Last week I wrote about "The 3 Stages of I-Can't-Believe-You-Did-That". Jake did not have a good week last week and I got to go through those stages more often than I care to admit.
Jake loves to chew things. We all know that. You've read the stories or heard about them. I made the mistake of leaving my cell phone on my bed. I know I can't leave things on the bed anymore because Jake can jump up there now. But I forgot. A little later I walked into the living room and there's my phone, open, on the floor with the back panel off. I entered stage 1 at that point and I freely admit, the concern I felt was not for the dog, but for my phone. I like having a cell phone but this has not been my favorite model. It flips open but has smooth sides and it doesn't have that nice little notch to slide my thumb into to flip it open. So, how does a dog without opposable thumbs manage to open my phone? The same goes with the back panel. The 2 times I tried to open it, I had to really work at it. Why was it now lying 2 feet away from my open phone? I tried the phone, and it didn't work. At this point I had skipped stage 2 completely and went right to a very strong stage 3. There was nothing amusing about it and I was highly annoyed now. My once cute little phone had huge holes in it. Jeff wasn't happy either and mumbled something to Jake about how he's lucky we're not getting rid of him so I thought I better get the dog out of the house for a bit. We went on a long, long walk. I think we all calmed down a bit. The good news is that here it is a week later and as I was leaving to take it into the Sprint store to see if it could be fixed, I tried it one more time and....it worked! It's a miracle! I was happy and the dog was off the hook. It still has some huge puncture holes in it but it works. But I still don't find it very amusing.
Jake got himself into some other predicaments later in the week that I could write about but as I sit here typing, he's running back and forth by the pool as Jeff swims laps. Sometimes he just follows Jeff on the side of the pool, sometimes he takes his tennis ball and drops it in the pool for Jeff to pick up and throw across the yard. He gets the ball, runs back and drops it in the pool again. Aww, he's so cute! Really, he's not such a bad dog. I think we'll keep him.
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Tuesday, July 14, 2009
Banisters and Bones
When I was a kid, I remember going to some kind of electronics store, like a Radio Shack, and wandering around while my parents were looking for a new radio or something. Part of this little store had an area that was a couple of steps up and was divided from the rest of the store by a little wrought iron banister (early 70's decor). For some reason, my little 8 year old mind thought it would be a neat idea to stick my head through the bars of this railing. My head went right between the bars but coming back out wasn't so easy. I tried to pull my head out before my parents, or worse, my brother looked over and saw my predicament. Panic set in and I started crying. My family, the sales guy, other shoppers, all came over to see what a stupid, stupid thing I had done. Then I remember my mom looking at me and going through
The 3 Stages of "I-Can't-Believe-You-Did-That!"
Stage 1 is Concern....my daughter's head is stuck, she's crying, is she hurt? Then when she saw I wasn't really hurt, she quickly (maybe a little too quickly) entered....
Stage 2: Amusement. I can't believe she did something so stupid. Why, oh why, don't I have a camera with me so I can taunt her with this for the rest of her life. She's got her head stuck in a banister, for Pete's sake! Wait till the neighbors hear about this!
Then comes Stage 3: Annoyance. The timing and severity of stage 3 is directly proportional to either a) the amount of time is being wasted on such nonsense or b) the amount of money that is being wasted on such nonsense.
Happy to say, between my dad and the sales guy, I was able to get my head out and, other than giving my brother a lifetime of "big head" jokes, I wasn't harmed.
Which brings me to my latest Jake story. Since it's summer, Jake gets his morning walk whenever Jeff or I get up, wake up a bit, maybe have some breakfast, etc. Yesterday as I was reading the paper and taking my time, Jake had a sad sack look on his face that I thought meant he wanted to go for a walk. I asked him if he wanted to go but he just looked at me and drooled a bit. Ok, he's not really a drooler so that was a little weird. Jake has some bones that he chews on. I had read it was a really good idea to get the round beef bones that have been cooked and still have the marrow in them for dogs to chew. They chew out the marrow, leaving a hallow center and you can put peanut butter in the middle for a nice little treat. So all around the house, we have these round donut shaped bones that he likes to chew on. Somehow, he managed to get a bone over his bottom jaw. I can only describe it as slipping a small ring onto a fat finger. It was pushed back over his back teeth and his tongue was stuck underneath it. How? I have no idea.
Jeff and I saw his problem and I tried to pull it off, thinking it would come off right away. Anytime I touched the bone, Jake went nuts. At one point, he ran up the stairs, behind the recliner and was trying to climb the wall....literally. Jeff and I tried to pin him down and pull it off but he yelped and scratched and the bone wouldn't budge. At this point, I was in Stage 1. I was so worried about my little pup. I called our Wonderful Vet and they said to bring him right in.
