Pulled: Friday December 30 2011 from Richmond County Animal Shelter
Adoption commitment for Gregor: Wednesday January 28 2012 by Jen Fowler and Kevin Richmond
Adoption commitment for Hazelle: Saturday December 31 2011 by the Headley Greenlaw family
Meet Chesters Gregor and Hazelle, fosters #59 and 60:
Chesters Edwards and Forest went to their new homes today! Hurrah! Conveniently, Edwards’s/Frankie’s new home is only twenty minutes from the Richmond County Animal Shelter, so I thought it only polite to pay Allison a visit. As soon as Allison saw me, she said that she had the perfect foster: a 3 month old Chihuahua/Feist male pup. “Perfect!” I said. And, indeed, he is. See teeny tiny Gregor, below:
And, no, there aren’t any “G” towns/cities/counties in SC named Gregor. Naming fosters after towns/cities/counties is so 2011. With a new year comes a new system of naming fosters: I will go down an alphabet of literary characters. I told friend Rebecca Pomeroy to choose the name for my “G” foster, since I used her donation to pay his pull fee. She sent a list of truly fun and funky “G” names, but I fell in love with the name “Gregor” — probably because it made me thing of Suzanne Collins’s The Underland Chronicles, featuring none other than Gregor the Overlander as the young hero. Yay for literary associations! — although Grace Hagood: I promise to name a foster “Easley” at some point, just for you.
And, yes, Gregor is wearing a Christmas collar with a bell. You can just see the corner of it in the photo. Why did he come with bells on, literally? For the same reason that Daphne BordeauX had a bow on her head. Richmond County Animal Shelter employee Ashley always adorns her favorite shelter dogs.
Of course, I couldn’t pull only one puppy. A puppy needs a puppy friend — or he’ll cry at night and keep us awake. Enter Chester3 Hazelle. In the perfect literary world, Gregor would be paired with Luxa. But, I needed an “H” name, so I settled on a Suzanne Collins’s character from a different book: The Hunger Games. Hazelle Hawthorne is Gale’s mother in the series, and is a minor though resilient and therefore admirable character. And her namesake is resilient too:
You kind of have to be when you’re alone at 3 months in a shelter. Gregor and Hazelle aren’t from the same litter, though they look alike in some ways (small ears, short snout). Hazelle is listed as a Cocker Spaniel mix; still, at three months, she isn’t much bigger than Gregor. So, perhaps she’s a Spaniel mixed with a smaller dog, like a Chihuahua?
What I’ve noticed about the newest additions so far:
Gregor’s best feature: an underbite and a tail that curls above his back
Hazelle’s best feature: one eye with eyeliner, and one without
Gregor’s best personality trait: he’s feisty. Very. He barked at and chased my mother’s much older and larger dogs. And he won.
Hazelle’s best personality trait: she’s sweet. Very. Gregor would rather play, and Hazelle would rather cuddle; so each annoys the other. However, when Hazelle reaches her breaking point, she never fails to “pin” Gregor, Lion King style:
Good girl, Hazelle.
Contact me if you’d be interested in adopting Gregor or Hazelle!
And now for a memorable mishap:
This is an old memorable mishap, actually, but it’s appropriate since it involves both rescue dogs and Gregor the Overlander. Earlier in the year, I was coming back from the Dillon County Animal Shelter with some fosters (Paxville and York maybe?), and I was listening to an audiobook, as I often do on long trips. I was so engrossed in the story that I didn’t realize I was still driving in the left-hand lane on the interstate, and slowly at that. Someone who was wanting to pass honked angrily and then gesticulated wildly once I changed lanes and he was beside me.
My response? Like a dork, I pointed at the cd player and mouthed:
“I’M SORRY! I’M LISTENING TO GREGOR! HE JUST BRUSHED LAPBLOOD’S FUR! IT’S VERY MOVING!”
All that to say: Gregor, I think, is a very fitting name for my first literary-themed foster. Well chosen, Rebecca!
Fostering Chester 
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