Tag Archives: dogs

Rough Day

All About Me, Home Life, Pets, , , , ,

Ever have one of those days when you really wish Jesus would quit fooling around and just come back already? You know what I mean; we all have days that we know going in are going to be bad, but then they turn out to be so much worse than we expected. This has been one of those days for me.

It started almost immediately: the wonderful but occasionally absent-minded and mildly careless Jess forgot to set her alarm and overslept, so I had to get up, take care of the dogs, fix her coffee and stuff. I really didn’t mind that. It happens fairly regularly, so it’s a minor hiccup–I figure, at least I get to go back to bed, she has to go to work. Then, later, when I do get up, my sister-in-law Andie is up fooling around in the kitchen.

I love Andie and look forward to her visits. However, we were expecting her today, and I figured I’d have time to clean up the house before she got here. She got here yesterday instead.

Now, neither Jess nor I are what you’d call neat freaks. We’re basically feral and, since the amazing and diligent Jess went back to work I’ve been responsible for housekeeping. Needless to say, Andie’s version of clean and mine are pretty different. She likes things to be neat, organized, and genuinely clean, while I feel pretty strongly that as long as nobody sticks to anything they lean on and I know what’s in the piles of stuff, well that’s good enough.

So the first thing I say to Andie as I’m taking the dogs out is that I’m going to take care of the dishes in a little bit. By the time I come back in, she’s already doing the dishes, she’s put away the clean dishes, “put away” some of the piles, and reorganized the remaining piles. She’s standing there waiting for me to tell her where the stuff in the remaining piles belongs. I’m like “right there.” I like to think that Jess and I aren’t the only people on the planet who don’t actually have a “place for everything.” To be honest, I don’t even know what half of that stuff is, much less where to put it.

She wanted me to do something about the recyclables, and then seemed shocked when that “something” turned out to be tying the bags shut and lobbing them down the stairs to the basement (don’t worry, next time I go downstairs, I’ll kick them over to where they belong).

Anyway, I had bigger fish to fry: I’m supposed to get my first colonoscopy (and endoscopy too! Hope they use a different tube for that one, or at least do the endoscopy first.) tomorrow, and so I had to swill down half of a giant bottle of Turbo-Lax to start my day off (gotta make sure I’m squeaky clean inside!). I get to get up at 6 tomorrow morning to drink the other half–yay.

So already the day is not great. When that Turbo-Lax kicks in, it’s not fooling around. I’m pretty sure I’m going to be taking my colon to the hospital in a bucket tomorrow. It’s also kind of tough discovering that I am literally as full of shit as people have always told me (well, not any more, so there!).

Then, Molly, our golden retriever that was my mom’s dog, collapsed on the porch. She hasn’t been doing well for a while, and apparently today was the day. I called Jess and asked her to make an appointment for Molly at the vet, so she did that and then took off early to go with us. While I waited for Jess, I alternated between sitting next to Molly, petting and talking to her, and running to the bathroom.

We got her to the vet, and it was as bad as we had feared: we had to make the call that nobody ever wants to make. They gave us a little more time with her and we both sat on the floor with her petting her and telling her she was a good girl while we both bawled like babies. I told her to go kick Harry’s (another one of our former dogs, who was kind of a jerk) ass, and Jess laughed and then said Molly’d be too busy looking for mom. That really set off the waterworks. I never could look at Molly without thinking of Mom. Molly was the last thing that Mom really recognized. Mom couldn’t remember her name, but she’d cup Molly’s head in her hands, lean forward and say “You’re my dog. Yes you are, you’re my dog.” Then she’d kiss the top of Molly’s head.

Anyway, we’re bawling our eyes out, and the girl came in and gave Molly THE SHOT. She was gone in just a few seconds. She was such a good girl. One of the sweetest dogs I’ve ever known.

Then we come home, and Andie’s cooking chili. The air is thick with the smell of frying hamburger, venison, and bacon. BACON! Who the hell puts BACON in chili? And what kind of monster does it on a day when one of the world’s great bacon lovers and chili lovers is on a clear liquid diet? The sister-in-law kind of monster, that’s what kind.

