the howling
Cusco (the cat was named Enya by her breeder, it stuck while we were trying to come up with something less embarassing, and we decided to stick with the New Age theme) is a shelter dog who was picked up by the Sunnyvale PD. He came home with us last Friday. His pedigree is unknown but he's very likely a Miniature Schnauzer or mostly-Schnauzer-mix. He's as big as a small adult miniature already at 13 lbs. I should measure his shoulder height. The shelter estimated his age at 4 months but that's probably a lower bound. White is off the AKC breed standards for Schnauzers even though there are any number of breeders who specialize in them, so white Schnauzers are controversial among Schnauzer people. It's an indication he was probably abandoned by someone who didn't understand the breed, or who got him as a Valentine's Day present or something. He's extraordinarily affectionate but otherwise was very poorly socialized when he came home. This means he jumps, humps legs, bites, and howls when he's not trying to lick you to death or curl up against you.
His tail was already docked, so we won't have that choice, which is good, as we had to agree not to clip his ears etc. I grew up with a Schnauzer mix (a "schnoodle") who had no end of trouble with his tail---they are fragile---and eventually had to have it amputated because gangrene set in the second or third time it got broken. So I'm in favor of the traditional Schnauzer "body mods" even though they're not very politically correct these days outside the dog-show subculture.
He has the "abandonment issues" that they tell us are typical for shelter dogs. This is a euphemism for the fact that he will go through a series of eardrum-piercing wounded-monkey noises to get attention when he is left alone in his crate or in his "safe space" in the kitchen for more than a minute or so. Also he is creative and keeps inventing new bizarre vocalizations. The good news is that his "dependency issues" make it easy to do the current politically correct "positive reinforcement only" training. Another euphemism: ignoring him is probably worse punishment than beating the poor guy would be. He is learning his manners pretty quickly though, settles down immediately to bed in his crate at night now, and I am getting back to where I can get work done during the day. We have plenty of work ahead of us in any case.
We're still not sure how he and the cat will get along.