Meet Baxter. He’s a pug. He loves food. Loves to go outside and bark at anything that moves. Loves to suck on his stuffed toys. But most of all, he loves to lick. And lick. And lick. And lick. Getting the picture? Basically he’s a total weirdo.

Baxter is 6 years old. My husband and I got Baxter together before we were married. Well, it was more me doing the getting, as I was still living by myself and wanted to get a dog. And I paid for him. Anyway, we drove to Bennett, Colorado to pick him out of the litter. He was tucked into one of two huge Rubbermaid bins. One had boys, the other had girls. I had already decided that I wanted a boy (I grew up with male dogs, so I’m just more used to them), so I elbowed my way over to the boy bin to pick a puppy out. The first little guy I picked up was cute, but just kind of looked at me like, “Oh, hi, yeah, I’m a puppy. I can barely stay awake.” I wasn’t very impressed. After I set that guy down, I looked at the puppy next to him – his tongue was hanging out and his tail was wagging furiously. I picked him up. The next thing I knew, I was being attacked by this little licking machine. He went crazy on my face. So naturally, I picked him. On the way home in the car he fell asleep in my lap, all curled up in my black knit scarf. It’s been love ever since.

These days Baxter is just as affectionate and sweet, but has developed several annoying habits. He has also become a little more lazy, but lucky for him, his owners are probably twice as lazy as he is. The habit that is probably most annoying is the sudden onset of severe snoring. As a result, I’ve had to turn on a table fan during the night to block out the noise.

Baxter is a great dog and loves pretty much everyone he meets. He greets anyone at our front door with a wagging tail and a toy in his mouth. He goes by Nu-moo-tu, Koon-doo, Poopy, Dumbass, and Snackster. He’s Baxter, and he’s fun for a girl and a boy.