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in any case, i resolved not to tell Dad until the deed was done. we had always had golden retrievers, but to soften the blow for him i decided to look for a female yellow labrador, like the one he [& his parents] had while in university. also, i thought the shorter hair (lab vs. golden) would be preferable. i perused the newspapers for puppy ads. i finally found one with yellow females. i phoned, they were in Mansonville, PQ, in the eastern townships. the woman said they were genetically yellow but in fact were a dark golden tone of yellow (she was indeed the most glorious golden colour). on the sunday of the labour day weekend i set out from montreal to mansonville, in my mother's old station wagon, and in the company of friends Karen Skene Tracy (now Karen Nailor!) and Sandy Beamish. we only got a little lost (we went the northern route to the eastern townships :-) on our way to Jim and Eve Lawrence's JEL kennels, on The Pheasant Farm in Mansonville.
there were 10 females and 4 males in the litter -
i had the pick of 10 lovely little seven and a half week old female puppies!
how does one choose !? !?
i was lucky:
as a pheasant strutted across the yard the 10
lovely pups prepared to launch themselves toward it.
i said ``hey wait!'' and just one of them turned to me
and did just that.
and that was Honey Bar.
her name?
it wasn't pre-selected.
as i cuddled her on the way to the house for registering
and paying and tattooing (ouch!), i was calling her `honey', so Eve
suggested that as a fine name.
it fit as her mother was Sweet April and
from her father, Bar le Duc, came the `bar'.
her full name was
by the way: my dad didn't meet her until mid-october! but he became a very big fan.
i gotta remember to tell you about the night she glowed for Tony and
Dan and myself (admittedly, more was involved).
because of her extraordinary good looks, and
her customary bandana, many people came to recognise her.
we were [she was] always greeted frequently as
we walked around campus or the student ghetto.
i would have to say that more people knew me
as "honey's mom" than by my name - and i knew a lot of people!
see waterloo section, below, for a story about THAT.
honey and i loved the whole trip, she made friends
everywhere - including a pit boss in Las Vegas.
after we had wandered around a bit in Las Vegas,
with Honey looking so fabulous and friendly that of course everyone
stopped to talk to her, i wanted to try out a casino.
i found one with slot machines near the door and
tied honey to a bench just outside, so i could keep an eye on her
while i tried a few machines.
a fellow in a Uniform came and asked me if that was my
dog, i said yes, he said the pit boss wants to talk to you, i'm thinking
uh-oh they don't want the dog by the front door.
instead, the pit boss said, i like dogs, that's a
beautiful dog, i'd like to buy your dog a hamburger.
he wrote out a chit for a free burger in the caf,
he offered me anything i wanted too but i just accepted a cheeseburger on
honey's behalf.
when the burger was ready i invited him to come out
and see her "tricks" - he was very impressed by her sit, stay, hit-the-dirt,
beggar, nose-flip, etc, and of course her ever-amazing piece-de-resistance,
show-me-your-tits.
sadly, i had to hike the grand canyon without honey,
since dogs weren't allowed.
i found a decent kennel and i hiked down and
up again with an english guy i'd given a lift to some miles from the
canyon.
i was caught speeding four times on the trip but only
got one ticket.
i really think that honey's charms were at least
partly responsible.
in la jolla near san diego we swam quite a ways out
into the ocean from some beach/park, and tons of people on shore were
watching us... when we got back we learned they thought some woman
was out swimming with a seal!
there are many stories of this trip, but we
especially loved the Klamath River area.
one afternoon she and i and a friend were
outside the UW student union [i think we were waiting in line to buy
delectable homemade extra-full-fat ice cream] when a woman came up
and started speaking excitedly to her friend, and sort of to us,
"wow! this is honey bar, isn't it? i knew this dog in montreal,
she's the greatest, this IS her isn't it? how are you sweetie? . . . ."
she never actually greeted me, and i certainly
didn't recognise her.
she came to work with me at InterFace Computer
GmbH every day - we walked, mostly, because we lived only 4 blocks
over/4 blocks up.
we both remember fondly the lovely people we
worked with there - and honey's favourite had to be Susie Neubrander.
Susie and her parents took care of honey when i was travelling and
couldn't take her along (mainly scandinavia).
they called her "Hoenig Baer" (honey-bear)
and i was always certain that she was dearly loved and cared for there.
