Once upon a time, my daughter asked Santa for a bright blue parakeet. Santa delivered the bright blue parakeet on Christmas morning, and my girls promptly named him Nemo. Maybe not the most intuitive name choice, but it worked.
Nemo lived a happy albeit short life in his cage. We discovered him one day, face down in his food.
Not good.
We quickly wrapped him in tissue paper. Ewww. And took him outside for a short graveside service and burial. Nemo had gone to the other side, into the light. Everyone made peace with his death.
Everyone, that is, except our black lab, Rosie. Apparently, Rosie was grieving uncontrollably, and we were oblivious. I was only able to fully grasp that sorrow when I caught her holding, in her mouth….Nemo. Ewwww.
Yep. You got it. My dog sniffed out Nemo’s grave, dug him up, snuck him into the house, and was attempting to hide him when I busted her. After an exhausting game of chase, I regained possession of Nemo.
This time I took the bird to the garden. I wrapped him tightly in plastic, said another little prayer, and buried him in the tulips. The end…or so I thought.
Several days later while planting my tomato starts, I saw my dog rolling around on something blue. I was marveling at the joy and abandon with which she lives life when suddenly I realized….NO!!!!! NOT THE PARAKEET AGAIN!!!!
Ick.
Yep, she found the dead parakeet. Yep, she dug it up…along with my tulips. And yep, she was rolling all over it, ensuring that the smell of a month-old dead bird would be with us for quite some time.
My husband helped me dispose of Nemo this time by taking him deep into the woods and burying him once again. Rest in peace, Nemo. Finally.
It appeared that all was as it should be, which is EXACTLY when you should suspect it’s not. I was spending a cold Sunday afternoon on my bed, vegging out while watching Lifetime movies (my favorite Sunday activity). Rosie had been in and out of the room, alternating between snuggling with me and barking at squirrels through the front window.
Suddenly, she was back, laying quietly at my feet. As I reached down to pet her, I saw it….a bright blue bird, resting under her chin. Oh. My. Goodness.
I grabbed the bird and hurled it out the window into the snow. Needless to say, everything within ten feet of my bed had to be sterilized, including the dog. I made a mental note to get the bird from the snow later and drive it somewhere far, far away.
However, as you would suspect, I forgot about the bird until one bright sunny day, as we were relaxing in the backyard. Yes, you guessed it. Rosie found it before me. She was ecstatic to lay the bird at my feet. I responded by hurling the bird in the fire pit. And that, my friends, truly was the end. Nemo was cremated that beautiful Spring afternoon.
And the moral of this story is….don’t ever let people tell you zombies aren’t real. Ok, I probably watch too much Walking Dead, and my dog is a bit warped. But still. You’ll think twice before buying a bright blue parakeet, won’t you?
Where do I begin? Let’s try a quick game of “Categories.” I’ll list some items, and you tell me what they all have in common. Got it? Ready?
Go!
Carpet, popcorn, candy corn, candy pumpkins, loaf of bread, Glo stick, ribeye steak, eggs, more bread, a table leg, chicken food, fish food, cat food, a flip flop, another loaf of bread, apple crisp, cake, yet another flip flop, one more loaf of bread, three kitchen mats, too many cookies to count, pizza, one Bitty Baby foot and three tennis shoes….
Any guesses?
Did you say, “Things that you find at my house?”
Great guess! And partially correct.
Try, “Things that you WOULD HAVE found in my house IF my dog hadn’t eaten them.” Ding! Ding! Ding! You got it!
Look at that sweet face!
Almost nine months ago, I met one of the great loves of my life….Rosie, also known as Dogzilla. I fell in love the minute I saw her sweet little puppy face. Of course, it doesn’t hurt that she’s completely adorable. The first time I saw her, she had so much extra skin, which should have scared me, and these beautiful, expressive eyes. I just melted into a big puddle of goo.
And then she started to grow……and grow……and grow…..will it ever stop? Seriously. Will it? Her head is bigger than my head. Her paws are bigger than my hands. Seriously?!?!
We tried to buy her a bumblebee Halloween costume (I know, I know….embarrassing…but she could use a teeny bit of humility.) Turns out the “large” costume was not quite big enough for the belly. We tried to squeeze, but it was a “no go.” She will be a wonderful “extra-large” hotdog instead, with light-up mustard. She is unimpressed. In fact, she barked at the light-up mustard. And then ate it. Burp.
The dog who loved soccer!