By the time I got to the vet's office, I was in Stage 2. As we walked into his office, the absurdity of our situation hit me. I was walking into the waiting room with a dog that had a bone stuck over his lower jaw. Why didn't I take a picture of him before we left the house?! Knowing I was around animal lovers in the office and waiting room I tried to look like I was concerned (stage 1) but I just couldn't help it and started laughing when I got to the desk. One lady in the waiting room took a look at him and said, "I think he better go in next". Yup, he was that pitiful looking. Jake's Wonderful Vet had me bring him right in and put him on the exam table. He had me hold his head while he injected him and then said, "Hold him, he'll start falling over". About 5 seconds later, Jake just kind of fell sideways and was out. Again, I thought this was all very funny. Wonderful Vet took what looked like bolt cutters and wedged it between the bone and his jaw and snapped the bone right off. Poor Jake had a cut up tongue and lips but was really no worse for the wear. Wonderful Vet said this wasn't the first time he had seen this, which in an odd way, made me feel better.
Stage 3 hit me when I realized Jake was going to have to stay in the office and sleep off the anesthesia and I would have to go back later in the afternoon to pick him up. Not exactly how I planned to spend a Monday but that was ok. I just wanted him to be ok so stage 3 didn't last too long.
I got Jake home in the afternoon and he slept most of the day. Today he's fine and playful like usual. And all the bones are in the trash.
The 3 Stages of "I-Can't-Believe-You-Did-That!"
Stage 1 is Concern....my daughter's head is stuck, she's crying, is she hurt? Then when she saw I wasn't really hurt, she quickly (maybe a little too quickly) entered....
Stage 2: Amusement. I can't believe she did something so stupid. Why, oh why, don't I have a camera with me so I can taunt her with this for the rest of her life. She's got her head stuck in a banister, for Pete's sake! Wait till the neighbors hear about this!
Then comes Stage 3: Annoyance. The timing and severity of stage 3 is directly proportional to either a) the amount of time is being wasted on such nonsense or b) the amount of money that is being wasted on such nonsense.
Happy to say, between my dad and the sales guy, I was able to get my head out and, other than giving my brother a lifetime of "big head" jokes, I wasn't harmed.
Which brings me to my latest Jake story. Since it's summer, Jake gets his morning walk whenever Jeff or I get up, wake up a bit, maybe have some breakfast, etc. Yesterday as I was reading the paper and taking my time, Jake had a sad sack look on his face that I thought meant he wanted to go for a walk. I asked him if he wanted to go but he just looked at me and drooled a bit. Ok, he's not really a drooler so that was a little weird. Jake has some bones that he chews on. I had read it was a really good idea to get the round beef bones that have been cooked and still have the marrow in them for dogs to chew. They chew out the marrow, leaving a hallow center and you can put peanut butter in the middle for a nice little treat. So all around the house, we have these round donut shaped bones that he likes to chew on. Somehow, he managed to get a bone over his bottom jaw. I can only describe it as slipping a small ring onto a fat finger. It was pushed back over his back teeth and his tongue was stuck underneath it. How? I have no idea.
Jeff and I saw his problem and I tried to pull it off, thinking it would come off right away. Anytime I touched the bone, Jake went nuts. At one point, he ran up the stairs, behind the recliner and was trying to climb the wall....literally. Jeff and I tried to pin him down and pull it off but he yelped and scratched and the bone wouldn't budge. At this point, I was in Stage 1. I was so worried about my little pup. I called our Wonderful Vet and they said to bring him right in.
By the time I got to the vet's office, I was in Stage 2. As we walked into his office, the absurdity of our situation hit me. I was walking into the waiting room with a dog that had a bone stuck over his lower jaw. Why didn't I take a picture of him before we left the house?! Knowing I was around animal lovers in the office and waiting room I tried to look like I was concerned (stage 1) but I just couldn't help it and started laughing when I got to the desk. One lady in the waiting room took a look at him and said, "I think he better go in next". Yup, he was that pitiful looking. Jake's Wonderful Vet had me bring him right in and put him on the exam table. He had me hold his head while he injected him and then said, "Hold him, he'll start falling over". About 5 seconds later, Jake just kind of fell sideways and was out. Again, I thought this was all very funny. Wonderful Vet took what looked like bolt cutters and wedged it between the bone and his jaw and snapped the bone right off. Poor Jake had a cut up tongue and lips but was really no worse for the wear. Wonderful Vet said this wasn't the first time he had seen this, which in an odd way, made me feel better.
Stage 3 hit me when I realized Jake was going to have to stay in the office and sleep off the anesthesia and I would have to go back later in the afternoon to pick him up. Not exactly how I planned to spend a Monday but that was ok. I just wanted him to be ok so stage 3 didn't last too long.
I got Jake home in the afternoon and he slept most of the day. Today he's fine and playful like usual. And all the bones are in the trash.
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