Hello! It’s me, Asa! I even have my own byline now! “By Asa!” Oh that sounds bittersweet. But I promise to make Angel Chuck Billy proud! When he started Living with a Golden 10 years ago in January 2015, one of his motivations was to keep Angel Lemmy’s memory alive by sharing his stories. I promise to continue that mission, while also honoring Chuck Billy’s legacy. Therefore, I hope to continue to share what you’ve grown to expect from Living with Golden, namely dog friendly places, and observations on daily life, with some historic facts, song parodies and UFO theories thrown in for good measure. However, Chuck Billy would be the first to tell anyone, especially me, that there’s no way I could live up to his high standards. Therefore, please understand that I will be bringing my own unique perspective as we move forward, while looking backwards.

Take for example, as Chuck Billy’s apprentice I will continue his research as a dog ufologist. However, let’s face it, some of his theories were farther out there than the galaxies he discussed! So I promise to try to keep my paws firmly planted on earth, while exploring the universe. Although I admit it probably is more than a coincidence that early this morning, on the day that I take over the responsibility of the blog, Mom and I saw a meteor go shooting across the predawn sky. Chuck Billy clearly is sending a sign that he is watching. I promise I will try my best to continue his investigations to his level of scholarship!

I also promise that neither rain, nor snow, or a plethora of distractions, will prevent me from taking Mom and Dad on our appointed rounds on neighborhood patrol. Again though, I must caution that things will be different. There will be a lot more singing and dancing, and wagging “hello” to the neighbors! Because who doesn’t like a little show on their commute to and from work! I wonder if I can get the squirrels and chipmunks to join me in a tune or two? I’ve got some great ideas for choreography!

Speaking of singing, I can guarantee I will be sharing more song parodies! After all, I see the world through music, and it helps me to organize my thoughts. And in bigger news, I promise that Asa’s World Tour of Maine will continue! Surprisingly in two years we still haven’t visited all the places named for countries and famous cities, plus there are some places I’d like to explore in honor of Chuck Billy. Sure I’m lacking a tour manager, but my stuffie friend, Llily Llama, squeaked that she would help me with the behind the scenes logistics.

Thankfully though, when it came to logistics, Chuck Billy was very organized, and wrote quite a few unpublished blog posts before his sudden departure over Rainbow Bridge. Some of which are Christmas related, so for the moment they will have to wait. One is a poignant New Year’s resolution, that may be difficult to share. Others are from the fall leg of our 2024 world tour of Maine, and a few things that happened at home while on guard duty. He never did get to share them because of the tech problems we were having with the blog. However, I plan to share them in the weeks ahead. Although I can’t promise the tech problems won’t persist. Dad helped me over the Christmas break to make some improvements here, and will continue to do so, as the launch of the new site is on hold indefinitely. I also promise to share favorite posts from the archives. We have ten years worth of material that is too good not to revisit, and they may even help me to smile on the droopy tail days missing my brother.

Now in all fairness though, please remember that Chuck Billy had more material to work with for his posts, because he was often reacting to my actions. Plus he had me to banter back and forth with, making for lively discussions. So please bear with me, if the posts are more introspective than before. Also I’m easily distracted and not as disciplined on keeping a schedule like Chuck Billy. In fact, to be honest, things have been really off here, with dinner being served as late as 5:23 PM! So please understand if I miss a day or two during the week, or if they aren’t posted until later in the day. I’m not use to having this much responsibility of writing a blog, while also taking care of Mom and Dad. In fact, I’ve gone from being a carefree daydreamer who only had to follow the lead of my big brother, to doing the job of two dogs! But I promise to do my best moving forward while looking backwards with Living with a Golden to make Chuck Billy proud!