Evelyne Ragsdale gets a kiss from Jake the Diamond Dog during his visit to the Lakeshore Retirement and Nursing Community on Wedgewood Avenue. (Photo by Lisa Nipp)

Evelyne Ragsdale looked over at the dog sprawled on her bed and asked him for a kiss. Jake the Diamond Dog just sat there. “Maybe he thinks I look too old,” the 92-year-old said. But Jake began to inch closer, then gave her a big, sloppy lick, right on the lips.
   
“That's right, that's right,” Ragsdale said with a big smile. “He's a beautiful dog.” And a busy one. The 6-year-old Golden Retriever, who spends his summers performing in baseball parks around the country, fills his off-season with volunteer work at retirement communities throughout Nashville.
   
He hit 10 last week, and another half dozen this week, including Lakeshore Retirement and Nursing Community on Wedgewood Avenue, where Ragsdale stays. The idea, said Jeff Marchal, the dog's owner, is to find an outlet for Jake during the winter. Trained to catch flying discs, shake hands, and bark “hello” and “thank you,” Jake is a popular attraction at Nashville Sounds games, running through the outfield and carrying water bottles to the umpires between innings.
   
Performing at nursing homes, Marchal said, allows Jake to showcase his talents to people who might not be able to make it to the ballpark. “They love it. I do it because I think the elderly are more forgotten. Many of them have had dogs in the past, and they like to see him.”
   
It is, after all, an act on the rise. Marchal began training dogs 12 years ago while working at a drive-through grocery store in Pompano Beach, Fla. His first dog, Jericho, often came to the store with him and, on a lark, he asked a customer if he'd let the dog retrieve the money from him as he was paying for a pack of cigarettes. The customer said yes, Jericho took the money, and the customer was so excited, he asked Marchal if he could drive back through. “I said, 'sure,' ” Marchal said. “This time, he bought two packs of cigarettes and it just sort of escalated from there.”
   
Soon, the dog was delivering groceries to cars — and getting national attention. The Globe ran a story on the store, and a baseball executive from the Fort Myers, Fla., minor-league baseball team took notice. In 1990, Marchal changed Jericho's name to Jericho the Miracle Dog and the two began to work for the Fort Myers Miracle baseball team.
   
When Jericho died in 1994, Marchal spread the dog's ashes on the field in Fort Myers, got Jake and moved home to Ohio. “It just wasn't the same,” Marchal said. “I needed a change.”
   
A year later, an executive from the Kane County Cougars, a minor-league team outside Chicago, called Marchal and asked him and Jake to perform. The duo spent the season with the Cougars, then went to Chicago and waited for another call.
   
The organization that owns the Cougars bought the Sounds in the off-season, and asked Marchal if he'd move his act to Music City. Marchal and Jake are now preparing for their third season with the Sounds — and spending their second winter entertaining the elderly on a volunteer basis.
   
As the pair left Ragsdale's room yesterday morning, the woman, a former owner of a dog food company, waved and flashed a broad smile. “He's super,” she said. “I hope you'll stop again.” And with a wag of his tail, Jake was gone. “We'll be back,” Marchal said. “We'll see you soon.”