Better dog

He was the mixed feeling dog for a long time.For months, our primary feeling about him was What were we thinking?Closely followed by It's a good thing he's cute.He was pretty troubled when we got him, a huge handful, and he introduced himself by killing one of my chickens.  It was a bad beginning and it didn't really improve.Any progress was swiftly followed by equally dramatic backsliding.Oh, and the porcupines!  He couldn't get enough of them, and usually had uncanny timing for hitting a particularly hard day, late return home, or only one of us home for the night.But HW persevered (I washed my hands of him around the three month mark- "He's your dog now.  I'll dogsit by prearrangement").And this winter, the dog turned a corner from trying dog (very very trying), to good reasonable dog.  He settled down, as though he's finally adjusted. He knows what to expect from each day, and what we expect from him.  Now he's content and relaxed dog.  A big upgrade from psychoses potpourri dog.  (Finally).  It's been nearly a year.He actually gives us more pleasure than grief now, which is saying something.He's always been funny, but a dog needs to be really funny to compensate for being such a case for so long.But now, we see flat-ear dog smiles all day, and we adore him right back.  He's HW's constant sidekick.Thankfully, he was always decent at running alongside a bicycle, because this dog is made for mileage.