Happy birthday, Asker Garip

Here's the story:
A friend of mine, Heather, had a collie named Jessie. She had several puppies. I have a photo of Jessie's puppies in the back of Heather's pickup. She was trying to find them homes. I wasn't in the market for a puppy, I thought. A few weeks later, I was at Heather's farm to buy milk. Someone had returned a puppy because they thought it was unmanageable. Heather put the puppy in my arms, and said I could bring him back in the morning if he didn't work out. Well, it worked out. So, I needed a name for this nameless puppy. I asked my Panoramio friend Suzen Ivanova for her ideas. Suzen was Bulgarian, but her mother was from Turkey, and Suzen preferred her Turkish heritage. There was a Turkish folk character who was a fun-loving, incompetent soldier with the rank of asker - a bumbling entry-level soldier. His name was Garip, so here is Asker Garip.

So, no Norwegians and no ash trees.

Happy birthday handsome boy

Who's a good boy?