How NOT to Give a Dog a Pill

On the eve of Tova's first heat, (which we had been anticipating for over 6 months), Tova decided to show us that heat was not such a problem, not such a mess. Especially when compared with diarrhea!

I won't get into the gory details of it all, but I'm happy that I have an airline-style crate, rather than the wire kind. For once, LESS ventilation was a good thing.

However, what to do about this was the question of the day. Well, it was the question for me. For my daughter, the question of the day was "why does it smell so bad in here". For my wife, the question of the day is mostly unprintable, and brings into serious question my relationship with several common household kitchen tools.

After a call to the breeder... OK, really it was after:

1. straining my back lifting the crate and dog as a whole unit (I could have SWORN I said I was going to stop doing that!)
2. carrying it out to the garage
3. soaking dog, owner, and crate to the bone, while cleaning very little
4. enduring continued withering spousal statements about male-ness in general and myself in particular
5. assisting in renewed efforts to actually clean the mess while averting near-disaster involving a certain 2 1/2 year old and the aforementioned mess

After all that, I called the breeder who directed me to buy kaopectate chewable tablets. Which I drove off to do while wife and children left the house for the relative calm of a sale at K-Mart.

Now I should take a moment to mention that my wife's background is in the medical field, while I spent 4 years and many thousand dollars in New York pursuing a degree in Theater. My wife currently works in the field of medicine. I currently work as a computer geek. This should translate to the reader in the following way:

1. I can present a really entertaining rendition of the class "DOS is your Friend"
2. You never want me shopping for any medical supplies

So, although I was explicitly instructed to purchase chewable tablets, I bought adult capsules instead. Ignorant of this, I blithely proceeded home, toward certain disaster.

Up to this point, the only medical experience Tova and I had faced together were visits to the vet (where, at most, I was asked to "sit in the waiting room and not break things") and offering her the monthly HeartGuard brick, which Tova, despite repeated doses, confuses for candy and snaps up, occasionally causing me to re-count fingers just to make sure.

Back in the garage, I happily (if somewhat cautiously) extended my hand with the two caplets, figuring these would be confused, if not for crunchy treats, then perhaps hard candy.

Sniff.........snorf......

An unimpressed dog wanders away, eyeing the garden hose hanging on the wall with suspicion.

Maybe she just needs a taste to get her going. I jam a caplet past her front teeth, waiting to hear satisfied crunching noises.

You know that "picky eater" dog food commercial with the basset hound? The one where he spits the kibble out and watches it ricochet around the kitchen?

Just like that, only now I have a caplet-sized dent in my car.

Just as visions of syringes begin to dance in my head, I remember an old trick I saw a girlfriend do in high-school with her cocker-spaniel (no, not THAT trick!). I race inside and grab the tub of peanut butter. Not just a regular tub, either. My wife shops for *duration*, so these are the econo-size jobs.

Now I am faced with the delimma of one pill or two. Opting to get the whole thing over with as quickly as possible, I dunk both pills together into the peanut butter jar, coming up with a plum-sized glop of PB. Forcing Tova's mouth open with the other hand, I skillfully jam the gooey mass into her mouth. Then I take both hands and hold her mouth shut for a moment.

Glufflle......shluck shluck shluck......gluffle...click!

Two pearly white pills clatter to the garage floor. I look irately at my dog, who sports a satisfied smile to go with the peanut butter smeared over the left side of her face. Remember, I used BOTH hands to hold her mouth shut.

Not content to be stupid once, I decide to try again. So I pick up the (now pasty-wet) pills, grab the container, and dunk again. Same result, except that the sound the pills make on exit is now more of a "splut" that a "click".

I admit defeat, spray down the half of the dog now covered in peanut butter, and go inside to clean up the half of me now covered in peanut butter.

My wife returns to survey the scene. It doesn't take long after "why are two pills missing from this box?" for her to get the rest of the picture. With a smile that only triumphantly superior wives can wear, she grabs a pill in one hand, the dog in the other. It is not lost on me that peanut butter, or any other condiment for that matter, is conspicuously absent. One pill goes to the back of the throat, and the muzzle is gently held closed. While rubbing her throat, my wife croons to the dog in the same voice she used to wake me up at 2:00am when our newborn puppy was crying to go out. Gently, nicely, with just a hint of a razor blade waiting in the wings. Tova rolls her eyes and gives a "Oh, you want me to *swallow*! Why didn't you say so?" look, and ....gluck....down goes pill one. Pill two goes even faster.

I now have a month's worth of PBJ sandwiches to eat.

How NOT to Give a Dog a Bath, Part 2

It all started with a bowl of water. Make that 2 and a half bowls of water at 5:00am, on a day when my wife and I both work. Now I should explain that normally Tova is only in her cage for "calm down" times and those moments when my wife is out running errands or picking up the kids. In most cases she is outside enjoying the view of the back yard or inside wandering around the kitchen. But on Mondays and Tuesdays, due to combined work schedules, she suffers the ignominy of confinement from about 7:00 to 3:30, when I get home.

