Well, it’s officially fourteen days since Pepper and Joe were found huddled outside our friend’s front door and twelve days since they came to live with us and annoy the heck out of Tigger the Dog. It has not been a smooth transition but then smooth is boring. Or at least that’s what we’re telling ourselves.
We’ve set up a routine that everyone is mostly on board with; breakfast at 7:30am, treats after each bathroom visit, dinner at 6:30pm, lots and lots of cuddles and ball throwing throughout the day. The only variation to that routine was Friday, when I fed them at 7am and left the house for work and Pepper and Joe sniffed out the hidden Valentine’s Day candy, ate it all and earned a trip to the vet complete with lovely medication that forced vomiting. Having these two in the house is like suddenly having a moving toddler, you have no idea what is a problem until they find it and show you. Every time we go anywhere in the house, it’s like a parade and we’re the Grand Marshall. And, since we got Pepper and Joe collars, there’s a jingle jangle to accompany the pitter-patter of their feet as they follow me upstairs and downstairs and to the office and to the kitchen and to the bathroom. Like, a serious parade. Tigger the Dog and Pepper have at least one scuffle a day while Joe watches them totally confused. Both dogs have had visits with the twelve-year-old neighbor girl who is dying to adopt them. We’ve gone on several very long walks – which is like Joe’s Vietnam with cars attacking from all sides - and made it home each time with all dogs intact and several bags of smelly poop. Speaking of poop, there is A LOT of poop. Like everything that is going in is coming out times two. And when they don’t poop, they pass gas. A LOT of freakin’ gas. And it is a noxious gas that covers the room in a thick green haze of taste-able odor. We’ve taken to lighting candles in the hopes of burning some of the odor. We’re lighting A LOT of candles. If you hear about a house blowing up in Nashville from a suspected gas explosion, um, that might be ours. But for all the pooping and gassing and scuffling, there are times where we are in stiches from the silly antics of the Terrible Three. Yesterday morning, a herd of eight deer made their morning commute down the hill in front of the house. Tigger announced their presence first. A sharp bark followed by a Chewbacca type gurgle from the front window. Joe unfurled his legs from his cramped position and ambled his way from the back room toward the front window. Pepper, from her corner of the hallway right near the bedroom door where she was waiting for Husband to wake up, perked her ears up and trotted down the hall toward Tigger whose gurgle was now a full on bark fest. Joe climbed up onto Tigger's bed, both of them seated at attention facing the herd of eight wandering slowly across the road and down the hill to the side of the house. I stood behind them, watching and Pepper, unable to see and too wary of Tigger to step onto the bed, stood on her hind legs next to me, ears at full perk, her front left paw on my thigh peering over the dogs. The moment she spotted the deer, all hell broke loose. Deer outweighed the threat of Tigger and her Mean Girl antics so Pepper jumped up on the bed too and they all went to town barking their unhappiness at the violation of their yard space. If this were a concert, this would have been the crescendo at the end with the every instrument banging away. Pepper leading with her high-pitched yip, Tigger filling the noise in the middle and Joe rounding out the bottom with his surprise baritone. For the next ten minutes, the three of them ran around the house, from window to window, sharing their ire about the intruders in the yard. They were so loud that the deer could hear them through the double pane glass and would freeze every few moment to be sure they weren’t about to be attacked, prolonging the barking concert. A highly entertaining moment, despite it being 8am on a Sunday morning - mostly because Mean Girl Tigger the Dog and Pepper were united in a common goal. So that’s our life of late. Three dogs and poop and gas and poop and ball throwing and gas and poop… We’re exhausted - and very much in danger of falling deeper in love… Crap!
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Various Chocolate Candies for Husband’s Valentines Day candy sign = $10 Card for Husband = $2 Vet visit after Pepper and Joe find the bag of candy and EAT IT ALL, card included = $200 Verbal lashing from Vet = PAINFUL!!! Happy Valentine's Day, Husband. Hope you enjoyed your candy sign as they puked it up. You ain't getting another one. ~ wife UPDATE Two hours later, this is what we found when we got back from lunch. Anyone want a dog? Or two? Or three?
A little known fact about me is that I shave my head when things get out of control. Yup. Who needs meds? I actually try and shave my head every two weeks but if my life is suddenly like a three ring circus, I will pull that shaver out and take back a little bit of imaginary control.
