Meet the kid in my Avatar pic, taken the moment I met him. Benny was a throw-away puppy that found himself in a rural Louisiana shelter. Fortunately for him, that shelter was Tangipahoa Parish Animal Services, where some of my Brandywine Valley SPCA team mates had been boots-on-the-ground for six months. This little guy was crusty and infected from untreated demodectic mange, severly underweight and full of intestinal parasites. Of course, I loved him the minute David sent me his story and his photo. My kinda foster kid!

About three weeks into treatment, his coat was growing back beautifully . . . except for those suspicious circular areas of baldness. Huh. Back to work with me he came for a fungal culture, and, yup, the kid got over demodex and replaced it with ringworm. This meant more weeks of foster care, but none of us minded! My disabled rottweiler was his very best friend, and, as puppies go, he was darned near perfect. We loved him very much.

As the 2021 Bark on the Boards approached, I knew it was time for him to fly. It was going to really hard to let this one go, but he was the perfect puppy and deserved the perfect family. I oversaw the adoption area at the event, and when a volunteer asked if she could walk him around, I said "absolutely"! She wasn't gone very long before she came back and said, "Benny has a home!" My inner mama-bear self was doing that "they'd better be good enough" thing. Don't judge. It's a foster mom thing ;)

A few minutes later, a man came up to complete the paperwork for my little fella. He didn't get past the first line on the app when I said, "Kehoe?!, are you Susan's husband??" Self-depracating fella that he was, he did not mind one bit being indentified as the spouse of a Rehoboth Beach legend. And, there it was. My crusty, skinny, wormy, throw-away Bayou pup was going to be part of the Browseabout family, long term supporters of Bark on the Boards and the Brandywine Valley SPCA. I almost cried. Actually, I did cry . . . shhhh, don't tell . . . foster mom moment of over-joy-ed-ness.

Without the support of our friends, stories like Benny's would never be. Your donations make these happily-ever-afters possible - our work in Louisiana, our transport program, our veterinary services - all were part of his story, and all are fueled by the generosity of people just like you! Will you help another crusty, throw-away puppy by donating to my page? Even just a few dollars would mean a lot to me :)

Thank you for your support!