My Venture with Scout

Scout is my dog, normally I say Scout is my boyfriend Alex’s dog because I fought having a dog tooth and nail, on numerous occasions I told Alex to take his dog and leave, but next month marks one year of having Scout and I guess I have to resign that she indeed is my dog.

Why did I not want a dog?

I have 3 cats, Roca, Rusty, and Zoe, they are pretty low maintenance, as long as I feed them and clean their litter, they are happy. They each have their own personalities and I love them, I love them so much that I could not fathom disturbing their peace and introducing a new pet, especially one that is not cat! As it is, Roca has become increasingly bitter with the introduction of each additional cat, I felt like a dog was going to push her over the edge.

I am selfish; I like to do what I want when I want, that means not having to worry about the logistics of what we are going to do with the dog. Cats are easy, you put out extra food, water, and additional litter boxes and they will be happy the humans are not wanting to pet and cuddle for a few days. It is much less of a burden to ask a friend to check in on the cats every few days than to take care of a dog which is a 24/7 job (especially this dog).

How did I end up with Scout?

In June 2019 , my parents dogs had puppies and they needed to find them homes because they could not afford to keep them and as it is, my mom doesn’t like dogs (this is probably where I picked it up). I said no to taking a dog on multiple occasions, but my mom took that as a sign that she should ask Alex instead. Alex has only ever had a pet goldfish and boy was he excited about the idea of a dog, but I still said NO.

August 2019 we traveled to Fort Worth to visit my family for my niece’s birthday and when my mom asked about a puppy, I still said NO, but that didn’t stop her from having my niece collect all the puppies and bring them inside so I could reject them in person. Yup it was still a NO from me. I did not want this responsibility and I made that clear to everyone, especially Alex! Obviously I somehow ended up with a puppy, but I was so upset that Alex didn’t back me and my wishes that I was ready to be done with him. How could I be with someone who didn’t respect my feelings that way? I felt so betrayed when I said no and Alex sat with his puppy eyes and got every single person in my family to keep pressuring me to take a dog, my mom was even massaging me while telling me how happy a dog was going to make me. Alex left with a dog, I wasn’t happy.

Why I wanted to quit:

She was so needy! I treasure the few hours of sleep I get at night and I wasn’t getting those because she had to use the restroom every 2 hours. We couldn’t leave the house for more than a few hours at a time because we had to be back to check on her and let her out. We had planned my 30th birthday vacation and we couldn’t take her or find a place to board her because of her age, we ended up paying someone a few hundred dollars to watch her for a week. My cats do not like her. She is so hyper, everyone says she is a “working dog” even to this day I can take her on a 2-3 hour hike and she still wants to play when we get home. She destroyed my new heels! She wants to chew on you (must be how she shows love), she isn’t as bad as she used to be, but when you go in for pets she always wants to nibble. She has destroyed my couch, which I don’t understand because it is one of her favorite places to be…I could go on forever!

Why I didn’t quit:

I want to cry just thinking about the struggle that was Scout at the beginning, but guys, it is so worth it for that goofy face she makes when she doesn’t understand whats going on. It is an ongoing struggle, especially because we never got to take her to training classes because I had a family emergency and then the pandemic happened, but YouTube and a very awesome friendship and walks with a dog named Sonny have really helped. Even with all the craziness, I’m just not the type of person that quits, especially on a living being, I will never understand people who abandon their dogs, Scout is so expressive and has a personality that isn’t shy about letting me know when she is upset. I can’t imagine getting home and not having her wag her tail so hard she knocks on everything within reach and her galloping back and forth waiting for me to put my things down and pet her.

The day I knew she was my dog was probably the day she found me a fossil outside, I had already secretly loved her, but that day I made it Instagram official! Follow Scout and my cats on the Instagram, link: https://www.instagram.com/lansburycats/

My First Post

I feel like my first post should be something super awesome that is really going to get people to want to read my blog, but the reality is that I’m really not worried about anyone reading this blog. I don’t have any words of wisdom or ventures I want to share just yet, mostly because I’m still confused on how these pages work and wonder if this will even post or if i will somehow accidentally delete it or attach it to the wrong place (In my experience, this is very likely to happen).

In this post I’m simply going to answer the suggested questions to help me get started:

Why are you blogging publicly, rather than keeping a personal journal?

I’m starting this blog as a business venture, to help me with my taxes at the end of the year. This is the 3rd year in a row I owe taxes, which one would think means I’m doing pretty good for myself, but I feel like I’m barely making it, in fact i have a ton of debt which is telling me I’m very much not making it. Don’t get me wrong, I am very blessed to be in the position I find myself, but there is definitely moves I can make, and this is one of those moves….I imagine i will write a blog that talks about this further.

What topics do you think you’ll write about?

This started as a travel blog idea because I do love to travel, specifically I’m a nerd that wants to visit all the national parks one day. I love hiking, camping, and seeing all the places that I never even dreamed existed. Growing up, my family was definitely low income, not much traveling going on there, didn’t even know to where or how one travels and goes on vacation. Thankfully, one life changing environmental science class, college, and a ton of geology classes got me traveling. Ventures are not only physical journeys one takes, in my life I’ve had many journeys, so instead of making this a travel blog, I’m making it about my ventures or adventures which lets me share other journeys I’ve traveled, for example my marriage and divorce, my journey through school as a first generation student trying to figure things out, and so many more.

Who would you love to connect with via your blog?

I would love to connect with anyone and everyone who finds anything I might say beneficial. Please let me know, its wild to think how we can easily connect to someone we would otherwise have no idea existed before the internet.

If you blog successfully throughout the next year, what would you hope to have accomplished?

If anyone sees my about me page, I would like to be able to describe myself better by the end of a year blogging. If not for this blog, I don’t know that I would take time to reflect on my thoughts, so hopefully I stick to it and become more in tune because of it.