S#!+ storm

Warning:  Do not read while eating.

Clearly the dogs aren't getting enough attention.  Now that we have Jake squared away with a healthy tummy and lots of hugs, Veronica is getting back at us for all the love she's had to share.  Yesterday morning we slept through the alarm and got out of bed 41 minutes late.  Chris ran for the shower, and I fed the dogs and started the coffee.  Jake finishes eating first, so he gets let out first.  Veronica waits a minute until Jake is back in, then gets let out.  Well, perhaps I waited a minute too long, because when I let Jake back in and let her out, I noticed a smell so foul and pungent that I had to find it.  First I had to find my glasses.  Once I could see, I went back out to the great room to find a large token of Veronica's affection in a sloppy mess on the floor.  I ran and quickly picked it up, not only because we were running 41 minutes late, but also because the stench was unbearable.  In my haste, I got some on my finger.  Yuck.  I ran to the sink to wash my hands, but on my way to the sink I stepped in a trail that Veronica left on her way to the door.  Off to a bad start?  I 'd say so.  I cleaned it up, then took a mini shower.

On a normal Tuesday I leave around 7:30, and Chris sticks around until around 11, which leaves him plenty of time to let the dogs out one more time before he leaves.  I get home around 5:15, so the are never without a potty break for more than 6 hours.  Yesterday he had to leave early because he had an exam or something trivial like that.  I wondered if I could make it at my lunch hour to let them out, but I didn't get the chance.  When I pulled into the driveway at 5:15, I raced inside, wondering what kind of mess I would find.  Then I thought I was being paranoid.  They're not babies.  It's been what, like ten hours?  Jeez.  I don't know if I could hold it that long myself.  So I opened the door and was punched in the face with the unpleasant aroma of bloody poo. Then I saw what had occurred, and it shocked me.  The first thing I did was grab my camera, like a good mom (picture is too graphic to show) and then I let them both out. The dogs were caked in it.  I wanted to cry.  Then I opened the doors, put on fans and lit candles.  Then I took the covers off the beds and put them in the wash.  I had to wipe and vaccum and clorox the cage and surrounding areas.  (Apparently when poop dries, it crumbles and becomes dust.  Poop dust.)  I had to Lysol spray the naked dog beds.  I had to wash the dogs.  I had to wash the dog towels.  Then, I had to feed them.  Dinner was an hour late for them.  Then I changed my dirty clothes and washed off.  Then, I laid down on the couch to watch a little TV.  The little poop machine saw how comfortable I was and thought she'd join me on the couch.  Even though her bowels ruined my evening, she's too cute to resist. Then the phone rang.  It was Chris.  "I just had the hardest test I've ever had, etc.".  I listened for a little bit, then I cut him off and said, "I just had the hardest evening I've ever had.  Your dogs were caked in dog crap.  And now they're squeaky clean.  What's for dinner?"

A complete and total Barf-o-rama

FRIDAY: I took Friday off work to spend some time with Chris, who was on Fall Break from school.  We spent the day in Richmond, which was awesome because it was a sunny, cool day, and there are fall colors out unlike Williamsburg.  We came home in the afternoon to find that Jake, who was not crated, had done something very bad.   There was rice everywhere, and there sat a sad, torn remnants of my herbal neckwrap.  We quickly ushered him outside and grabbed the broom and the vacuum.  We vaccumed the rug, the floor in the great room, the kitchen, and the entry way.  We collected about 3/4 cup of rice in total.  We left him on the deck and took Veronica out to the vet to get weighed (30 lbs!) and then to Petsmart. 

SATURDAY: The next morning, Chris got up and fed the dogs.  No sooner after he scarfed his breakfast, he vomited on the WHITE SHAG rug.  Again, I ushered him out to the deck.  But not before barfing again on the floor in the sunroom.  Chris and I pushed back our own desires to vomit and wiped up the messes, which, by the way, contained more grains of rice.  We have a pretty good rug cleaner, so it wasn't so bad.  Jake stayed out on the deck for the remainder of the day.  He was visibly ill, slow and lethargic.  I brought out the water jug for him, and took the opportunity to trim his witchy claws, which are all black.  I hesitate to trim them because they are black and you can't see the quick, but they were so long, I thought I'd just give them a trim.  I did a great job, but on my second to last nail, I saw blood.  I was so upset, I ran inside to get a paper towel, but when I got back to him, the bleeding had stopped.  I felt bad about that.  I went out in the middle of the day for a massage, because my back has been killing me for about a week.  It was a supremely relaxing massage, and I was walking on clouds.  I returned home in the late afternoon and tried my hardest to relax.  When it was dinner time, I filled the bowls, and let the dogs at it, but Jake didn't eat.  He just drank a TON of water.  A few minutes later, that ton of water was a slimy, ricy mess on the rug.  Again.  My muscles tensed right back up, and I screamed for Chris to come down, because this wasn't something I could clean alone.   I needed reinforcements.  Chris got the wet/dry vac from the garage and went to town on the stain.  Out went Jake one more time, to the deck.  He drank some more water, then puked more rice on the deck.  (I keep a hose at the deck now to clean Veronica's messes.)   Around 7, Amber and Jason came over and we were all hanging out inside.  We let Jake back in too.  There we sat, trying to relax with a beer and some ambient music and lighting.  Out of nowhere, Jake let out puke #5 for the day, where?  On the rug.  We all thought Chris spilled his beer.  Luckily the wet/dry vac was still handy, so that was cleaned up pretty quickly.  Around 9:30, he ate dinner and kept it down.  Thank God.

