Another Day, Another Disaster...

Me to B: SURE YOU CAN GO TO INDY FOR A LIVE FANTASTY FOOTBALL DRAFT WITH THE GUYS AND I’LL JUST STAY HOME AND WARD OFF DRAGONS AND CLEAN UP POOP AND BLOOD AND MORE POOP ALL BY MYSELF… [SOB*sniffle*SOB] NOIMNOTMADJUSTGO!  [SOB*sniffle*SOB]

No really, it’s fine… despite the inevitable disasters that only occur in his absence.  Fortunately he was just home for an entire week, during which the only mishaps were a small flood in our hallway and a stray Oscar turd by the front door…  Alas, Friday came and B went, and I was left with no lack of excitement, that’s for sure!


Friday night was fairly uneventful.  We’d had a busy week and I was exhausted.  The dogs were not… but it’s amazing what you’ll miss when you fall into a Benedryl coma.  Judging by the number of toys strewn throughout the house when I woke the next morning, I’d say it’s highly probably they threw a doggy rave party and I slept through it all. 


My intent was to take them to the park for a bit on Saturday, but it was ungodly hot and humid again so I opted out.  And I had some wedding tasks I wanted to tackle with a friend, so… sorry dogs.  I guess I should pause here and mention that B finally put a ring on it a couple of weeks ago.  Even if it was supposed to be a total surprise
(which it wasn’t), Oscar somehow managed to find the ring receipt and eat it while I showered one morning.  I’m not sure if he was trying to ensure the deal would be sealed and there was no way to return the ring, or if he was expressing his displeasure that he would be forever stuck competing with B for my love and affection, thus he ate the receipt in lieu of being able to find and eat the actual ring (which was with B, fortunately!)  My money is on the latter…


When I got home on Saturday, I took the boys out to play fetch.  Did you know that 74% of the world’s population of mosquitos lives in Charlotte, NC?  More specifically, in my neighborhood.  Fetch didn’t last long because I was literally being eaten alive by millions upon millions of mosquitos.  By the time we reached the front door, I was
just one big, red, itchy welt.   I’ll probably die from malaria by next Thursday.  And of course I didn’t notice that Nugget’s paw was bleeding until I saw red paw prints all over my beige carpet.  Super.


Later that evening, while tripping on some Benedryl, Nugget lost his dinner.  Not once.  Not twice. THREE times.  I’m fairly certain that it actually multiplied in his stomach because what he threw up looked like a whole lot more than what he consumed.  The smell was wretched.  It took me like an eternity and a half to clean it up because I
couldn’t stop throwing up.


Sunday was Nugget’s birthday.  I couldn’t think of a better way to enjoy the day than at the lake.  Oh how I sorely regretted that decision.  The lake level was down, so the “shore” was basically just mud.  Gross, thick, red Carolina mud.  I lost one of my favorite flip flops in it.  Nugget left all of his tennis balls way out in the water and Oscar cut his paw.  So he was bleeding like all over the place.  I wrapped a towel around it when we got in the car and the bleeding had stopped by the time we got home.  Dog first aid ninja, right here!


Later that night at home, I had some boxes out and was trying to get some things packed.  (Oh, I forgot to mention that we’re moving to Boston for B’s work).  We have a couple of months, but I wanted to get a start on things.  This plan, however, backfired since any hint of foreseeable drastic change totally makes Oscar’s brain short circuit
and he begins peeing and pooping all over the house.  I was all like, “Doodle, no!  I’m saving a box for you!  We’ll bring you with us, don’t worry… I’d never forget to pack you.”  He just looked at me all confused … and then peed on the floor again.

Happy 3rd Birthday Nugget!!

Three years ago today, my handsome man was born to Lacey and Copper Dunn of Locust, NC.  Lacey only whelped two pups (her first litter) and Nugget's sister didn't make it past the first night.  So for 9 weeks, Nugget had his fur parents and breeder parents and siblings all to himself.  What a chubby, little rolly polly chunk of love...  And SPOILED rotten already!  (See?  He came that way!)  When I saw his pic (below) in the classifieds of our local paper, I knew immediately I had to make him mine.

We brought him home in mid-October and it took me approximately 1/252,286,773rd of a second to fall in love.  Just LOOK at those eyes!

He was nearly perfect from the start.  He immediately slept through the night and had only a few accidents in the house.  He also made it very clear that he prefers LOTS of attention.  Having been the only pup, he was certainly used to getting plenty of it!  For awhile, I contemplated getting an automatic tennis ball launcher in order to give my arm a rest!

One day I came home from work to find this: 

Houdini had somehow escaped his kennel and shredded a back of printer paper and used the leg of the desk as a teething ring.

And sometimes, he required impromptu baths... (Yes, that's mud on his nose!)

But Nugget has always been an extremely well-behaved and easy-going dog.  I am so lucky!  

We've been through a lot together in 3 short years... and it feels like an eternity!  I cannot imagine one single day without him.  He has been and continues to be such an amazing blessing not only in my life, but also in the lives of others through his work as a therapy dog. 

I love you, Nugget George Houdini!  You make my world better just by being YOU!  

Happy 3rd Birthday, sweet man... 

NOW LET'S GO TO THE LAKE AND SWIM!

WORDLESS WEDNESDAY

This Week's Chaos... I Can't Make This Stuff Up Part 3

After several weeks of trying to determine whether I had died and been dismissed straight to the hottest depths of hell, or that the sun might actually be orbiting around the Earth and at a proximity so close, it was once thought to be scientifically impossible, we finally saw some relief from the unbearable heat wave this past weekend.  Good thing, because I wasn’t sure I had enough Klonopin left to make it through another weekend cooped up in the apartment with the boys.

