Spunky the Monkey Man Pressnall
(This is my Spunky Monkey doing the Bichon Wave. Some of you have asked what that is. My experience has been that some Bichons are born with the instinct to "wave" and some aren't. It isn't something you can teach tme to do. Either they do it..or they don't!:))

This is about the night our Spunky Monkey came into our waiting arms in Tulsa, Oklahoma. YOU MIGHT WANT TO GET A KLEENEX. TISSUE ALERT!
Small Paws Rescue:Heartbroken Spunky

 
    Five years ago, back in March of 2000, we got a call from one of our volunteers in Joplin MO. I THANK GOD EACH DAY FOR SUSAN IN JOPLIN WHO SAVED MY SPUNKY MONKEY'S LIFE THAT DAY.
   You see, Spunky had been abandoned by his human Dad, and left tied to a neighbor's boat after he ran off with his lady friend. (Spunky's dead beat human Dad, not Spunky)
   He had been tied to this boat all winter, left alone in sub freezing temps. The next door neighbor had been pitching food to him but they got tired of hearing him scream and bark and loaded Spunky up and took him to the pound to be..well...to go permanent night-night.
   When people bring an abandoned dog to a kill shelter, the shelter doesn't have to wait to euthanize them. They knew no owner would be coming for this dirty flea bitten bag of bones. They can do it right then and often times, when they are overcrowded, the dog is dead before the person even leaves the parking lot.
  One of our volunteers just happened to be at the shelter that day volunteering. She intercepted Spunky, rushed out the back door with him, and called me right away.
  I'll never forget it. I was out of town on Small Paws business at Texas A&M. She told me a 1 year old male Bichon had come in covered in fleas and black with oil from the driveway which had been his home for several months over the winter.
   Susan took him home and bathed him..five times...to no avail. He was still dirty,
   Angela, our Small Paws legal counsel, drove to Joplin MO. to pick him up and bring him back home to Tulsa.
  She got home and bathed Spunky five more times. Finally, the fleas were gone and he was starting to appear to be almost white.
  I got home late that night from Texas A&M Dale drove over to Angela's to get this new little boy who we were going to be fostering.
  Dale called me on the way home from Angela's and he was well...he was choking up. He said for me to prepare myself because this was the saddest thing he had ever seen.
  Now I found myself wondering how bad could this be? After all...Dale has seen the PUPPY MILL AUCTIONS. 
  Dale said it wasn't physical...it was emotional. He said Spunky was heartbroken and THAT was breaking Dale's heart.
   Mill dogs had never known love and lost it. This little guy had lost his Daddy and his home.
   Dale was carrying Spunky, and together they walked into our bedroom, where I sat with the laptop on my lap. I looked up and that baby's eyes were just crying. He WAS heartbroken.
   I took him outside in the front yard on a leash and he raised up to me to be picked up. I reached down and picked him up and held him to my chest. Good Lord, baby...what kind of monster did this to you?
  I told him that no one would ever hurt him again and that after we got him fattened up some and feeling happy and healthy again, we would find him a wonderful forever home and he would never be sad again.
  Spunky was adopted to a wonderful home in Alabama. But he would have none of it. He was pining for his daddy, Dale.
  Three weeks later his adoptive Mom called and said she was so worried for him...that he just missed us so much, he wouldn't eat.
   We weren't looking for another dog then, but we both knew our Spunky needed us. We drove and met his adoptive Mom in Little Rock Arkansas and there our Spunky got the new last name of Pressnall.
   Small Paws Rescue:Spunky Comes Back to Live With Us  
  Now I told Dale that I could NOT have a dog named Spunky. I just couldn't.
  Dale told me that Spunky already knew his name and we couldn't take that from him too, after all he had lost and I agreed.
   Then, Dale added another part to his name...he said he was going to let me have something that I had always wanted. A Monkey. That's when he became Spunky the Monkey Man Pressnall.
   I told Spunky Monkey that I had always wanted a little monkey and that as a kid my parents said no (nobody ever wanted to have any real fun around there! Humph!) and as a wife my husband said no (Why couldn't I have a sweet little monkey???) and now I had my own little white monkey.
  Folk, something happened to me that I never counted on. I never thought I would love again so completely after I lost my Nicholas to cancer.
  You guys know how much I love Chipper and that I would give my life for him, just as most of you would do for your Bichons.
  But this little Spunky Monkey Man. He did something to me. He snuck in...by surprise, and he grabbed my heart, hook, line and sinker. I am totally gone on him to this day.
  He weighs only 12 pounds and has the heart of a LION! He wrestles Mozart our Schnauzer to the ground and wins!
  He blitzes and runs his little motor like a little boy would do while playing cars.
  He will find every mud puddle there is, jump right in it, then act surprised that he has to get a bath.
   http://www.smallpawsrescue.org/pup3/creature.html
  I don't know if he remembers his days of living outside in freezing temperatures. He went through many snowstorms that winter,all alone, living outside under that boat.
  The spring storms were just starting to come and thunder upset him to this day. Usually I just hold him and carry him everywhere during a thunderstorm.
  A few months ago he was very ill and the vet said he was critical. We didn't know if he would make it. I asked all of you to pray for him. This is the video we made of him when he got well...seemingly overnight.
http://www.smallpawsrescue.org/pup3/spunky.mov
  Spunky is now six years old, and he is....well, he is just my Spunky Monkey Man. He is mine and I am his. We are so very happy together! Love, Robin