We continue our series of posts featuring the namesakes for Sal Romano’s adorable dog pillows with “Muey the Shih Tzu”, the pillow that began it all. Described as, “Always slightly scruffy, but with a heart of gold”, the Muey pillow was the first to be run in our catalog, and was such a hit with the customers that we soon added numerous other pups to the pack.
Muey was my baby girl. She was eight years old when she and her father, Shoji, came to live with me. They had been put up for adoption by a lovely young woman named Jamie who had recently joined the army, and could not find a family member able to take them. I fell in love with both dad and daughter instantly, and very quickly we all settled into our new life together.
While her father was a free-spirited, rolling stone sort of a guy, Muey was sweet and nurturing almost to the point of being a worrying mother hen. She and Shoji often came to the warehouse, and even did a bit of modeling for the catalog. Muey was quite shameless about expecting people to rub her tummy – one scratch on her head, and she would collapse onto her back, often lying in the middle of the floor for the better part of an hour, awaiting more belly rubs from any human who happened to pass her way.
It was an added bonus to my adopting Shoji and Muey, that I stayed in touch with Jamie, the dogs’ former mama. She and I developed a friendship, and she would often share stories and insights about the pups. But some things I had to discover on my own. For instance, one day when Muey was walking through the photo studio, she seemed to be distracted by one of the boxes. She stopped and, instead of sniffing the box like an ordinary dog would do, she carefully studied the writing on it before determining that it wasn’t worth her time. To think, up until then, I had no idea my baby girl could read. Gracious, how talented she was!
The picture I’ve posted here is one of my favorites of her, called, “Muey as Rose Marie” because of the one bow in her hair. It’s her Hollywood headshot, very glamorous, and very befitting the Muey Pillow image, I think.
My Shih Tzu is a 5 year old Male and I named Him JoJo. He is about 8 pounds and just like Ms Muey, JoJo immediately stops what he is doing when he sees someone coming. If he knows the person, he quickly rolls onto his back and waits for his tummy rub when our guest walks in the front door. I thought by now, he would have stopped. I have been able to use it to tell me if my guest is someone we know or is a stranger.
I have 3 Shih Tzu that mean the world to me … love yours!!!!
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