Rudy and Wyatt came into our live six months ago yesterday. We absolutely love the dogs they are becoming.

These six months have gone by pretty fast, despite the summer being marred by extreme heat in June and two big wildfires that burned very close to us.

We also had the misfortune of having the worst air quality in the country, and likely the world, in mid-July.

The air quality greatly improved by late August. The temperatures also returned then to a more tolerable range and the immediate threat of being immolated by fire subsided.

September has by and large been lovely, so far.

Another negative about this summer has been Rudy testing positive for Hookworms at his annual check-up in mid-August.

Which likely means that Wyatt also has them.

Hookworms are the worst and most tenacious of all the intestinal parasites that can plague dogs. Our vet thinks it’s likely that they brought them from Florida, where they came from, since he says he doesn’t see a lot of hookworms here in the Pacific Northwest. They’ve been up here since January. The kennel we adopted them from treats the dogs they get in extensively for parasites of every kind. We gave Rudy and Wyatt monthly treatments of Panacur and Advantage Multi until early July. But, like I said, hookworms are very tenacious and extremely difficult to eradicate. The boys went on a two-dose regiment of Triple Wormer. I am really hoping this takes care of it. I will soon find out as I dropped off fecal samples for both of them this morning.

Although still not 100% trustworthy, the boys have been on a mostly upward behavioral trajectory. It’s hard to tell whether this is because they are becoming more settled and mature – Wyatt turned 3 in June – or if it is because there are simply fewer things lying around for them to destroy.

Only one of the three dog beds that were in our living room has survived.

We still have to close the doors to both bedrooms when we go out, or risk coming home to dirty laundry strewn about. Wyatt, the brindle criminal, has developed a penchant for sorting through the laundry. Dirty bike shorts are his favorite things in the basket.

We don’t dare leave any shoes or jackets hanging on the hooks near the front door. The house does have a very clean, minimalist look to it, which is not entirely unpleasing. I recall it took Tiger over a year before he could be trusted not to destroy anything when we went out for an evening.

I am confident Rudy and Wyatt will eventually get there…Our biggest challenge at the moment is trying to convince them not to chase after deer. We have so many mule deer, our yard is like a nature preserve. Tiger and Truman eventually learned to ignore the deer. This also took about a year before they lost interest.

Rudy and Wyatt are greyhounds #7 and #8 for us. It has taken all of our dogs a full year for their true personalities to emerge. Their lives in a home are so different from what came before for them. Watching them settle into their lives in their forever home with us is one of my greatest joys.