So my eyes hurt from crying, my ass hurts from . . . well you can imagine, although I recommend you don’t try too hard . . . and I’ve got to take even more laxatives, while smelling all that good food. Food that I CAN’T HAVE!!!!!

I go outside to have a smoke, and there’s a good breeze blowing. I turn my back to the wind, and all of a sudden, there’s a sound . . . a weird sound . . . a sound like somebody blowing across the top of a giant, empty, coke bottle. Halfway through the cigarette, I had to rush back inside, and the sound stopped. I’m pretty sure that, after today, the doctor won’t have to worry about using the micro-camera equipment–he’ll be able to just grab a camcorder and shove his arm up there. I think there’ll be plenty of room.

Needless to say, I’m not looking forward to tomorrow. Maybe I’ll get lucky and Jesus’ll come back tonight.

Some Days It Just Doesn’t Pay to Get Out of Bed.

All About Me, Culture, Home Life, Pets, Politics & Culture, Wives, , , , , , ,

Some days, you just know going in, that it’s going to be a shitty day. Take the other day for example; I woke up when the alarm went off – my least favorite way to wake up, or at least least favorite normal way to wake up (waking up to being swallowed alive by a giant anaconda for example, would be worse, but extremely abnormal). Anyway, I get up, stagger through the canine obstacle course that is our bedroom, and head to the bathroom to find the lid on the toilet down (almost always a harbinger of impending doom).

“Huh,” I thought, with my cloudy, morning-brain, “I wonder why Jess put that down?” I figured it was to keep the dogs from drinking out of the toilet.

It wasn’t.

It turned out that my wife, the lovely-but-tragically-digestively-challenged Jess was running late for work when the previous night’s meatloaf hit her. I blame myself of course, after all, it was me who made it, and me who got careless with the garlic powder (I like garlic, sometimes a little too much). It was a new container, and instead of opening the shaker side of the lid, I accidentally opened the spoon side of the lid and gave it a hearty shake. I estimate that I dumped at least a quarter to half-cup of garlic powder into the meatloaf, hence the ensuing (and ongoing) digestive tragedy.

At any rate, not to be too indelicate, our pipes were apparently not up to the challenge, and since the diligent, and extremely time-conscious Jess was (conveniently?) running late, she simply had no choice but to leave me a fabulous parting gift. It was a disappointing and unpleasant start to the day.

Well, I got that taken care of, as well as my own ablutions (oh, don’t act so grossed out, you do the same thing), and got all the dogs outside to do their thing, had my morning smoke, got all the dogs back inside, managed to survive the three-ring-circus that is feeding time at Casa del Moon, and headed for the den to do some writing. My entry to the den was blocked, however, by the dog gate (Molly the old Golden Retriever sleeps loose in the den, and Mattie the young, crazy Jack Russel/Beagle mix sleeps in a kennel in there). Normally, the gate is only shut at night, to keep Molly from wandering.

“Huh,” I thought, “I wonder why Jess latched that gate?” I figured it was just an accident, one of those things you just do without thinking, because you’re busy thinking about other things.

It wasn’t.

It turned out that Molly had experienced a tragic digestive crisis of her own overnight. Three times (apparently what the lovely and resourceful Jess was thinking about was how glad she was that she was running late for work). For more info on why Jess latched the gate, see my post, My Dog Eats Poo: A Disgusting Allegorical Tale. ‘Nuff said on that.

So, my morning was pretty much eaten up by cleaning . . . well, let’s just leave it at that.

To top it all off, I had to go to work.

I don’t like going to work. I’ve been doing it all my life, and I’ve never liked it. That’s why I want to be a writer-it’s so much more fun. Sadly-so far at least-it’s also far less lucrative, so I get the dogs all squared away, saddle up, and head to work.

Now don’t get me wrong, I like this job better than any other job I’ve ever had. I like helping people to improve their writing skills, especially when they really want to improve. Unfortunately, this particular day’s students didn’t really seem to want to improve, they just wanted me to tell them what to write so they could pass their classes. This always puts me in a bad mood.

