Cooper is literally a stuffed animal brought to life by some mad scientist in an attempt to confuse and delight all of humanity.
Cooper, showing off his good side.
He is half pomeranian and half Care Bear, as far as I can tell. He is always neatly tucked away in his lil crate when I walk in, snuggled up in his lil blanket. When I loose him from his crate, he hops out and immediately begins licking my arms and face, getting progressively more and more excited. I have found that he can work himself into quite a mania, letting out some ferocious yips. I'll give him a treat or two to calm him down, hook up his harness and leash (and hilariously cute jacket if it's too cold outside) and we're on our way.
Don't let the innocent gaze fool you...
...he knows exactly how cute he is.
Once outside, people sense his presence from blocks away and are immediately drawn to him. Cooper is the ultimate proof of my theory of the inherent invisibility of the dog walker. I'm used to the fact that people will mostly address the dog when interacting on the street, but when Cooper is involved he might as well be walking by himself.
When walking other dogs, people will usually give me a cursory "Hello" or "Hi" or even just a friendly glance, but with this lil dog it's none of the above. They drop to their knees, powerless before the Platonic ideal of preciousness that is Cooper.
Their command of language fails and they are reduced to meek cooing and baby talk. I'll usually say something to break the weirdness of a total stranger talking to a dog and completely ignoring the human by saying something like "He's a cute one, eh?" or something awkward like that. This will illicit a passing grunt from the stranger, as if to say "How DARE you interrupt my daily interaction with this glowing canine form of all that is good and pure in the world."
What I'm trying to say is, people like Cooper a lot. And I like him too—and am a bit jealous of his control over humanity.
In all seriousness though, Cooper is a chill dude and I like hanging out with him. He keeps a good pace, doesn't really bark at anything, and does this amazing spin move when he's trying to figure out where to go to the bathroom. Here's to you Coop, you loveable little ragdoll you.
Sean
PS: Apologies for the obvious reference in the title, it was impossible to avoid. In fact, Josh had already written a post on Cooper in 2014 with the same title!