing the word ‘temporarily’ until it’s become a reflex. Someone gushes over him and like a Tourettes patient I yell “He’s. Not. Staying!”

But it’s been a couple of weeks now since Jen and I found him by the side of the road in the Hoffman Triangle, a particularly rough part of Central City. He looked like a large cat, so dirty and tangled that Jen started calling him Marley for his matted dreads. He came running over, though, which is not typical street behavior.

The boy can recognize a couple of saps, what can I say? Jen let the little filthball happily roll all over her while I drove to the vet. They’re a non-profit rescue group and I was hoping they’d be able to keep the bugger. No such luck, and although there were several people who oohed and ahhed over the cleaned up puppy nobody was able to adopt him. So he’s stashed here. And the clock’s ticking. And people are getting attached.

He’s not going to look anything like that in a few months- the vet said he’s a Schnauzer/poodle, about 18 months old and 9lbs. Thick, inches long fur was shaved from him- there was so much of it that we had no idea he was a boy despite his…uh… well endowed and amorous nature (a situation what’s also been ‘fixed’).

Look, I don’t deny he’s cute. But there are already three dogs in my house and I’m in trouble here- outnumbered 2 to 1. Alison wants to keep him because, theoretically, she’ll be taking Bruiser at some point when she gets an apartment and says he’ll be lonely without company. Charlie wants to keep him because he’s a cute little bastard and the same size as Bruiser. When I tell him that Crazyland lives in the gap between having 3 dogs and having 4, he’s pointed out that that’s really only 2 dogs per household. Which is nice, except he lives, eats and poops at my house, not his.

I suspect this is a fight I’m going to lose. But if you know of anybody looking for a cute, affectionate puppy, drop me a line. Please. I’m begging you.