Then a kid comes in. While one of my colleagues is reading his paper, this kid is blathering on about one of his classes which focused (in part) on the Civil War, and he didn’t feel that the other side (the side he identified with) was fairly represented. Then, he made the mistake of asking me what I thought.

I knew where he was coming from: when I was a kid, most of my heroes were Confederates (my family also has southern roots). Let’s face it-the South had all the cool guys: Robert E. Lee, J.E.B. Stuart, Stonewall Jackson, Mosby’s Rangers, etc. What did the Union have? A bunch of incompetents, an alcoholic, and a couple of deeply devoted arsonists. But then, I told him, I read some books, a whole bunch of books, in fact, and had come to the conclusion that better men never fought and/or died for worse cause, i.e. the right to own another human being as property.

He seemed to take offense to that, pointing out that the Civil War wasn’t about slavery, it was about state’s rights.

I pointed out to him that the only state’s right the South was specifically interested in, the only one that couldn’t have been settled peaceably was the right to own slaves. If you doubt me, and I’m sure some of you do, here’s a link to the Declarations of Secession of Virginia, Texas, Georgia, Mississippi, and South Carolina. As far as I can tell, the other nine states never really mentioned any specific reasons (other than hating Lincoln, and/or perceived unfair treatment) for seceding. Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong.

He, of course, countered with that old chestnut, “But most confederates didn’t even own slaves!” True enough, but, those guys were talked into war by the guys who did own slaves.

He then asked if I thought all people who fly the Confederate Flag now are racists. I told him no, I didn’t think that, but, I asked him, what would you think of me if I was flying a Nazi flag over my house, not because I was a racist, but because I was proud of my German heritage and had ancestors that fought for Germany? He didn’t seem to have an answer for this.

All this time, I was getting more and more aggravated. I have a pretty low tolerance for stupidity, and virtually no tolerance at all for willful stupidity, and this kid was pretty much the poster child for it.

It got quiet for a while, and then he asked me what I thought about the cool kids club. I didn’t know what that was, until he said it’s spelled with all K’s. I told him I wasn’t a fan.

He didn’t say anything, so I waited. And waited. And waited some more. Finally, I asked him what he thought about the KKK. He was really quick to point out that he wasn’t in favor of hurting anybody, and he really liked black people, in fact, he had a lot of black friends, but there were some things that he did like about the KKK. I asked him what those were, and he hemmed and hawed around for quite a while, just um-ing, and well-ing, etc.

I finally asked him if he was having trouble thinking of something good to say about them that wouldn’t make him sound like a racist, and he just laughed, and said something about racism being pretty much over in the good ol’ USA.

By this time, my head was about to explode, and of course, my mouth started moving faster than my brain. I told him that, of course, he could say that, he was safe. He asked me what I meant by that.

It’s important to understand, at this point, that we were not alone. There were several others present, all young white men, including one gay kid.

I said, “I mean you’re safe. I’m the safest person in this room. I’m white, middle-aged, at least marginally middle-class, and married. At this point, I am pretty much my only natural predator. You guys are less safe than me, because you’re younger, and more likely to get yourself into stupid, potentially life-threatening situations, a stage I’ve already survived. You guys are safer than Xxxxx.”

Xxxxx asked why they were safer than him, and I said, “Because you’re gay.”

This came as a complete surprise to Xxxxx, who pointed out that no, as a matter of fact, he was not gay.

Talk about derailing your own argument. Here I was, trying to point out that there are segments of our society that live their lives at considerably more risk than others, and that for those who are at virtually no risk to deny the evils of racism, xenophobia, homophobia, sexism, etc., that plague large portions of our society is, quite simply, deluded and disingenuous bullshit, and instead of making my point, I merely succeeded in making myself look (or at least feel) like the biggest asshole in the room.

Xxxxx wanted to know why I thought he was gay, and all I could think of was that I just thought he was. I had of course launched into that compulsively and diarrheatically vocal apology mode which usually only makes things worse, and makes you look like an even bigger asshole than if you’d just said, “I’m sorry” and shut the hell up.