She has caused multiple injuries to me. Ok, that’s unfair. I have caused multiple injuries to myself as a result of the giant dog in my life. I have fallen on my elbow on ice while trying to catch her, fallen on my elbow on a hardwood floor as she ran past me and knocked me off my feet, sustained a black eye when she jumped up to “kiss” me, and of course, my favorite….broken my foot when I smacked it on a doorframe, trying to keep the giant dog from eating a stolen chocolate cookie, because, as many of you know, dogs can’t have chocolate.
Of course, we are clearly not dealing with a “normal” dog here. This dog can eat pretty much anything and the only thing we hear from her is “burp.” No serious tummy aches, no crying or pain. Just “burp.”
I consider myself a pretty responsible pet owner. My cat, Jackson, lived a long, happy existence without incident. My other dog, Sallie, is now five years old and in perfect health, with no serious happenings to speak of. And then, there was Rosie.
A rare event…Rosie tired.
One day, I was doing laundry. I set an empty Tide Pod bucket by my feet as I was moving a load from the washer to the dryer. The giant puppy put her head in the bucket and got stuck. It was horrific. She thrashed around, trying to shake the bucket off of her head, banging into walls. I moved quickly, removing said bucket from the sweet puppy’s head.
Through the ordeal, however, she ingested a bit of Tide, and began tossing her precious cookies everywhere. We quickly bolted to the veterinarian’s office….the sweetest, most patient vet in the ENTIRE WORLD. She doctored Rosie up and sent her home in perfect condition. On a positive note, her burps were clean and fresh for a few hours, and she is still very healthy. Tide Pods are now completely secured at all times.
I took Rosie to doggie daycare today, which I have to do routinely to burn some of the energy. There was a nice man in the lobby, wrestling a huge German Shepherd. Strangely enough, my giant, maniac dog was sitting quietly, doing exactly what I told her to do. Weird, but true.
The man turned to me and said, “Wow, your puppy is so well-behaved!”
I glance behind me, and then realize he’s talking to me. Trust me, those aren’t the words I usually hear about Rosie. Typically, it’s, “Oh my gosh! Get your dog off of me!” as she hurls herself at people. She has a particular affinity for small people. Loves to knock them flat.
She really doesn’t want me to go.
Anyway, I looked at the poor, weary man whose arms are covered in giant puppy bites and scratches and said, “It will get better. Those first six months are brutal. I haven’t had a serious injury for about six weeks now…..broken foot is almost healed.”
I really was trying to be encouraging, but somehow it just didn’t flow quite like I’d hoped. I decided to leave it with, “You’ll be in my prayers.” Even my dog looked at me like I was totally insane.
Dogs really are amazing animals. If you’ve never opened your heart to one….or two…..or more, you’re missing the most loyal friend you’ll ever have. They give you laughter when you think you can’t laugh anymore.
My giant baby
They nurse you back to health when you’re sick. They are so incredibly excited to see you every single day, no matter what you’re wearing or how bad your day has been. They protect you, love you and give you their hearts completely.
So as hard as raising Rosie the giant dog seems some days, when she looks at me with those big, brown eyes, I’m toast. Every time. My hope is to be able to repay her with years of happy days and tons of love and smooches. Let’s just hope she stops growing……seriously…….
Small detour from the chickens here. Sorry, but I had a “happening” that I have to get out of my system. I keep replaying the evening over and over in my mind and it just doesn’t get any better. Sometimes it helps me to “write it out” so here goes….
I have a precious miniature poodle named Sallie. Sallie has been my friend on days when I honestly didn’t deserve to have a friend. She has seen me through dark days and happy days, never wavering. Needless to say, I love her limitlessly.
Sallie the dog
Our family recently added a new member, Miss Rosie. Rosie is a beautiful black lab with tons of affection and energy. But with the addition of another pet, we decided to get some obedience training for Miss Sallie. She’s a great dog, we just never got around to doing it. Our thought was that keeping her from jumping on guests (in addition to curbing other doggie behaviors) would assist when we train Rosie, who will be massive in size, to not jump on people and maul them.
We asked a trainer to come evaluate her, since she’s four years old, so we would be clear on where to place her in class.
Sallie was brilliant in the evaluation. She could sit, ring a bell, take a bow….very cute. Based on this evaluation, the trainer placed her in a “tricks” class, for more advanced doggie learning. Sounded like a great plan. Until the class….
Sallie was a maniac. We got the pleasure of sitting next to a lady who had a tiny dog, that came into the dog training center in a cute picnic basket that matched her owner’s outfit….and the dog’s. Wowza. That dog could do everything but cook me a fried chicken dinner, which it could probably do if someone took the time to train it. Unfortunately, all Sallie wanted to do was eat that dog. Not so good.
Based on this performance, I made the call to move Sallie to a more basic obedience class for older dogs. I figured we could use the attention training, and thought it best that we not damage the sweet little picnic basket dog. So we went to our first class last Thursday.
