Murphy

"Just call me Murph the Surf"

One of the newer members of our household is Murphy, a yellow Labrador Retriever who was born in August, 2001, and was raised to be a guide dog under Guide Dogs for the Blind, Inc. of San Rafael, California. I got to know him while he was still a puppy, because Anne, the person raising him (before he was sent to San Rafael for training), was the day supervisor at Recording for the Blind & Dyslexic in Hollywood, where I have been a volunteer since 1985. She would bring the dog in to the studios each day.

Martha met him in April, 2002, at the RFB&D booth at the L.A. Times Book Fair, and promptly fell in love with him. We asked Anne to keep us in mind if Murphy ever fell out of the program for some reason.

As it happens, in January, 2003, Anne advised my session of volunteer narrators that Murphy had, in fact, been dropped as a guide dog candidate because he was too distracted by other dogs. We renewed our statement of interest, and shortly thereafter Anne called to say that we could adopt him. We brought him home from the Southern California kennel location on February 7, 2003.

Having a big dog in the house is a bit of an adjustment after dealing with four small dogs (the two beagles and two cocker spaniels). So far, however, he is fitting in and getting along. I have concluded that he is really just a beagle who happens to weigh 82.6 pounds. He can actually wolf down his food faster than Shasta does -- which is saying something.

More photos:

We decided to shoot an "All Murphy" photo. Here are Jill and Allan Murphy (Jill is my cousin), holding bottles of Murphy's Beer, with Murphy (the dog).

Back to the Photo Album page.

Back to Geoff Bryan's Home Page!!