I want to post a formal apology. I did not intend to offend anyone with my remarks.
I did not intend to create a tiff. I have simply seen this situation several times and always look for the welfare of the dog. When I read the whole thread, I became very concerned for the potential dog and my reaction was very emotional. So often I have seen great effort taken by people to find a dog for someone because they feel that the person really wants a dog only to find out later that the dog and the person do not match or the belief was misguided. Because I have close ties to a very large community of dog people, I have been involved in trying to place three dogs in the last six months that resulted from similar situations (eight total in the last year and a half). The happy thing that I can say is that the dogs now have wonderful homes. One such placement involved a woman that felt that she could not get "attached" to the dog because she was 78 years old and could not imagine the possibility of what would happen to the poor dog should she pass on before the dog did. Unfortunately, the lack of attention and bonding created a three year old dog with several behavior problems. She had had dogs before, in fact several. I'm not saying that the grandmother involved is such a person, just that this thread set off an alarm.

My comments on the miniature schnauzer should have been written with a smiley face at the end. While I have personally met only one of the breed that passed the CD (and did so only by attending miniature schnauzer specialty shows), I understand that there are many gems in the breed. They are also known as loving and protective family members. My observation regarding the hunchbacked owners still holds true, however. It is an odd phenomenon and one that intrigues me greatly. I even had a chance to see the dog above pass her third leg for her CD at the specialty and I have to say that, out of about 20 owners, at least eight were hunched over. Very, very strange

[This message has been edited by Sophies Daddy (edited December 11, 2000).]