Lucy aka 十三妹

To tell our story about the farm where we-excluding-hubby had a fabulous fun patting and hugging dogs, I need to share the story of Lucy first.

I first saw Lucy when we were back in Batu Pahat for 2012's Chinese New Year. 

Hubby brought me to a new "Mee Hoon Kuay" food store and he ran into an old friend. After I finished my noodle, I wandered off to buy juice from a nearby coffeeshop. As I started to walk back, I saw this little brown puppy watching me. I squatted and patted its head for a while, and started to walk away. Puppies are always adorable but... dangerous. There are so many puppies on the street, and what do I do when I fall in love with every one of them? I haven't got my farm yet... So walking away is always the best thing to do as long as the puppy is not in immediate danger. She loitered around a coffee shop, she should not starve. Right?  

And the little brown thing just kept following me. When I reached the food store, I went in and asked hubby for some meat from his bowl to feed her. Of course, hubby wasn't too happy to share his food, haha! After the food, I went back to the car to fetch Lucy some water.

I knew I was in trouble. I wanted to bring her home.

This is truly a DNA defect in all humans; when we fall in love with something, we want to bring it home, we want to possess it. We just could not leave it alone, utterly convince it could not continue to be happy without us.  

Being the hubby that I fell in love, still in love with, he of course said no. 

I begged and cried, and begged again.

I know it would be difficult to keep her, but perhaps Batu-Dad might be able to keep her in the place where he stores his renovation material with the rest of the guard dogs? 

No good...there are snakes there, she is too small to handle snakes. 

Wouldn't the rest of the dogs help her if she is in trouble with the snakes? 

No, they won't. 

I left her in the area with water and went off with teary eyes. I kept trying, and finally hubby told me to check with Papa Dom, who had only one condition. The puppy must be named Lucy. Papa Dom can name her Auntie Lucy for all I care, as long as he was willing to have her! As all fairy tales go, the rest is history.

Lucy puppy napping after we bathed her at Batu home before sending her to Papa Dom.

Turned out it was a good thing that Lucy was adopted by Papa Dom. Less than two weeks after we picked her up, she had a bad infection near her front shoulder. The vet said Lucy could have died since she could not reach to lick the wound to keep the flies away.

The wound was so swollen that the pus literally burst out on the way to the vet. Poor hubby took another hit...

And in a way, that turned out to be a blessing for me! I got to keep Lucy for a couple of days in OUR house because Papa Dom was very caught up with work at that time. He didn't know I was hatching evil plans to have him adopt a puppy; it was difficult for him to re arrange work last minute. Lucy needed to be fed with antibiotic on time and the wound needed to be cleaned several times a day. I was the best person to do that since I am technically half a housewife with me working from home :)

I was never so happy being a part time housewife!

Lucy really loves to be on her stomach!

There she goes again!

It was really nice to have Lucy at home. I used to be really uncomfortable with unknown noises at home, especially if it originated from the upper level. I would bring along a small knife when I go up to check; that was how uncomfortable I was. With Lucy around, and if she did not stir from those noise, I know it was just noise and not someone trying to break in. She followed me everywhere, and that kind of kept me feeling a lot more secure :)

She would laze around when I was working at the backyard.

This is a crop of the top photo, but look at her cute snout, her smooth fur, who would mind a repeat :)

Oh! Why does Lucy have an alias?!

Lucy was at a farm as a guard dog for a period of time. In the farm, there are other guard dogs, and Lucy used to fight them a couple of them all the time. Despite the scars and wounds, she continued to fight to try to claim the alpha spot in the pack. She fought so much and has so many scars, so Papa Dom nicknamed her 十三妹 <simple translation: female hooligan>.

See, I told you - puppies are dangerous.