are things complicated yet?

Even with a crusty nose, he's still a happy animal

We are having some Jake drama.

Sometime last week Jake started to get this very strange red spot on his snout, just above his nose.  At first it looked like he was a bit sunburned or had pawed at it too much in a moment of enthusiasm.

He had also been licking his paws and rubbing his face a lot in addition to some watery, puffy eyes.  His nose looked like it was running and it was a little crusty - like your nose would be if you had a cold and used cheap Kleenex to blow it too much. We surmised that he was suffering from allergies but took him to the vet anyway.

Jake didn't ever seem to be all that bothered by his change in appearance - he was still peppy and happy to see us.  He was a bit more laid back at night but honestly, for Jake that's not very unusual.  He's pretty cool.

The vet thought it was a seasonal allergy and gave us some drops for his eyes and told us to call if he didn't get better in a few days.

And oh, did he NOT get better.

Over three days his nose and the spot on his snout went from being a little puffy to really puffy.  Then it got all crusty and scabby.  And it got puffier.  And he kept pawing at it.  The next day the scabs broke open and his nose and snout were a crusty, oozing pussy mess.  It looked so painful.

We called the vet.

Today when Chris got home to take him in, Jake had managed to rub off ALL of the crusty stuff leaving a bright red and raw patch on his snout. 

Usually his nose ends where the red begins.  ALLLL of the red stuff is new.  When Chris emailed me a photo of him I was shocked that he looked this way.

The vet now thinks that he's suffering from a spider or insect bite of some kind.  He hopes.

("Hopes!?" This is not making me feel better!!)

He prescribed a steroid shot and some antibiotics and a really lovely cream to put on his nose that Jake promptly licks off every time we apply it.

If he's not better in 2-3 days we're supposed to go back.  If it's not gone by then he'll biopsy the red puffiness and see if it's something that falls in the Really Bad Shit category. (He mentioned lupus, a tumor and other stuff I don't want happening to my sweet Jake.)

I hope he starts to looking better soon. 

I really hope this is the first and only time he does this

 As everyone should know by now, Jake is a really good dog.

He doesn't scratch the furniture, bark unnecessarily, jump on people, bite or dig in the yard.  He's the very definition of "mellow."  He just likes to hang out and go for a walk and have a milk bone every now and then. 

However, Jake does have a few behavior quirks - and one of them is that he will occasionally find something in the kitchen trash that catches his fancy.  He will duck into the pantry, grab the coveted item and then head urgently outside to chew/lick/devour it before we notice and take it away from him.  (We're so mean.)

I've caught him rapturously licking butter wrappers and chewing paper towels that were used to drain bacon.  Sometimes, Chris will look out the window and be like, "Dammit!  Why does our dumb neighbor's trash always blow into our yard!?"  Upon further investigation it's usually something Jake has pulled from the trash and licked until the printing nearly came off.

As such, Jake is not allowed in the pantry and we keep the door firmly closed.

Thus, you can imagine my lack of surprise on Wednesday when I saw Jake hurry past me towards his door with what looked like trash in his mouth.  The odd bit was that he wasn't coming from the kitchen - he was coming from the baby's room.

I called out his name and he reluctantly stopped in his tracks.  (Caught!)  He turned to face me and I saw it:  a diaper.

DID YOU HEAR ME?  A DIAPER!!!

He must have found it in her room on the floor.  Since we haven't organized the closet yet, stuff is just piled up in there.  I bet he thought it smelled interesting and thought he'd take it outside to investigate further.

After Chris and I finished laughing hysterically (really, you should have seen him looking up at us with a diaper in his mouth like, "What?  What's the big deal?")  we considered that this is NOT behavior we want to encourage and that our laughter and smiles may have made him feel like, "Hey, this is an ok thing to play with!"

I think that once the diapers have been ah, utilized, they won't smell so interesting to him and he won't be tempted to take them outside though.

I mean, one has to hope.  Right?

I think my parents just stole my dog

I don't know about you, but my weekend rocked.

After a rowdy day at the lake, a 4-day smorgasbord of delicious food, an afternoon of shopping with my mother at baby stores, a few rounds of Wii, a movie with the family, a minor league baseball game, 2 nights of backyard fireworks and several hours on the back porch laughing until I cried I am worn out.

July 4th 2008 truly set a new benchmark for Family Fun.  Curiously though, somewhere in the middle of all of that excitement and laughter, my mother convinced us to leave Jake at their house.  In Austin.  All week.