Like now, life in our household is very much like a circus. Wait, not really a circus, more like a high school hallway all day long. Tigger the Dog is the mean girl, bulling Little Pepper for the cute boy, i.e. Husband’s attention. Meanwhile, dumb cute freshman Joe, is totally oblivious to them; he just wants to talk food and what he can do to get the coach’s – also Husband - approval. And Little Pepper, who is losing a bit of her self-esteem mojo every day but still manages to come back at Mean Girl TTD with a literal snappy comeback when needed, shutting her down. If high school movies are anything to go by, we’ve got another semester of this before they bond over some big school trick or they get one over on the Principal i.e. me, or they both dump the cute boy and become Best Friends Forever. It is exhausting. So I shaved my head. Now my current hair ‘style’ is just my sides and back shaved with the top afro-ing itself silly. Most times I twist the top bit into little ringlets – well, little ringlets on day one and dreads every after until I comb it out and start over again. But my hair is also not happy with life right now and needed a break from twisting so I’ve just left it large and only slightly contained from going all over the place in a modified pony poof. Keep in mind that there is so much poof right now, it’s almost like my head has another hairy head on top, seriously poufy. That is how it was ‘styled’ as I was standing in the bathroom, taking back control of my life one hair at a time, a second pony poof hair head on the top of my head. I shave the sides, the back near the base of my neck and I slowdown the process to try and give myself a somewhat even line around the base of the poof. This is delicate work made worse by the fact that I can’t wear my glasses so I can’t see so who the hell knows what it looks like back there. Anyway, I shave around the poof as best I can then slide the razor down for a last pass at the base of my neck, lift the shaver off my neck, bring it over my head – AND SHAVE A CHUNK OF POOF RIGHT OFF THE TOP! Seriously, a large chuck of Afro buzzes right off the top and falls into the sink in front off me as I stand there, stunned and stupid, shaver still buzzing in my hand. The irony of the situation hits me and I start laughing. And laughing. And laughing. Fuzzy hairball in the sink, razor in my hand, hole in my poof, high school circus right outside the bathroom door – how could I not? I’m totally that girl from Sixteen Candles minus the Anthony Michael Hall make-out session at the end. Now, I know this isn’t tragic. I have an Afro; no one can tell I’m missing a chunk of it but me - and I’d just be guessing. And the shave served its purpose; I am feeling slightly more in control despite the hole in my head. No real harm, no real foul… And yet - Mean Girl TTD is so gonna make fun of me… What a difference a week makes. One week ago, these two were found, cold and traumatized on a friend’s porch. Both of them starving and covered in various wounds and sores. Now look at them! Clean and starting to plump up, they no longer follow us from room to room to make sure we don’t leave them. They will actually choose to be in separate rooms, something that was impossible for us to attempt a few days ago. And look, you can almost NOT see Joe's ribs! The antibiotics are doing their thing. Both of them are starting to lose the snow burn that was most evident on poor Joe’s testicals and Pepper’s feet. Both of them have lost that glazed look of “What the hell happened to us?” And both of them are starting to feel comfortable knowing they’re getting a regular meal and a warm place to sleep. Joe is starting to play, a big gangly bony mess of play but he is starting to play. He can only manage it for a few minutes before he remembers he’s sad and life is hard but in those few minutes, we actually have seen a bit of a smile on that line-ridden face. Little Ms. Pepper has got her pep back. That little sucker will chase a ball for hours and, when you’re done and you hide the ball, she’ll bring you a rock or a stick to throw, anything to keep the game going. The little sores on her feet don’t stop her from running even though we are trying. Last night, Husband managed to get the pair to sit on the bed WITH Tigger the Dog while waiting for me to put out the food. Really that should be, Husband managed to get Tigger the Dog to sit on the bed with Pepper and Joe since she is still trying to do her best to pretend they aren’t here. We put together a GoFundMe account to help pay for Pepper and Joe’s meds and impending sniping. I have been so dang touched at how many people have contributed to getting these poor pups healthy. We’re doing what we can to repair the damage from the homelessness but that lack of love and trust will take a long while. I mean, look at our rescued Tigger the Dog. She’s still a mess three years later and not just because she picks up on my wackiness. Who ever had her before messed her little brain up! Let’s hope Pepper and Joe have a quicker recovery.
Today I’m spending time trying to arrange removal of Pepper and Joe's parts. I’ve never been actively involved in the part removal scheduling – other than mine, of course. All our previous beasts have come to us missing the parts that make them hump things - like Pepper was doing to poor Joe’s face last week. I didn’t know that it costs more to spay than to neuter. But of course I never stopped to consider, as my mom pointed out that, “The boys have their parts easily accessible.” The woman at the vets office was very amused when I asked if they did husband part removal too. The answer is no. Even though he still owes me because he lost the Kitchen Bet of 2006, he is never getting "the snip" I could never have tricked Husband into going down there and getting it done. I digress. Anyone want a dog? Or two? They are the sweetest, totally well trained beasts. And Pepper does tricks! I’ll even throw in Tigger the Dog to sweeten the pot. Anyone? Anyone? Who am I kidding? We’re going to end up with three dogs and Husband will forever have a reason to not take me anywhere… good thing they're cute... |
AuthorMy name is ej. I'm a girl. I say that because with the short hair and the short initials, folks aren't always sure. More brilliant insights to who I am in About me Archives
April 2019
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