Loved your screed. You nailed it.
Sounds like Asimovian follows the same nomenclature system as my mother and sister have always done with their cats, namely the Clunky Victorian Moniker (usually one that can be shortened to a more informal nickname).
I was re-reading some of the James Herriot Yorkshire vet books recently, and was surprised to see in his (somewhat fictionalized but fact-based) anecdotes how unhesitatingly he recommended to pet owners who had just lost their dog or cat that they needed to get another one. It’s not so much being callous about the lost pet as, apparently, having a strong conviction that a new pet will make the grieving process easier.
In the ‘70s and early ‘80s I used the names of heroines in Michener novels. Then moved on to suffragettes. Since 1989 my kids have named them. Serves me right.
I have lost many dogs. Our first dog after we got married was a Border Collie, and we loved him. He developed epilepsy at about a year, and we went through another year of increasing meds to get it under control, but it never did. So we had to put him to sleep at 2. Watching the life go out of his eyes as we petted him and told him he was a good dog was an incredibly hard thing to do.
Our next Border Collie came to us a few months later. She lived to be nine, and we loved her. One day she walked up to me panting hard, and her gums were white. It turned out she had autolytic anemia. The pet hospital gave her a full transfusion, but it didn’t help. She died a few days later. It was devastating.
Our next Border Collie was a rescue. She was the dog of our kid’s childhood, and she’ll always be remembered as a very special dog. She was smart, gentle, playful yet never destructive, and she loved all of us. We took her on vacations with us, and pretty much everywhere else we went. When she was 12 we decided to get another puppy, thinking that if the old dog passed the blow wouldn’t be as hard on our child. And a year later, she got sick and died.
We still have that puppy, who is now a wonderful 9 year old border collie. And four years ago we picked up a second border collie as a 9 month old rescue from a family member who got her and then became too sick to care for her.
My advice: Go ahead and get another dog whenever you feel ready for it. You always think that no other dog will fill the hole left by the one you just lost, but dogs have a way of getting into your heart and filling it. You’ll never forget the old one, but if you are a dog person it’s always nice to have a dog around to ease the pain.
Hear, hear, Sam_! We’re on Border Collies #4 and #5 at the moment, and the only thing I really regret is not being able to trade some years of my life for an extension of any of theirs.
How does he know?
What?
I have a shelter a mile from me that is stocked 24/7/365 with dogs.
I guarantee you that your next dog can be there waiting for you whenever you decide you are ready.
Some people don’t want just any pet. There’s an intuitive aspect as well as a practical, good match aspect.
I never have as many pets as I would want, if I had the resources to care for all of them. So as much as I grieve the loss of a beloved pet (cats in my case almost always, though I’ve loved some dogs too), when they are gone that creates an available slot for another animal to love, and I fill the slot immediately because there are always plenty of shelter animals needing a home, and I have plenty of affection to share.
We got two cats (littermates) three and a half years ago and one of them disappeared a year later. We don’t know what happened; was it stolen or did it meet a fox? When it was clear that it was not coming back we started asking around for another cat. We found one, rather unexpectedly, about six months later.
We were of course sad at the loss of a very friendly cat, but the real surprise was how the other one grieved. To the extent that she scratched herself bloody until there was a hole at the back of her neck. She does not get on with the new cat all the time, but is clearly happier to have company.
The new cat is a bit weird but very friendly.
I don’t. The spay/neuter movement had been successful here. At the start of the pandemic a co-worker tried to adopt a dog. After failing for a few months, he decided to try to buy a dog. The first breeder he contracted with didn’t come through when there were fewer live puppies than expected. The next breeder, several hundred miles away, did. He has a completely adorable dog, now. But no, the next one isn’t always waiting for you.
Yes, there was a lot of demand during lockdown. But my brother struggled to get his first dog, and then to find a dog his first dog liked, well before the pandemic.
Everything the OP said is true concerning how dogs don’t support us in exactly the way that humans do. But they do give you a ton of love and companionship and fun, and when that’s gone, it’s quiet and sad and you miss them.
We had to give up a dog last year for excessive aggression. Even though he gave several of us scars (and a stitch in one case), he was a sweet boy when he wasn’t being an asshole. A year later I still miss him, and I feel guilty that maybe we didn’t do enough to address his aggression, but the grief was gone after about 4 months.
After losing my husky dog, (several years ago now!), it took me over two years to be ready again. Hubs was prodding and pushing, but to no avail.
I went on Kijiji because I was considering selling something, checked the pet section trying to gauge how much traffic the local site actually saw, and discovered most of the dogs were hundreds of dollars, whoa. Then I happened upon a free dog, he was cute alright. I kept going and began to feel bad for him, cause he was free, but still a beauty!
When I told hubs, his immediate response, after listening politely was, ‘What are you gonna do about it? HaHa!
Long story short, I did pursue and won that dog! Had him 13 yrs, he was beyond awesome, we lost him in Aug. I am still heartbroken. And now, dogs cost thousands and rescues are difficult, 40+ applicants for every dog in my province! Ugh. I thought I wouldn’t wait so long, and with the whole pandemic thing, I really, REALLY miss having a dog. It sucks.
Before I came along, @wonky had a “Bert” policy for any long-haired white cats who adopted her, proceeding alphabetically. So at the time she moved in with me, we had Albert, Bertram and Cuthbert. I was informed upon meeting that said policy would continue, and we have wrestled over the years with the name for the next such creature: I rejected “Dagbert,” but we have come to an tentative agreement on “Daubert.” Don’t get me started on her future plans for “Eggbert.”