They're going to see us again on Saturday and return him at that time (I hope) but right now I can't figure out how she talked us into this.  I don't even remember agreeing to it actually.  All I know is that when we left their house this morning, my parents looked like they had just won some kind of prize.

He'll be well taken care of.  My mother has a plastic bag in the fridge labeled "JAKE" that contains delectable scraps of meat that she has meticulously saved just for him.  He'll likely get daily walks and she'll open the front window just for him so he can bark at the neighborhood children and UPS man.

Dad will take him outside to chase the deer at dusk and then shower him with milk bones afterwards in a game they've created called "Go Find It" which consists of hiding pieces of milk bone around the house for him to hunt while we watch him frantically run around the living room for the treats.  (It's actually pretty funny.)

Actually, after a week of all that pampering and attention I hope he wants to come back home.

Wait.  That's part of their plan isn't it?  Dammit.

Happy Friday, from Jake

As we both sit here in a delightful bubble of 78-degree bought air, watching the Today Show on a fabulous Friday, I think that we have the same thought:

What time is lunch?  And, more importantly, is it a lunch of ice cream?

Oh wait.  That's just me thinking about ice cream for lunch, isn't it?

I broke the dog. AGAIN.

Yesterday we had some perfect springtime-in-Texas weather.  After shutting down my laptop for the day I decided it would be a great idea to take Jake for a walk.

I said it out loud too:  "A walk!"  He reacted the only way he can when he hears his favorite word: barking and jumping gleefully and running laps through the kitchen until the moment that I finally (FINALLY!) put my shoes on and open the front door so we can GET GOING ALREADY.

The walk started out fine.  He was excited to be out.  He was smelling stuff and having a good time.

"Man, this is great!" I thought.  "We are going to go the long way and take a really nice, loooong walk today.  That will be awesome."

About 200 yards into our awesome walk I noticed that Jake was walking kind of...funny.  We stopped.  He stood on three paws, held up the fourth and looked at me pathetically.

Yeah.  We were repeating this incident near-verbatim.  Without warning or reason, he was done walking.

He held his paw in the air and refused to put weight on it.  I stopped and felt his paw up and down.  He didn't wince or react.  We took a few steps.  He was walking with just as much enthusiasm as before even though he clearly hurt - he wasn't putting any weight on that paw.  It was like Jake was saying, "I am not letting this gimpy paw ruin our awesome walk!" 

See?  He's such an awesome dog.

We walked home slowly and in a gimpy fashion.  We gave him a pill.   He looked really freaked out.  It was like he was saying "I'm hurting and I don't know why and it's scaring me."  And that just breaks your heart a little bit, because he's such a sweet animal and you want to help him.

To help you fully appreciate the pathetic-ness, here's what he looked like walking through the kitchen:

Gimpy Jake from AMS on Vimeo.

We figured out that there was one section of his paw that was sensitive, so Chris thought it would be good to ice it.  Makes sense right?

Jake actually preferred to eat the ice though.  I promise that after we laughed hysterically we felt bad about the whole "dog's head in a plastic bag" thing and put the ice in a bowl.

After a pill and some serious TLC, he's good as new today.  Probably no more walks for a bit though.

Extreme Jake Makeover

Before...

...and after!

Jake made his twice-yearly trip to the groomer this week to get a haircut.  It's always an adventure that starts off with Jake not knowing where we're going, figuring it out when we get there and standing by the door while I check in, just in case I've forgotten that he hasn't had his haircut yet so I might accidentally take him back home with me.

Hasn't happened yet, but I wouldn't put it past me.

As you'll notice he's a lot less....happy in the second photo.  For a full three days he was downright pissed off at me since I was the terrible person that took him to the groomer.  He showered Chris with love and affection and for me he had nothing.

Such a temperamental animal.

When I was paying for this masterpiece of a haircut it occurred to me that I pay more to have JAKE'S hair cut than I do my own.  (Seriously, is there skill involved here other than a #3 guard and running it all over his body??  Why am I paying for this?)

Jake's haircut, mani/pedi and shower with blow dry costs a grand total of $70. 

I pay this because the house is a lot cleaner when he has less fur.   Really, the difference is amazing.  Also, Chris feels quite certain that his short term ill feelings towards me would be near-permanent if I was the one exacting the torture of a bath and haircut on him.

And really, I just can't have that.

5 inches of snow in March? Just another wacky day here in Texas.

Man, the weather people sure knew what they were talking about. 

The snow started about 11 am and came down in big, fat, gorgeous flakes and clumps the size of cotton balls.  If I went outside it was like being pelted by a hundred tiny snowballs all at once; they would hit my arms and instantly explode in quiet little piffs.

