Reader(s) (hopefully (s)), meet my friend, Spoonie.

The precious face you see above belongs to my sweet, annoying, cheerful, loud, and definitely psychotic yellow lab, Mary Spoon Davis. I'll spare you the details of what insane lapse of thought drove us to name her "Mary Spoon," and hop right to why "Spoonie" fits her so well.

Spoonie is a weird name. It's ok to laugh/question/mock. I know it's strange. I've known it since 2006 when we deemed a 3 pound, helplessly sweet, painfully adorable puppy as "Mary Spoon." I cannot tell you how many times I've told people Spoonie's name and gotten one of the following responses:

A. "Why did you name your dog after a utensil?"
B. I'm sorry, did you say... "Spoon?"
C. "Well do you have a Fork also?"
D. "Hahahaha. Oh.. her name is actually Spoon?"
or the ever classic and frequent,
E. Blank stare and awkward silence.

All that to say, "Spoon" is a weird name. A random name. A weird word. A random word. These are both things that characterize my friend Spoonie: weird, random.

But "spoon" is also a happy word. Well, I think it is. And Spoon is certainly a happy girl. And she verbalizes that happiness probably 75% of her conscious hours... but really.

Shouting joy from the depths of her being.

I truly learn things from my weird, random, happy friend Spoon. I will share them with you at some point, dear reader(s) (please be (s)), but I just had to introduce my friend before I flooded you with tales of her insanity from which I actually glean great life lessons.

The Unnecessarily Awkward and Ridiculously Lopsided Adventures of Spoonie and Emily are forthcoming. Stay tuned.