On Saturday we enjoyed a beautiful 5 mile walk, during the last half of which Nugget protested by parking his rear in the grass and refusing to move every 20 feet.  He was totally killing my stats on my Android Noom workout tracking app!  We eventually made it home and they both crashed, but B was determined to use me as a guinea pig in his new work out plan so we headed to the gym.  He wanted to start me off lifting 8,000lbs, but I struggled so we dropped it to 10lbs.  He made me do all kinds of fancy sh*t and on Sunday, I was fairly certain I would be needing a wheelchair for the rest of my life… or at the very least, for the next week.  But he had to pack and hit the road for a work trip… convenient, right?  Paralyze me and then leave me?  I’m selling the story to Lifetime.

Since I couldn’t move, I prayed the boys would be entertained with some frozen peanut butter Kongs or any of the rest of their 319 toys … or even the box of matches I carelessly left on the coffee table.  For the most part, this worked… until it didn’t because Nugget was hoarding Kongs.  And anyway, Oscar got diarrhea from the peanut butter and one time he didn’t quite make it outside, but thankfully he only soiled the (NEW!!!) rug by the door.  By bedtime, I was SURE he had to be empty since the amount of poo I saw come out of him was roughly equal to at least half his body weight.

In the morning, I realized just how wrong I’d been.  Oddly enough, I didn’t smell anything (my guess is that I’ve cleaned up so much by this point that I’m actually immune to it), but the entire hallway to the front door was spotted with Oscar’s liquid poo.  This brings to mind a deeply burning question, which often keeps me up at night – OSCAR, WHY CAN’T YOU STAND IN ONE SPOT AND POOP?!?!?!

I texted by boss to let him know I’d be late and then proceeded to pick up poo, dry heave, scrub, dry heave, rinse, repeat.  I was just about to get in the shower and get ready for work when I discovered more of the same in my bedroom.  Consistent with his previous design work, this too was all over the room, though with a delightful new twist – IT WAS SPRAYED ALL OVER THE WALL, TOO!  I texted my boss to let him know I was taking a personal day and began cleaning and steaming the carpets and did not finish for 5 hours, though I estimate I could have completed it in 3 had my legs and arms not been screaming and threatening to detach from my body and run away, still from Saturday's workout.

Fast forward to Wednesday – only because Tuesday was a non-event as they were both exhausted from daycare and draped sloppily about my furniture, lifeless and... (God Bless America) QUIET!  I got home from work on Wednesday and we began our normal routine of hugs, kisses, wiggles, more kisses and then outside for a potty walk.  As per usual, dinner was served immediately upon return from that walk, lest they would have attacked and eaten me for dinner like the savages they are.

I commenced with my own post-work routine of changing out of my work clothes and then sat on the couch to check important emails.  (Fine, it was Facebook and I was playing Words with Friends).  The next thing I know, Nugget turns around and attacks Oscar and they become engaged in a vicious fight.  It didn’t last but maybe 10 seconds before I could break it up, but it felt more like 10 minutes.  I immediately tossed Oscar into his crate and gated Nugget in the hall by the door.  My plan was to leave them that way until probably the year 2017 or at least long enough for me to find my Klonopin and all of us to calm down.  That plan derailed when I turned around and saw blood.  Not just a little blood, rather something you might see if you stumbled upon the scene of a recent gun fight where 96 people bled to death.  I looked over at Oscar and he was standing in a pool of blood in his crate.  Additionally, he kept shaking and blood was splattering everywhere. 

After a brief moment of seriously questioning my will to live and contemplating the possibility of darting out into rush hour traffic – preferably into the semi lane – I scrambled to find my phone and call B.  That’s a testament in itself to my exorbitantly elevated level of stress and already abnormal and unclear thinking since I knew he was 30,000 miles above Michigan… (or was it Iowa?  Brazil maybe?)  en route to Chicago from New York for work.  I don’t really know where exactly he was because my knowledge of geography (or a clear lack thereof) is obviously a little shady and I honestly should have never been promoted beyond the 4^th grade, but I think teachers just got tired of me.  Regardless, what the heck did I think he was going to do about this from 542,237 miles away?  Exactly!  I wasn’t thinking… which is why my next course of action was to call my mom.  My mom lives in Kentucky, which is another 21,869 miles away.  Fine it’s only like 500 miles, but I read once that a fast-moving turtle can travel about 1 mile in a day.  Do you realize if I was a turtle it would take me a year and a half of walking to go visit my mom?!  I love my mom, but that’s hardly worth it.  Sorry mom.  Thank God I’m not a turtle… and anyway, that would be really hard to explain.  I digress.

Long story short (HA!), I figured out the bleeding was coming from his ear.  In short order, I was able to get the bleeding to stop because I’m basically a dog first aid ninja.  I called the vet and we headed over for him to be checked out.  Dr. White glued his ear back together.  The gash only ended up being about ½ inch, but Dr. White confirmed that ears tend to bleed viciously… Thanks for the late-breaking, I’m pretty sure I have physical evidence of such soaked into my freshly steam-cleaned carpets and walls.  Osc will be fine and Nugget will be going through some intense self-evaluation exercises to get his moral compass back in line.  Obviously skipping church has not been serving us well since the “Thou shalt not kill” commandment has seemingly escaped him.  Who am I to judge?  It escaped me too, for a minute.  But for now, I think we’re all friends again.

WORDLESS WEDNESDAY

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WORDLESS WEDNESDAY

Whatchu nommin' tonight?