It snowed all day and into the night.  By supper time there was a serious 5 inches of snow in the yard.  As we do not own a snow shovel Chris had to sweep the driveway to remove the snow so he could put the car in the garage. 

A day later it was gone, but we enjoyed it while it lasted.

Sometimes you just need a little Jake to make you smile on a Tuesday

Who needs mood elevators when you've got a Jake?

Everyone has this kind of day occasionally.

Where the day drags out in front of you like you've morphed into slow-mo and at the end of it you're frustrated and annoyed with every human who crosses your path.

By the time you get home, all you really want to do is throw yourself a spectacular pity party with ice cream for dinner, lots of red wine and bad television on Fox (they really do have the most intellectually unredeeming yet horribly addictive television, don't they?) while you sulk in your pajamas about how completely unfair and stupid today was and UGH can I just not get out of bed at all tomorrow?  Please?

But then you get home and you see this and he's just so happy you're home already so we can finally play together and run around and have treats! OHBOYOHBOYOHBOY! TREATS!

And bam!  It's ok.  Dogs are awesome. 

Jake almost died this weekend. And it is not funny.

This looks like a very wholesome, all-American peach stand doesn't it?  And, in many ways it probably is.   You would never guess that it has a sort of sick Stephen King-like history.

The girls behind the counter are probably daughters of the owner, it's on a dusty highway in the middle of Nowhere, Texas.  There are two gas stations nearby.

They have preserves, honey, tomatoes and delicious, ripened-on-the-vine Texas Peaches.  It's the picture of perfection in middle America.

Unfortunately, Jake almost died at this peach stand this weekend. 

And it's all my fault.  ALL MY FAULT. 

We had stopped for gas and Jake likes to take a bit of a walk when we stop so I put him on his leash and thought I'd cross those 2 lanes of traffic and get some peaches, take the dog on an extended walk and everyone in the family would be happy about this pleasant turn of summer events.  Simple. 

Uh, not really.

Miscalculation # 1
The street isn't really an ordinary street.  It's a 2-lane state highway with plenty of trucks and cars on it, all whizzing by.  But the traffic was well spaced and we easily crossed it without any chance of harm.

I'm lackadaisically looking at peaches and preserves and thinking how quaint and wonderful this is to be buying peaches with all the fuzz still on them that are completely bereft of produce stickers and just sort of ho-humming along in the sunshine. 

Jake is smelling stuff and generally excited to be out of the car.  But he's on his leash, so he's fine.  Or rather, I think he's fine.

Miscalculation # 2
I have a habit of taking off Jake's collar sometimes at night because he likes his neck scratched.  And sometimes, I put it back on pretty loose.  Because who wants to wear a tight collar like that when you have so much fur?

So there we are, buying peaches next to a highway and I don't remember that his collar is on loose and sure enough...he slips that collar and leash right off of his neck in a moment.  Less than a moment.  Half a moment.

For a split second I look at Jake and I can't figure out what's happened.  But then I do.  And my heart stops.

Jake is always, always, always on a leash because he has no self control to stay next to us or obey basic commands when he's not.  He gets excited and crazy and takes off running.  When you give chase he thinks it's a game and runs faster.

I drop the money, drop the peaches and...

Miscalculation #3

...I chase Jake, screaming at him to "STOP!" even though I know that isn't one of the 11 words he knows. 

And he runs right across that highway. 

My 30" tall dog runs across a highway that has oncoming traffic in both directions. 

My world is instantly plunged into exaggerated slow motion where I can't run fast enough or say the right words quickly enough because he's running too damn fast directly across the highway and my legs are slow and cemented to the ground.  It's exactly like a nightmare.

Before I know it I'm chasing him even though I know I shouldn't.  I know I should stop and say "TREAT! TREAT!"  That is the only word that will make him stop in his tracks, but I totally forget all of this and foolishly think that I'm faster than him and I can catch him and make him stop.

But we're running.  And a mini-van has to do that screeeeech! thing to avoid hitting him (and me) and he runs right through the busy gas station into Chris's now-waiting arms.  The whole thing lasted maybe 10 seconds.

He's excited about his moment of freedom but all I can think of is that Honda Odyssey that was honestly inches away from mauling him.  From killing him.  From putting me into a no-Jake world.

Chris asks if I'm ok (I am), he puts Jake back in the car and I go back to get my money and my stupid, unnecessary, dangerous, scary peaches.

The girl selling them says to me "Oh mah GAWD! That was so scary! I would have just cried all day long if something happened to that dog!"

You and me both honey.