As we walked in, the first thing they did was place us in a separate room from the other dogs, which was a brilliant idea, since Sallie was a little excited. They then placed a girl in the room with us to assist me with training Sallie.
Unfortunately, I think that girl, who was very sweet, has trained about as many dogs as I have, and that number is zero. Someone kept having to come in the room to tell her what to tell me to tell Sallie to do…lots of middle men here. We spent much of our time waiting for the person to come back in and tell us what to do next. I should probably state here that I have little tolerance for inefficiency. Oh, I’m not particularly efficient myself, but I’m great at judging others. I have a breaking point and we had almost reached it. Then the thunderstorm started.
I knew it had been cloudy outside, and we were expected to get some showers. However, I was not prepared for people running out of rooms and yelling, “These dogs are just shutting down!!!” I’m sorry, what!?! What the heck does that mean!?! Sallie was not shutting down. Well, anyway, I don’t think she was.
The lead trainer suddenly instructs us all to bring our dogs to the main room so we can learn about dogs and thunderstorms. Alrighty, we were fine with that. Apparently, some dogs can get freaked out by storms. It makes sense. Especially since my young daughter, who is with me, is also TOTALLY FREAKED OUT by storms.
I’m so happy that at this point we are all sitting around, discussing storms like the end of the world is about to occur. One guy yells, “I think I see a wall cloud!” At this point, my daughter turns WHITE! She is terrified. Forget the dogs, my kid needs a thunder shirt! And seriously, if you see a wall cloud, maybe we shouldn’t be here with our dogs, waiting to get blown away.
The lead trainer points to a dog, a beautiful yellow lab, and says, “See…look at that dog! He’s completely SHUT DOWN!” I look over and he appears to be sleeping peacefully. Hmmmm….now I’m struggling a little with the whole “shutting down” thing.
She then instructs us to rub our dog down with fabric softener at home when a storms approaches to calm it. I’m thinking, “If I rub Rosie or Sallie down with fabric softener sheets, I am fairly certain Rosie will try to eat them,and then we’ll be at the emergency vet clinic all night.” (Rosie has an appetite for dryer sheets….not sure why, but she really, really wants to eat them.)
I’m sure there’s merit to the recommendation. It just hit my daughter and I as hilarious. And it’s never good to get the giggles in the middle of what other people perceive as a crisis. Not good at all.
After the thunderstorm lecture, we are asked to get our dogs going again and try to get them to follow the “sit” command. That kind of cracks me up as, after all the stress, the yelling and my daughter having an anxiety attack, Sallie is not very relaxed and cannot focus at all. We try and try and try again. Nope, not gonna sit.
Rosie the puppy
All of a sudden, the trainer blurts out a question to me, “Is your dog fat or is she just bloated and gassy?” I’m sorry…what?!? Did you seriously just call my best friend “fat” in front of everyone? And that’s when I went right over that little edge.
I did contain myself until class ended. I took my sweet Sallie up to the front desk and asked the trainer, “Did you call my dog fat?”
“Yes,” she said, “I think she might be carrying some extra weight. I think that’s why she won’t listen to you. She’s not hungry enough.” She then feels her tummy. “Oh, never mind,” she says then, “She just looks bigger than she actually is. How often do you feed her?”
I reply, “I feed her twice a day. She eats a special food as we’ve had a horrible time with her digestive system. I’ve worked with my vet, who I trust completely, for years to try and get it right. In fact, Sallie doesn’t eat much more than half a can of food a day.”
“Well,” she replies, “You need to cut her food in half. She won’t obey you if she’s not hungry.”
Ummm….I think I’ll stick with feeding her.
She asks me where I got Sallie. I make the mistake of saying we got her at PetLand, before we all knew the terrible things that place did to puppies. I then get a lecture on how those dogs were bred for looks, not personality, and therefore, Sweet Sallie is just from bad stock. She diagnoses her with generalized anxiety disorder. Now I’m getting anxiety.
“Are you a nervous person?” she asks, “You know dogs sometimes act like their owners.”
I look at my daughters. “Am I a nervous person, girls?” I ask.
“Not at all, Mom,” they reply faithfully and in unison, although the eye rolling doesn’t totally escape me.
“DO I SEEM LIKE A NERVOUS PERSON?!?” I screech at the trainer, in a voice so high-pitched I’m pretty sure only the dogs heard it. It’s at this point that my daughters start pulling me toward the door. Yes, probably a good time to head home.
Sallie in her party clothes
Needless to say, Sallie won’t be jumping out of any picnic baskets soon and we still don’t have our matching outfits. Actually, I think I’ll just order us matching thunder shirts and call it a day….