I make no defense for myself. Xxxxx is a really nice kid. He’s very soft- and well-spoken, and speaks proper english, is always neatly and tidily dressed, doesn’t curse, doesn’t talk about women, and has good posture. Apparently, to my hunched, slouching, profane, vulgar, only conditionally showered, torn-T-shirt and worn-out jeans and shoes-wearing mind, that all adds up to gay. I made assumptions about him, based on purely circumstantial evidence, and, in a twisted kind of way, I supposed I proved my point, just not the way I expected to.

Hell, for all I know, that other kid, the stupid one, probably does have a lot of black friends.

All I know for sure is that I should have stayed in bed.

And, of course, that I, and most likely most of you too, have a lot farther to go on a personal level toward fixing the problems our society faces.

My Dog Eats Poo: A Disgusting Allegorical Tale

Culture, Politics, Politics & Culture, , , , ,

Our current oldest dog, Elsie, is a sweetie; she’s the princess of our little doggie family. She’s an English Springer Spaniel which, for my money, is one of the most beautiful breeds of dog. She is also probably the smartest dog we have. Now, at thirteen, she’s almost blind, and pretty much deaf (although the deafness seems to come and go a little bit, depending on what you’re saying to her), and fairly constantly confused. She spends most of her days napping on the couch, although, due to her arthritis, she frequently needs help getting up there. Even though she’s not the cute little puppy she used to be, everybody still loves Elsie. There’s just one problem: she eats poo. She seems to like it best when the weather is cold (poocicles!), the colder the better (crunchy poo!), although she doesn’t turn up her nose at it when the weather is warm either (gummy poo!).

Elsie, the Princess of our little doggie family

There’s nothing like seeing this beautiful little dog wandering around the yard, and then she looks up at you, and she looks like she’s doing an imitation of Winston Churchill, with a big ol’ poo stogie hanging out of her mouth as she enthusiastically gnaws on it. It’s kind of funny, but disgusting, and no matter how we try to keep the yard clean, with four dogs, there’s always some out there. It also doesn’t help that two of the four are big dogs with consistently impressive output. At least she’s not a big licker; trust me, nobody wants puppy kisses from Elsie.

The weird thing is that she’s a picky eater, and getting pickier every day. We’ve got her on special dog food formulated for older dogs, and she ate it for a while, and then just stopped. For a couple of days, we just couldn’t get her to eat. Finally, my wife, the beautiful and compassionate Jess, started mixing canned dog food in with Elsie’s kibble, and she started eating again.

She’s the same way with her medicine; she just pretty much refuses to take it. She’s on two different types of pills, and wants nothing to do with either of them. She would take them from Jess (well who wouldn’t?), so it was no big deal for a while, but when Jess went back to work, I had to give them to her, and she wasn’t having any of it. For a while, I could stuff the pills into chunks of hot dog, but she got wise to that; she’d chew up the hot dog, spit the pills out, and then swallow the hot dog.

This caused numerous problems because, for one thing, at this point, the pills smelled like hot dog, so I had to get to them before the other dogs (who seem to believe they are perpetually being starved) scarfed them down, and secondly, now, the pills were all slimy and hard to get hold of, but by the time I caught Elsie (who knew what was coming, and still moves pretty fast for an old dog), they had become spit-glued to my hand, so when I finally got her jaws pried open, the damned pills wouldn’t come off of my fingers. So there I was, having the thumb I was using to keep her mouth open gnawed through, while trying to scrape the pills off my finger with her teeth, without dropping them out of her mouth. It was a traumatic experience for both of us, and there were some days when she just didn’t get her pills.

Meatloaf seemed to solve the problem, at least until the leftovers ran out, but to be honest, I kind of resented having to save the meatloaf leftovers to pack her pills in (I love her, but I also love cold meatloaf sandwiches), and cooking an entire meatloaf just for her seemed like going just too far. I tried just mixing her pills in with her food, but she would eat around them. Trying to keep her comfortable and alive is no easy task.

