Last weekend was pretty eventful for me. Though I do not miss borings weekends. As most of us celebrate Father's Day during the weekend I also experienced the passing of my cherished friend, Mocha.
Allow me to give a little story of how Mocha came to be and how she came to pass.
Back in the ending of 2000. Jason and Jou Li dropped by my place with a surprise. It was a small furry... round thing that resembled a teddy bear. The first thing she did when she came into the house was head straight to under the sofa and slept. She had this pretty sleepy yet apathetic look about her which made her look extra adorable.
She was pretty oblivious and unafraid of most things, except thunder. I spent a lot of time with her and she was always very energetic. She is also plays very rough. It is how we played that I believe developed her into a very tough and hardy dog in her later years. When I taught Mutu how to sit on chairs and sofas, she would struggle and follow suit. Failing the first umpteenth times only to succeed eventually.
Everybody from far and wide in the neighborhood will drop by just to visit her. They all thought she was so cute and for that my house became quite well known to dog lovers all around. She was always friendly with everybody who would want to make friends. Sadly even with people that did not like dogs. I taught her many things and I felt so lucky for her being so intelligent, that she learned things so easily and so quickly. I even manage to teach her things without using food as bribe which most other people do.
I believe she grew up to be a really beautiful dog. I was told that she had a various combination of ancestry some of which included the Labrador Retriever and German Shepard breed. Her and obedience of a Labrador and subtle color scheming of the German Shepard was pretty noticeable. Despite her gentility towards humans, she is pretty intelligent and ruthless. There was a time when Mutu; my family's miniature Pinscher got lost for the second time because he somehow escaped or got locked out of the house. I had a dumb idea to let Mocha try to track him down, which to my great surprise she did. All I did was talk to her like I always do, and asked if she could find Mutu. She may be a domestic pup but she certainly had a little hunting skill in her whereby any small creature that trespassed into our area would be killed mercilessly. Her long record of kills include rats, shrews, birds, cats and even chicken. I have no idea how the chicken got into my garden but Mocha helped herself to it.
Towards the end, we noticed that she had wounds appearing randomly all over her body. We took her to the vet for a check up. The vet was pleasantly surprised at how well Mocha behaved. She was all calm when the vet drew blood for some tests. To our dismay, the vet diagnosed her having some rare genetic disorder whereby the body's immunity system attacks itself. Much like the human's Lupus. Prescription of steroids were given to her for the rest of her life which was a necessary evil to help slow the process of her disease. Towards the end, the disease was more evident. Signs of the illness advancing was apparent whereby wounds appeared more frequent as well as her losing hair. Despite all of this she still fought on, living her life normally as she could. Until last Friday. I noticed that she did not want to eat her dinner but rather just lay down and rest.
On Saturday I heard a cry from her. I quickly rushed to check what was going on and she already showed signs that she did not have much time left. All I could do was be at her side caressing her and comforting her as best as I could and hoped that she got rest. A few hours into the evening she was gone.
My father and I buried her that night. I was more relieved than sad. That I did not have to make the decision of euthanasia and that if she suffered on her deathbed, it was only for a day or two.
* * * * *
Speaking of my father, I took him out for dinner on Sunday evening to Fish & Co. My dad actually went without much resistance. I guess it was because my mom mentioned how affordable the prices were for the portion received. It was also pretty fortunate that Fish & Co had a Father's Day special where ordering two main meals would get you one free. I was actually hoping to take my dad to The Ship seeing as all of us have not been there for more than a decade. I thought it would have been great to take him to a place which hopefully was old school. I have yet to find out.
She was pretty oblivious and unafraid of most things, except thunder. I spent a lot of time with her and she was always very energetic. She is also plays very rough. It is how we played that I believe developed her into a very tough and hardy dog in her later years. When I taught Mutu how to sit on chairs and sofas, she would struggle and follow suit. Failing the first umpteenth times only to succeed eventually.
Everybody from far and wide in the neighborhood will drop by just to visit her. They all thought she was so cute and for that my house became quite well known to dog lovers all around. She was always friendly with everybody who would want to make friends. Sadly even with people that did not like dogs. I taught her many things and I felt so lucky for her being so intelligent, that she learned things so easily and so quickly. I even manage to teach her things without using food as bribe which most other people do.
I believe she grew up to be a really beautiful dog. I was told that she had a various combination of ancestry some of which included the Labrador Retriever and German Shepard breed. Her and obedience of a Labrador and subtle color scheming of the German Shepard was pretty noticeable. Despite her gentility towards humans, she is pretty intelligent and ruthless. There was a time when Mutu; my family's miniature Pinscher got lost for the second time because he somehow escaped or got locked out of the house. I had a dumb idea to let Mocha try to track him down, which to my great surprise she did. All I did was talk to her like I always do, and asked if she could find Mutu. She may be a domestic pup but she certainly had a little hunting skill in her whereby any small creature that trespassed into our area would be killed mercilessly. Her long record of kills include rats, shrews, birds, cats and even chicken. I have no idea how the chicken got into my garden but Mocha helped herself to it.
Towards the end, we noticed that she had wounds appearing randomly all over her body. We took her to the vet for a check up. The vet was pleasantly surprised at how well Mocha behaved. She was all calm when the vet drew blood for some tests. To our dismay, the vet diagnosed her having some rare genetic disorder whereby the body's immunity system attacks itself. Much like the human's Lupus. Prescription of steroids were given to her for the rest of her life which was a necessary evil to help slow the process of her disease. Towards the end, the disease was more evident. Signs of the illness advancing was apparent whereby wounds appeared more frequent as well as her losing hair. Despite all of this she still fought on, living her life normally as she could. Until last Friday. I noticed that she did not want to eat her dinner but rather just lay down and rest.
