The Tater Tot

I was a foster mom for AARF until I fell in love with Tate aka Tater Tot. For several months I felt the pangs of puppy fever but I resisted. My forever dog, Truth, started to get a little more picky about the fosters she would allow in "her house" so I wasn't even sure if she would accept a puppy. Then I got the call from Susan, AARF's Director. She told me a puppy had been found up in North Georgia and it was at Buckhead Animal Clinic if I was interested. I decided I'd meet the little guy and maybe take him on as a foster dog first so Truth would have a little time to accept him...or not.

When I met Tate, who they were calling Opie at the time, he was 6 weeks old, weighed 5 lbs and was a little bit of a mystery. His beagle markings were muddled together with what looked like basset hound legs. In other words, Tate was ridiculously cute. I changed his name from Opie to Tate and immediately the staff at Buckhead Animal Clinic took to calling him "Tater Tot" and it stuck.

I brought Tate home to meet his new sister. Truth approached, sniffed him and from that point on her maternal instincts took over. She became very playful with and protective of him. A few weeks later, I adopted Tate officially and have fallen in love with him more and more as time goes by. Tate is goofy to Truth's serious but together they are simply hilarious.

Now a little over a year later, Tate weighs 55 lbs and carries it in a short, stocky, sausage shaped body. He can't jump per se but when he gets excited he'll hurl his full weight onto you to let you know he is pretty happy to see you. He likes kissing ears and eating socks. Every so often I catch him eating crunchy leaves off the porth or scaring himself with his own farts and I think to myself "God, I love that dog". Adopting Tate was one of the best things I've ever done. I think Truth would thank me if she could for giving her the best little brother a dog could want.