SUNDAY:  We got up early and hosed off the wet/dry vac, which made me gag a little.  Both dogs ate breakfast, and spent the day basking in the sun on the deck.  I hung some jeans out to dry out there in the glorious sun as well.  I was pleased at how well Jake was doing, and it looked like he has some energy back.  He had a full meal in his belly, and I decided to do some training with them with some Milk Bones.  They did great.  I went back inside and resumed my Sunday chores.  Around 5pm I called them in for dinner and saw two more rice piles and 3 veronica piles.  Again, gagging, I brought the clean clothes inside, grabbed the hose and cleaned off the deck.  The dogs both ate their dinners, and spent the rest of the evening inside.   We monitored Jake all the while, and the vomiting seems to have stopped.  Of course now he is limping.  I was worried that it was my fault, from cutting the quick.  Then I realized that I cut the quick on his back paw and he is limping on his front paw.  I can't help but wonder if he is faking for attention.  He has been getting tons of sympathy from me.  The good thing is that while we were watching the SNF game, we were playing catch with Veronica, and Jake came up to us and started to play too.  I'm thinking he is feeling better.  I guess we'll find out today if he can keep his food down.

Is it me or does Brett Favre have a type?

Sideline Barbie

The Wife

YAY!

Veronica gained 2.7 lbs since her last visit two weeks ago.  Her current weight as of this morning was 28.9 lbs.  Last visit she was 26.2 lbs, and the time before that she was 28.4 lbs.  So she beat her previous high weight by half a pound.  I'm stoked, but we still need to figure out how to get rid of the blood.  We'll keep you posted.

What's wrong with Veronica

Veronica has always been on the small side. For crying out loud, she was six pounds when we brought her home. She’s grown tall, even taller than Jake but still hasn’t reached thirty pounds. People used to come over and ask what was wrong with her. She’s so skinny. I always replied, “Boxers have a hard time putting on weight”. This is what the vet told me on her first visit, and I believed it even though Ramona never had a problem putting on weight.  But I don't recall ever measuring her food.  Anyway, even though he scarfs her food, we’ve always held tight to what the feeding instructions should be. We don’t want another fat dog. (No offense, Jake.) We took her to the vet one day because while she overcame wetting the bed, she began having very loose, sloppy stools, topped with a squirt of cherry sauce. She even had two sloppy accidents in the house.  It became apparent that she was ill. That was about two or three months ago. The vet immediately admitted that the amount he told us to feed her was too little, and that we should bump it up from 2 cups a day to 3 cups. I had a rush of guilt. We knew she was still hungry, and we didn’t feed her more. Even though she’s skinny, she is bouncing off the walls with energy and super affectionate. But the poop thing scares us. The poor thing has had a finger up you-know-where more times than I’m comfortable with. She’s been on medicated food, pills and some other powder medication and she still has the sauce. The only thing that’s changed is that she isn’t having the accidents anymore, but on her last visit, she lost two pounds. The vet told us not to worry…yet. We’ll have her weighed tomorrow. I told her last week (and I looked her in the eyes) to GAIN WEIGHT. I hope she understands.

A few weeks ago, Jake started spending time with Veronica in her cage, which is a one-bed cage. We keep his bed next to the couch. One night he decided that he wanted to stay the night with her. We obliged. He started getting comfortable, so we moved his bed in there officially. He has the choice during the day to stay in or stay out, but he stays in at night. We don’t know if he knows she is ill and wants to keep her company, or if he is jealous of her awesome pad. Maybe he’s afraid of being alone. Either way, it’s cute.

The smelly kid

I try to keep everything that I post here positive and happy.  Perhaps that's why I have a hard time posting lately.  I have a great work environment.  I have a huge cubicle with great big windows looking out onto Jamestown Road with a view of the B&Bs that line the street.  For the most part the people that work in my cluster are cheerful.  There is one who is not, but she has a lot of problems that I can't relate to.  She historically has missed a work a lot, cried at work and sometimes dresses like she's homeless.  She recently got a talk from her boss about her tardiness and her general attitude at work.  She started dressing better and basically has what I call "showed up to work".  She recently started a diet that has changed her life for the better.  Not only has she lost a lot of weight which has improved her personality, but she also is on time and hardly misses work.  She smiles more often and has started talking to us.  The only problem I have is now that her diet requires her to eat a meal at her desk at 8:00 am, right when I get to my desk.  It smells like chicken with garlic and onions.  Every day we have to endure this smell.  It's not that its a bad smell, its just that its not a smell for first thing in the morning.  To be honest, at this hour it kind of smells like B.O.  And its every morning.  We all look at each other when she brings it out.  Nobody wants to say anything to her.  Someone told her once that she could cover it up, and only uncover it when she takes a bite.  She did that maybe twice.  I hope she gets over this soon because I'm losing it over here.  Why can't she eat a cinnamon roll?