On this particular morning, after our 5:00 potty run, Tova decided that she was a pyr-fish, and guzzled down 2 and a half bowls of water. Happily ignorant of the truth in what I had done, I directed her back into the crate and trotted off to work.

When I returned home, there was a slight odor in the air. I was immediately leery, but saw no telltale puddles in the cage, so I thought that maybe it was just a case of gas. Of course, when I took her out of the cage I discovered Use Number 2 for Dog Hair - Nature's Handi-Wipe. I have only God to thank that she didn't choose this moment to practice the "shake" command.

Outside we went, for a quick airing-out. Snow or no snow, I didn't want her soaking any longer than necessary. Besides, I knew I could get ready and bring her back inside quickly.

I had just bought one of those bathtub-mini-shower thingies, a K-Mart special. Tova had been looking a little brown around the edges, so I was all set for bath anyway. At least that's what I thought.

Once again I cleared all chase-able things on the way from the garage through the kitchen to the hallway to the stairs up to the bathroom.

I grabbed a bundle of towels, emptied the bathroom of all chew-ables, and began to install the shower-attachment.

I should note that our house is not even a year old, and it was at this time I discovered that our spigots are all extra-wide. Wider, in fact, than any known adapter for those shower-things.

20 minutes and 6 plumbing attachments later, I decided to pitch the idea and just give the dog a plain old bath. I also remember that it was only 10 degrees outside (not counting wind chill).

While I have read about Pyr's in the winter and how cute those "drool-sicles" can be, let me state right now that "pee-sicles" are significantly less cute. Tova was, however, unfazed by the weather. Thank goodness for that.

Inside we go, through the kitchen she knows as home, into the hallway where we rarely are allowed, and up to the stairs. "Stairs?" she says "Don't like em. There's more than 2 up there. Think I'll pass.".

"Oh now get real" I say to myself. I go immediately into my doggy cheerleader role. "You can do this, I know you can!" No good. I tempt her with treats, and even wave the cat in front of her as bait. As tempting as the cat was, Tova still wasn't going to run up that massive number of steps (10).

From the amount of struggling, I am fairly certain Tova didn't enjoy being carried as much as I didn't enjoy carrying her. I can only hope this translates into a desire to revisit the stairs issue, and perhaps come to a decision about them that doesn't involve my back or feline body parts.

Finally into the bathroom, I began running the water. If Tova's expression was leery for the stairs, it was all-out panic for the bathtub. This was, of course, the moment my daughters chose to open the door and see how the bath was going. The act of knocking them over, however, slowed Tova enough that I was able to wrestle her down before she attempted to test un-modified canine aerodynamics over the railing.

A short while later the bathtub was full, my children were tethered to the toilet, Tova was locked with me in the bathroom, and I was ready for a nap.

Into the water she went, and the dog who found 10 stairs impossible to traverse was now attempting to scale a 90-degree sheer wall made of wet tile. Some animals are so fickle.

Lacking the shower-thingy, I began the cup-and-dunk routine. My daughters were only too willing to help, and so Tova quickly learned to turn her body away from wherever they were, in order to avoid drowning.

Shampoo was next. Tova lathered up very nicely. So did my two-year-old. I caught her fast enough to save half the 16-oz bottle of shampoo. She won't need to wash her hair for another month. The 5-year-old was enchanted to see Tova licking the bubbles. Tried it herself but wasn't impressed. Fed it to the 2 year old which was significantly more fun. Both children were then exiled from the bathroom.

The rest of the bath was (relatively) uneventful, but was a major pain the back. Literally. Soaping and rinsing a furry 55lb dog takes *a lot* longer than a fur-less 35 lb child.

I still couldn't find a way to make Tova shake. No, blowing in her ear didn't help. It certainly did elicit chuckles from my wife, however. Remembering the scarring from my last attempt to "squeegee" the water out of Tova's fur, I opted for the "squeezee" method this time. Tova looked irked, but I finished with all my digits in tact and relatively few open wounds.

I lined the floor with towels and let her out of the bathtub, figuring to toss and towel over and begin drying in earnest. Tova hopped out with a sigh of relief. I turned to grab the big towel. Tova figured it was a good time to shake. There must be a class during the day while everyone is out that Tova goes to teach her these things.

Not happy with being bitten, scratched, soaped, wetted, and braided (the last done by the 5-year old while I was distracted rinsing dog shampoo out of the 2-year old), I decided to round out my day by adding pummeled, run-over, and burned. I got out the hairdryer. I have since been told that most people put the dog into a crate as a safety feature for both themselves and the dog.

Tova was now mostly dry, so I called it quits and began moving downstairs. Of course, Tova wouldn't go down them either. She then had the nerve to look surprised as I put her back into her (cleaned) crate, rather than be allowed to walk around the house for a while.

Meanwhile, I stripped down to my underwear, got a glass of water and 6 Advil, opened the phone book, and began looking under "D" for "Dog Grooming Services".