Write. Read. Repeat.

Where to begin…

Sly’s presence is one of the best things to ever come into my life. She is my best friend, my shadow, and the reason I would happily sell an organ to take care of her.

Sly is a retired greyhound racer who was born on a farm in Atascocita, Texas and sent to Florida to race for only a year and a half. While her personality shines, her athleticism is low, but this doesn’t matter a single bit to us.

The stats

Sly was born on April 4th, 2014, making her nine this year….*sniffles*. She is average size for a female greyhound weighing in at 65 pounds.

Racer greyhounds get tattoos in their ears when they are puppies, noting their birthday and farm identification number. Her’s read 44B (April 4th, and second in her litter, in the right and 63504 in her left).

Her racing name was Atascocita Sly and she was trained under the call sign Sly.

Out of 43 races, Sly won 1st place in 6 of them, but who gives a shit.

Her adoption

Once Sly was discarded by the tracks, she was transported to Greyhound Pets Inc. in Woodenville, WA.

She was adopted out by a different family in February of 2017. They wanted a dog they could go hiking with….clearly not researching this breed. Especially Sly.

The story that sold us on Sly when we went to go meet her was the event that made her first adopters bring her back the night before.

They had just taken Sly on a very long walk/trail and when they got home, Sly got up on the couch next to the female owner, looked her dead in the eyes, and took a hot shit on her couch.

The reason they brought her back was one of the many reasons we said yes to her on August 20th, 2017.

PERSONALITY

We decided to keep her name as Sly, as we got her when she was 3 years old and would respond to that name. She also had a kleptomaniac spell when we first got her so the name really did fit.

Her acts of thievery have greatly decreased over the years, but whenever she hears you chopping veggies or getting the peanut butter out, she is right their to supervise.

Despite her older age, she still gets the zombies in the back yard, especially if we have the hose out or run with her.

Many greyhounds are not cat or little dog friendly due to their high prey drive, but of course this gentle little nugget wouldn’t hurt a soul (unless you are a squirrel). We already had our first cat Olga, who by that time was around 5 years old, but we didn’t know how she would handle a rambunctious kitten.

In December of 2017, we adopted an 8 week kitten named Maverick (post on him to come). Sly was more nervous of him than he was of her despite the significant size difference.

Once Maverick was out of his quarantine period and was old enough to be left out unattended, him and Sly were inseparable.

They sleep in the same bed together, groom each other, and even share snacks with one another.

After starting her on a life long steroid and prescription diet, Sly was able to gain weight and eat normally. We still have to be careful in what we feed her, down to her heartworm and flea prevention, but she is much better than she was during those months of uncertainty.

As Sly aged, she began having muscle spasms in her back and bicipital tendinitis started in her left shoulder, for which she receives laser therapy and acupuncture.

to sum her up

Sly is the best. It really is that simple. Yes, she has done some disagreeable things her time with us, but has never done something that would ever make us give her up. Both her rehoming and racing history breaks my heart, but as with any animal that we adopt, she gets nothing what the highest level of love and care.