Munich was a great city for us.
the incredibly good transit system is also
civilised enough to take dogs!
dogs cost a child's fare, which i was
more than happy to pay.
she loved the englischer garten and the Isar River.
she also loved the little pub ken and i liked to go to
for dinner sometimes - the best kaesespaetzle (like macaroni and cheese
but WAY better) you could imagine washed down with weissbier - aaaahhhh.
once she sneaked under the bench of our booth
(she *was* on a leash but there was enough slack for this escapade)
and wriggled her front half into the kitchen door behind me.
i think a slight tug on the leash alerted me
and i finally twisted around and looked over the back of the booth
and there she was, being fed mounds of sausage by the doting kitchen staff.
she has been to:
Germany, Austria, Netherlands, Belgium, France, Spain, Italy, Switzerland,
Yugoslavia, Greece; not to mention: Canada, USA.
she wandered Alpine meadows with us.
we moved back to Canada in 1988, mostly so Ken could use the NSERC
he had been awarded to do his PhD, and had already put off for two
years. he chose SFU - simon fraser university. we flew back,
and drove across the country, with stops with my family in upstate
NY and friends in waterloo and Ken's family in winnipeg and friends
in calgary (hi Ruby!).
so honey moved to the Vancouver area of BC with us and
settled in happily. we found a house to rent that allowed a dog
(more easily than we expected) in Burnaby, a Vancouver suburb.
we found lots of neat places to go with hiking and camping and so
on, like lynn canyon over in north vancouver, and harrison lake,
and tofino (bella pacifica near tofino is a terrific campground -
they allowed dogs some years ago, i hope they still do!).
for a year or so i worked on a research project in the faculty of
education at SFU, and she came to work with me there daily. she was
held in great affection by the staff along our hallway. we were in
a cave of an office, at the far end of a long hallway of offices
and she would often lie just inside our doorway, and greet
passers-by, and watch life happen.
when i moved to another research project in the school of computing
science, she was still coming to work with me but folks are a
little sticker there. for some years the school's powers-that-be
put up with honey coming to the research labs daily. however i eventually
got a "real" job working for the school of CS and that was it, now i
was a university employee (not a professor's employee) and they could
jerk the chain. so honey was forbidden to come to work with me any
more and spent her days sleeping at home. as you can tell i thought
this was a rather pedantic attitude, but there it is.
in 1991 we had our first baby and honey wasn't impressed with the noise
level sometimes but was happy to curl up with the baby when she was
alseep and give her sniffs and kisses when she was awake and quiet.
i always wonder what dogs think of kids not being housebroken...
:-)
and about Doug we ``got to the other page'' fall 1982
this was a cross country driving tour that started
from my hometown of Queensbury, New York and had its first stop in Erie
Pennsylvania where my sister was living.
she called it ``Dreary Erie: the Mistake on the Lake''
(i can't say one way or the other, myself - it seemed fine to me).
when she asked me where i was going,
what was my plan,
i showed her my lovely new Rand McNally Atlas, the page with the whole
mainland US and much of Canada on it, and i said,
oh well.
but you know, that's exactly what we did.
honey made friends in waterloo, 1983-86
during my master's work (MMath'86).
she especially loved my various roommates: Michael
Monagan, Thomas Strothotte, Jill something, Rick Tiedemann (and his dogs
Brandy (beagle) and Sally (Saint Bernard)) and the other Rick,
and eventually, Ken.
she almost caused Tim Brecht, my office mate,
complete coronary failure when he entered our darkened office late one
evening before he had met her, and heard scrabbling claws approaching
and a warm furry body hurling itself at him.... but doesn't it just
make you laugh to think about it now, Tim? .. uh .. Tim?
honey was a STAR in Munich 1987-88
honey flew intercontinentally 6 times, i guess,
back and forth to Munich, sometimes via Amsterdam.
we took the train from Amsterdam once because i
couldn't handle the stress of changing planes with her.
we practically had to carry her around because we,
without thinking, had given her the tranquiliser dose for
all-the-way-to-Munich, so she was still very dopey in Amsterdam.
she hiked a long dusty dry canyon on Crete.
she swam in fountains in Rome on boiling summer days.
she `whitewater-canoed' on the ardeche river in france.
BC? no problem! 1988-1993
Mica joined us early in 1993
honey did play with baby mica -- but preferred her curled up asleep & cuddly!
i wish they'd had more time together...
Honey Bar with Mica, shortly before she died
From sumo@cs.sfu.ca Thu Mar 4 08:22:35 1993 To: many many friends Subject: goodbye, Honey Bar sad news - Honey Bar has just died, eleven and one half years old. she was at home with us, and it was very gentle and peaceful. we discovered early in january that she had cancer, an untreatable melanoma in the roof of her mouth. exceptional to the end, she hung in there for eight weeks, twice as long as the vet had initially predicted. this has broken my heart, as some of you can imagine, but we're coping. well, i just wanted our friends, and hers, to know. if you should happen to have a special memory or thought about Honey, and i know a few of you do, please, don't be afraid to share it with me. sure, it will make me cry some more, but i like to hear from other people that she was as special as i've always thought she was. hugs, sumo
