“Surprise, I Gotcha”

“What the hell is this dog doing in my apartment?”-Holly Malone

It was a typical Thursday evening and I just got home from work and walked up to unlock my apartment door, well at least I thought it was gonna be a typical evening. I looked down to find my keys to open my apartment door and was trying to find my keys in the dark so I could unlock the door. I looked up and saw a cute, adorable dog that I didn’t recognize. 

I then proceeded to walk inside and said to my roommate Frankie, “Ummmm…. Who’s dog is this and why is it in our apartment?” Frankie then proceeded to tell me how she was fostering Jessie known as Jess.

My roommate, Frankie rescued Jess from her work. She works at an animal hospital called All Creatures Animal Hospital. She was rescued because she had a contagious disease called Parvo. According to purina.com, Parvo is “Is a small virus that first appeared in the 1970s. It’s transmitted from dog to dog through feces and vomit. Puppies are at the greatest risk for getting Parvo. Parvo in puppies is very serious. It’s a deadly disease that is easily preventable. Parvo strikes young puppies who’ve not been vaccinated.”

Frankie then proceeded to tell me that she had later found out that not only was Jess surrendered, but the owners wanted to euthanize her because they couldn’t breed her or pay her medical bills.

I didn’t grow up with dogs. I was actually terrified of dogs when I was little but as I grew up, I grew out of that phase and began to start loving dogs. Jess was, and still is, extremely attached to Frankie and I was the second mom in the “family”. 

Frankie tried to find a home for Jess but 6 months later… Frankie did not find a home for Jess. Well I guess, she did considering that she is stuck with us! To celebrate her adoption, we didn’t throw her a birthday party. We had a “Gotcha Day”. According to Adoption.com, “Gotcha Day is celebrated by some families as the day their adoption was finalized and becomes “legal.” 

Our “Gotcha Day” for Jess consisted of a two hour adventure to PetSmart. Some of the things that we did while at PetSmart included buying Jess Halloween toys or toys that she liked and letting her pick them out and then we named her toys. We then ended up putting all sorts of ridiculous adorable Halloween costumes on her in the store and took pictures of her. Some things that we dressed her up in were things like a flamingo hat, a princess costume, and lastly a giant hot dog costume.

“I know why this dog is in my apartment because I get to come home to unconditional love at my apartment door every single day.”-Holly Malone