Penny Pug

She was the worst birthday present I’ve ever received.

My dog, Penny, was given to me as a gift three days before my 26^th birthday.

Goober.

Penny came to me via a family member, who picked her out for me. When I went and picked her up from the animal shelter, I remember thinking she was cuter than I thought she would be.

That feeling didn’t last very long.

Penny, the 11-pound, 6-month-old Pug, ended up being a batshit crazy terrorist whose personal goal was to ruin all of our lives.

By the time my birthday rolled around that year, I hadn’t slept in three days because Penny screamed at me all night. I actually remember being mad and thanking my family for such a terrible birthday gift.

Penny had separation anxiety. There was medication involved. She ate her way through a metal crate. She spit in my face. She whined and cried when she wasn’t touching a human being. And, it was her personal goal to poop in the house as much as possible.

She was terrible. She ate electricity and melted her chin off by sticking it in a 400-degree oven (in two separate incidents). She survived both, luckily.

I used to judge people whose children and pets got injured in stupid, freak accidents. It wasn’t until I got a dog that I realized that stupid stuff happens and sometimes you can’t prevent it.

Fast forward almost three years later, that worst birthday present ever turned out to be pretty cute.

It’s comforting to me to fall asleep to the sounds of her snorting and snoring. She has the biggest attitude ever when it rains or snows. She sometimes gets mad at me if it’s cloudy and cold outside. She's mostly fearless of things that can actually harm her, but she's scared to death of things that pose no risk to her.

She spent a week being afraid of a fan sitting on the floor in my living room, for example.

It takes me a few minutes every morning to convince Penny to wake up. Mostly, she just gives me dirty looks, snorts loudly, then goes back to sleep. Often, on cold mornings, she comes in from outside, goes back to bed and then refuses to move.

Pugs.

The cool thing about little dogs is that they don’t know they’re little. Her personality far outweighs her little 18-pound body.

Plus, when she flashes me her underbite, I turn to mush.

She actually turned out to be one of the best birthday gifts I’ve ever gotten. Sometimes you really have to look for the diamond in the rough before you find it.