Awhile ago I asked you all for dog name suggestions for our new male golden lab puppy. Hubby had christened him a gruesomely strange name the dingbat parrot actually had yelled out right before we got the new puppy....Okay, it was "FLAUBERT" - how bizzare is that for a fine, strapping (or soon-to-be)dog that resides in a small, "red meat"-kinda rural community where all the REAL dogs with real dog names would have woofed at him derisively until he probably would never even ride into town in the pick-up truck....

WELL, my favoite, "Chester" was vetoed so I emphatically continued to exercise my own veto over the dreaded Flaubert (my husband can be very stubborn - but so can I!) We FINALLY found a compromise name we both can live with and when the light bulb finally flashed on it just seemed to fit. And it is --- drumroll please ---- "Modoc" - after the county we live in. Short, punchy, related to something significant to us (the location of our first venture into homesteading) and nothing ole 90+-pound doggy will soon have to be concerned about being called when out in public. (Okay, so I just could NOT envision explaining to the good ole boys who hang around the post office bench chawin' and swappin stories about how we tranplanted city-slickers -- who are ALREADY under intense suspicion just for daring to move to their neck of the rural woods - ruined a fine dog with a sissy name like Flaubert!)

So, again, thanks to all who shared names, dog stories and their own wisdom on naming new dogs when I needed inspiration!

Patricia and Modoc

-- Patricia (hemsley@hdo.net), June 19, 2001