Alistair and Neville don’t fall into the long-haired white category, so while they are honorary Berts in nature, we didn’t name them thusly. They are the first cats that adopted us since we’ve been a couple, and their names were more a result of our sense that they seemed rather snooty and barely deemed us worth discussing when we first met them at the shelter. Now, having been around them for three years, we know they are anything but snooty or dignified. But the Clunky Victorian Monikers (I love this) still fit. Their nicknames are definitely not shorter, though—appellations like “Goober-Doo” (Alistair) and “Slinky-Doo” (Neville) are thrown about rather commonly in this house.
I have two dogs at the moment, both 14 years old. They are mostly deaf and one of them can’t see very well. I love them dearly!
7 years ago we got a puppy, one of a sibling pair found outside a bar we frequent. They were about 8 weeks old and thouroughly adorable! Amie made FOUR dogs that we had. It was pretty hard to keep up, but I did it! I just had to have that sweet girl.
My Dad who lived with us passed away in October 2016. He was 92, but his death was sudden, and heartbreaking. Three months later my girl Lab Lucy got cancer and we had to put her down. It was devastating especially so soon after Dad, and I still miss her. Amie was a joy through this. She was about one year old I think.
A few years later we moved into our lovely new house! Then one day my neighbor’s huskies got out.
My poor little Chihuahua baby (11 lbs) was attacked by my neighbor’s Husky this morning. That asshole is 80 pounds or more.
Their two Huskies had gotten out, and I was trying to put them back in their backyard. No one was home. While grabbing a ladder in my backyard, the two dogs came in my yard. My three dogs were safely (I thought) behind my doggie door cover.
I managed to get their gate open even though it was majorly stuck. I carried the ladder back into my yard, and the large male husky runs up with Amie in his jaws! He dropped her bleeding limp body, and I scooped her up.
Our Ring camera showed that they went INTO MY HOUSE, pushing my dog door cover in, and he snatched my little Amie and brought her outside and he shook her like a ragdoll.
I rushed her to the emergency vet, and they did what they could, but her little neck was broken. They intubated her, but her heart slowed then stopped.
RIP my baby girl.
The neighbor has agreed to pay the vet bill, but it doesn’t seem like enough. I’m devastated. She was such a good girl.
We have been looking for a new pup, and actually put in an application for one, but we didn’t get her. Now we’ve been thinking that Ernie, my bichon, is a bit too cranky to take on another dog. Harley would be fine - he loves everybody and every dog. So we’re going to wait until they pass to get another dog.
Maybe. 
Sorry this is so long.
tl;dr - Grief is hard, but happiness is a warm puppy. Do what feels right.
I lost my best cat in the world to a husky who got out. I, too, saw Foggy’s limp body in the mouth of the dog. 30 years later it still hurts to think about.
We had a leash law, and a lot of neighborhood cats were killed. I managed to get the prosecutor to go after the owner of the dog. I think he was ordered to build a higher fence or something.
The monetary value of an old flea-ridden cat is probably negative. I didn’t ask for any monetary compensation.
@wonky, forgot about the name change, I’m sorry!
I generally do go with people names for my animals. Veddy veddy British names do seem to work particularly well on cats!
On topic, I’ve tried both ways of dealing with grief. When a beloved cat died years ago, I got a couple of kittens as soon as the universe presented them to me (a matter of weeks). However, I never emotionally connected to them as strongly as to the original cat. I wonder if it may have been because they always had each other, and needed my affection less.
A few years ago, we lost a dog. It was indescribably hard (though of course you all know what it’s like). We didn’t get another for a while. Instead, we moved. I honestly believe that if She’d lived, we’d have stayed put, but we wanted to get away from Her house, as well as throw ourselves into a new project. Here we are years later, and we got two of the same breed as She, plus a couple more that just donated themselves. We may have over-reacted. 
I had to put my poor little Imhotep to sleep in September; by early December I knew I was ready for another cat. I just haven’t seen one I want to adopt yet.
I’ve outlived two beloved greyhounds and currently have two more. Of my first two, their endings were diametrically opposed in terms of experience. One’s ending, Ajax’s, was horrendous and he suffered excruciatingly (osteosarcoma) in the last 15 minutes of his life, and I suffered just as much emotionally while at the same time trying to be strong for him. I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy. It was also so sudden that after euthanizing him, leaving his body laying on the floor and walking out felt to me like I was abandoning him. Getting home and seeing his toys all over the floor was a gut punch. For months I was full of serious rage as well as deep grieving. I don’t think it was any different than losing a human loved one to something serious like a car accident or homicide. I mean I had SERIOUS rage that I didn’t know what to do with. I eventually just learned to live with it until it dissipated a bit, but I still have dark shadows of it in me.
My other dog, Capri, lived a very good long life and we euthanized her when she told us she was done with being frail and infirm. We handed her gently and lovingly into the arms of God/Buddha/Mohammed/the universe. My deep grief at losing her was mixed with satisfaction that we did good by her throughout her life and she had a good long run.
I still miss both of them, deeply. For me, grieving one is completely different from starting to love another. You get another pet when you feel ready, and it’s entirely different from person to person. I’ve found that each of my dogs is a unique individual, so I’ve loved every one deeply and built totally different relationships with each one. With my current dogs, the ultimate existential goal is to have an ending like Capri’s, rather than Ajax’s. Their lives are so much shorter than ours that you just have to deal with it, do the best you can for them and love them like they deserve to be loved. Every one is a blessing to your life.
We all mourn in our own way, and we should be allowed to do so without judgment or even “advice”, which is generally useless and even unwanted.