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INTERVIEW

Pet Set: Lucas Adams And Lando

“Lando is a Black Lab [Labrador Retriever] mixed with a miniature Australian Shepherd. He just turned 6 years old.”

Did you grow up with pets? “I always had dogs. We always had a cat or two that would hang out in our barn.”

How did Lando become a part of your life? “I’ve had him since he was 10 weeks old, so I’ve had him since he was a puppy. I raised him since he was a baby so he is now my son, always. At one point, I helped my sister take care of her puppy because she was moving and the whole time, I was like, ‘I really want to get a puppy again.’ That solidified it for me. Where I’m from in Texas, it’s such a small town, that people have litters all the time and give them to friends if they want them. So family friends of ours had a litter of puppies and they were like, ‘He’s one of the last ones. Would you want him?’ They sent me a photo of him and I was like, ‘Oh, of course I do. I can’t say no to that face.’ And I immediately started going over names.”

How did you decide on his name? “It’s Lando Auditore. Lando is from Star Wars, obviously. Auditore is from the Assassin’s Creed video game franchise, Ezio Auditore, which is my favorite.”

Describe his personality. “He’s very lively and he’s also very ornery. We always joke that he has very expressive eyebrows. He thinks he’s a human so he always looks at you, and he’s been very vocal as of late, for the past year or two. But he’s very playful. He wants to snuggle all the time. If he doesn’t want to snuggle, he wants to play tug of war. Every morning, we have tummy time because he just wants to snuggle when we wake up, so I can literally say, ‘Good morning, good morning,’ and he rubs his head up against your side and lays down next to you because he wants his belly rubbed in the morning. So that is every morning. He gets his belly rubbed and scratches all over. He’s very friendly and just the sweetest little thing you’ll ever meet.”

What are his top likes and dislikes? “Top like is peanut butter. You can crack a jar of peanut butter open and he’ll be three rooms over and come in immediately. And his ropes. He loves ropes and his toys. He doesn’t like pillows. We have no idea why, but if you raise a pillow too high in the air? It’s, ‘That terrifying monster. Please get it away from me.’ He likes to lay on them but if there’s a couch pillow on top of the couch, he won’t lay there because the pillow might fall on him. So we move the pillows around all the time for him. The vacuum and his basket that we have his toys in are also dislikes. He doesn’t get it. He thinks we’re punishing him by putting his toys away and he just stares at the basket and whines until we help him. We don’t have to grab it for him but we have to stand next to it while he grabs the toys.”

Is he a good traveler? “He has some very high levels of anxiety in the car. He gets kind of scared. He does good when one of us sits in the back with him on long road trips. So if we’re going to be in the car for a few hours, one of us will sit in the back with him to keep him calmer. He doesn’t like the car very much.”

What do you do about grooming him? “Usually, we take him to get groomed. We did wash him ourselves before but he sheds so much that we would have so much hair everywhere. We take him to the same place every time because there’s a lady there who he loves so we call and ask if she’s there. That helps out with a lot. So we’ve made a relationship there.”

What are your favorite things to do with him? “He loves going on hikes; that’s one of his big things. We go to dog parks. He loves to chase so we can play fetch forever. He just wants me to throw it as far as I possibly can and he will sprint for it and sprint back. But you have to have two balls because he doesn’t like to give up the other one if he thinks you’re going to take it away from him, and then if you show him another ball, he’ll drop the first one and then chase the other one. He’s been going to more of my sporting event games. Shelby [Wulfert, Adams’s fiancée] or I will bring him to the dugout and he loves that because he loves being around people. We always try to involve him in anything we’re doing.”

How does he do in the dog park? “He loves the dog park. He thinks every dog is his friend already, so he is ready to go as soon as I let him off the leash. And then he gets mad at me because he doesn’t want to leave. At the two dog parks we go to, you start to see the same dogs over and over again, so I’ll be like, ‘Okay, there’s your buddy. Go.’ And he’ll just take off. But he’ll come over to me every five minutes to check in. He’ll press his body against my leg for a second and he’ll sprint off again.”

Who is his favorite, you or Shelby? “He is a daddy’s boy.”

Do you dress him up for Halloween? “We have. Last year he was a stingray. It was really, really adorable. I did get him some Halloween bandannas already. That’s another one of his favorites.

Try to take the bandanna off? He wants to puts his head back through it. We have a drawer of bandannas for him now for different occasions.”

How do you spoil him? “Oh, man. How don’t I is the better question. I give him treats whenever. I got him some healthier treats so I can give him treats more often. I get him toys and antlers constantly because I know he wants to rip things apart. He has some toys that he likes to cuddle with. Anything I can do to spoil him I do because I just want him to know that he’s loved.”

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