M and I first met the puppy who would become our dog Moose when he was 5 weeks old. We were living in Frisco, Colorado at the time and decided that we wanted an Alaskan Malamute. I can’t remember why we decided on that type of dog, but fortunately for us, there was a lady in Denver named Diane, who was a Malamute breeder.
M and I drove down to Denver one day to see the remaining 4 or 5 puppies from a litter of 8, as well as to meet the mother, since we read that was an important thing to do. I am not sure why, but I suspect it has something to do with the potential temperament of the dog when it matures. M and I showed up at Diane the breeder’s house with no idea what to expect, other than we would get to see some puppies. I do not think we expected to fall in love with a puppy that day, but realistically, when has anyone ever visited with puppies and not fallen in love with them immediately?
Diane took us to a room where she had the puppies waiting for us. She let them out of a crate to wander around while she interviewed us to see if we could become suitable parents. We talked and watched the puppies explore for a bit, before one puppy wandered out of the room and toward the stairs leading down to the rest of the house. I asked Diane if that was ok, and she said I should probably retrieve him before he tumbled down the stairs. I went and got the little guy and brought him back to the room, but he continued to try and venture further than he was allowed.
I don’t remember why M and I chose that particular puppy. Maybe it had something to do with his colors, which at the time were a mix of black, dark gray, and white. He had particularly dark “mascara” around his eyes, which later became a running joke around the neighborhood due to various neighbors complimenting Moose on his makeup application. His colors changed as he grew, and his “mascara” eventually faded. Moose was a total furball, like a lot of puppies, but what we didn’t know until later was that Moose was actually a type of Malamute called a Wooly Malamute. Basically that means the fur of the wooly Malamute is simply longer than normal.
We did get the chance to briefly meet with the mother of the litter, who turned out to be quite the aggressive mom. That caused us some concern, as we did not want an aggressive dog, but we eventually figured out that the mother was upset about something when we saw her and that we shouldn’t put too much stock into her behavior at that particular time.
M and I had to wait another 4-5 weeks before we could bring the puppy home. We used that time to prepare for his arrival. We bought a humongous crate and a dog bed, more on that, later. It was around this time that M and I decided to choose a name for the dog. Since the dog was an Alaskan Malamute, we thought he should have a name from Alaska, so we got out an atlas and started to look at town names in Alaska. Everyone we knew with a northern breed dog, named the dog Juneau, or Kenai, or something along those lines. We wanted a different name. Something with one syllable. Talk about a challenge. Try looking for a one syllable name for a town in Alaska. A lot of them are unpronounceable because they are Inuit names, like Talkeetna. After searching for a while, we found a town called Moose. It is a simple name, and at the time, we didn’t know any other dogs named Moose.
When the time came to pick up Moose, we drove back down to Diane’s house, full of excitement, and I am sure, a bit of trepidation due to the unknown. Diane had washed and bathed Moose, who in the time since we had first seen him, had gone from about 5 pounds to about 12 pounds. Instead of looking like a small moving Chia Pet, Moose looked like a toy dog. I do not mean that in a negative sense, but more in the sense that he didn’t look real because he was so perfect. Not a fur out of place, very cute and incredibly soft.
The three of us set off for the nearest PetSmart store to stock up on puppy food. Since PetSmart is a pet-friendly pet store, we used that time to take Moose for his first little walk. It did not take long in the store for people to notice Moose and want to pet him. We made our purchases, and proving that the attention in the store in addition to the walk was a lot of activity, Moose slept in M’s lap the whole drive home.