For now, we’ve solved the problem with peanut butter; we stick the pills in a big glob of it, and stick it to the side of her food bowl. That’s worked for a couple of weeks, but this morning, when she’d finished breakfast, sure enough, there were the pills, spit-glued to the bowl, licked clean of peanut butter. I don’t know what we’ll do if the peanut butter stops working. I’m not proud of it, but I’ve actually thought of going out to the yard, and sticking them into some poo. Hopefully it won’t come to that. Also, I’m not sure she wouldn’t just eat the poo and spit the pills out. It’s really kind of disturbing. She sees the yard as one great big smorgasbord, greedily scarfing down all the recycled dog food she can find, but the stuff she needs, the stuff that will keep her alive and relatively healthy, she will go to any length to avoid.

It seems to me that she approaches food with the same attitude that we humans approach reality. More and more, we seem to seek out the reality we want, the reality that tastes good to us, no matter how shitty it might actually be (and a lot of that poo is really shitty).

For at least a year now, we, as a nation, have been gorging ourselves on an all-you-can-stomach poo buffet, with no sign of slowing down, much less stopping. We schlerp it up on the Facebook and Twitter, on the radio and TV, even go hunting for wilder and more rarified varieties in the untamed jungles of the internet. We just can’t get enough, or at least not enough with our packaging preference (after all, poo is just poo. A dog turd is a dog turd, whether it’s dressed up to suit the purposes of the right or the left). Plus, with electronic poo, with brain poo, there’s always plenty to go around, so we can not only share our favorite poo with all our friends, we can also inflict it on our enemies (’cause that’ll show ’em!). Besides, you know how they say we only use like 5% of our brains (although personally, I think that’s a high estimate for much of the world’s population), so we clearly have lots of poo storage available. Let’s shovel some more in!

Most of the time, it’s not even specific poo, it’s just broad, generic, generalized poo. So much of it is “liberals all do this” or “Conservatives all think that” or “all protesters want to destroy America” or “all politicians are corrupt” (actually, this is one of my own favorites. That’s why I keep using the term “we”).

Granted, sometimes it’s kind of funny – every time I see one of those “shares” that says “Watch Bill O’Reilly DESTROY Obama!” or “Rachel Maddow CRUSHES Mitch McConnell with this argument!”, I get a visual in my head of the allegedly “DEMOLISHED” party exploding, or melting like the Wicked Witch in the Wizard of Oz, which is kinda fun, except it never really happens. They’re never even slowed down, much less destroyed or demolished (That’s one of the problems with the Facebook & Twitter: It gets used by a lot of people who either don’t know what words mean, or just don’t care).

But really, what are our options? Oh sure, there are books we could read, books by great thinkers and writers, who’ve really studied the world & what it means to be human, what it means to be a citizen of the nation or the world, who’ve spent a lot of time trying to answer the big questions, and of course, reading those books might make us wiser and smarter, but isn’t it just easier, more efficient, and just tastier to our brains to just trust the makers of memes read that stuff, digest it, and poop out the important parts? It’s really like being on a diet. Reading Thomas Carlyle or Thomas Paine or Voltaire is just going to turn us into fatheads (especially Carlyle – that guy never used one word when ten would do); it’s just too much. Besides, reading books might make us think, and dammit, we’re Americans! Thinking didn’t make this country great! Getting out and doing stuff made this country what it is today (granted, genocide, slavery, exploitation of immigrants, women, and minorities are some of the things we got out and did, but you’ve gotta take the good with the bad, right?)!

Stuffing ourselves on pre-digested, pre-packaged, intellectual poo leaves lots of brain-room for remembering sports, movie, or book trivia, or to remember all the passwords to our accounts on the Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Reddit, and all the rest (because if we can’t remember our passwords, how are we going to get our yummy intellectual excrement).

Reading and thinking is really just too much like taking our medication or eating healthy; yes, we all know it’s probably better for us, but who has the time? We’ve gotta get out and do stuff – although “getting out and doing stuff” seems to involve a lot more video games, Netflix, and watching other people doing stuff on TV, but why argue semantics? The point is: We’re Americans! We eat Poo! It doesn’t matter whether it’s greasy fast food for our bodies, or intentional misinformation for our brains, we’re apparently not gonna stop.

So there!