Life of Kiki

This is Kiki, our Greyhound. She retired from racing at the ripe old age of 2-years old. She was in a very, very bad accident during a race and crashed into the rail with another hound. The other dog had to be put down but Kiki, although she broke her leg in three places (and now has screws and plates in her leg), was able to be saved and turned over to Midwest Greyhound Adoption. MGA picked her up in Wisconsin, took care of her broken leg surgery, rehabilated her for about 6 weeks in their kennel and then placed her with my family. They tend to "specialize" in helping Greyhounds with broken legs which is very honorable, but very expensive too.

Kiki is very sweet (which is the general disposition of the Greyhound breed) and is a beautiful brown and red brindle. Contrary to what you may think Greyhounds are not the high energy, gotta run-gotta run-gotta run dogs that are, say, Labradors. Greyhounds run very fast but their races are pretty short - something like 30 seconds. So, she is able to burn off her energy rather quickly with a 60 second tear around the back yard. Then she comes up to the deck, panting and tongue hanging out and plops down to rest.

In fact if you want a Greyhound to be able to go on long walks with you, or run with you it will take some training and time to build them up to that point. They do love to get outside, but they aren't going to last more than a few blocks (at least my Greyhounds never did!) Generally once they are retired from racing, they like to sleep, eat, poop and sleep. Mostly sleep.

Kiki loves people and loves attention (here she has her 60 lb self laying ON my husband). Sadly with two little ones in the house now she is third in line attention-wise. So, sometimes she just plops in the middle of the room and looks cute, waiting for someone to notice.

Here she is laying on a snow boot. She'll do anything to be close to something my Hubby has worn (if you couldn't tell from the earlier picture he's her favorite)

I had to laugh when I took this picture because she had her head squarely on her fleece toy, just like a pillow. Greyhounds definitely like to be comfortable - she can often be found on the couch (a no-no) or sometimes on our bed (a BIG no-no). They just can't resist a soft, warm spot to get cozy in! I think it must have something to do with them being so darn boney - it must be hard to get comfortable sometimes, even though she has several dog beds throughout the house.

Kiki has a good pal down the street - not another dog, but a neighbor, Michele. Michele will come over and take Kiki out with her for a few hours, run down to the beach (Lake Michigan) or to the dog park or just on errands. Kiki always comes home pooped out and usually with a bag of treats from a doggie bakery. She is very lucky to have such a nice human friend on the block!

Sometimes when Kiki is outside she will sit on the deck and face the direction of Michele's back yard (she lives two houses away) in hopes of catching a glimpse of her. If she does see her she gets very excited and wags her tail furiously - it's rather sweet!

For more pictures of other beautiful, sweet, loving and gentle Greyhounds check out http://www.midwestgreyhound.org/