little coneflower

well, duk duk, I am sure glad that got cleared up. I guess I was really hungry when the tushie man said it, because I sure thought he said ice cream cone and of course how could u say no to that no matter if u r getting an eye thingy removed or not?...  hey, can u scratch my nose for me?

wow, I see this might be a problem for both of us. good thing this is only our test run so that way we can work out the kinks. how bout maybe we take off the yellow part?

yep U just have 2 look for the snaps cuz remember that time when mom first made it for me and we wore it for easter? that was the year u got us banned from..okay okay, i will get off our bed but I call dibs on my same spot so no stealing it when we are all done or I will pound u...hee hee, yeah I guess u r right I guess I should save the pounding for after my stitches dissolve. okay, is that the last one? 

hmm, full range of head motion but I cannot reach my eyes with my paws. a fit that is not too loose or too snug. yes this is much better than that blue thingy we got when I got frankentushied. now if I can only resist rubbing my head on the floor we will be set!

although if I do, maybe mom would make me a new one with propeller shaped blades instead of marigold petals. :) 

word of the day: dermatographism

Something tells me I am going to miss the days of being bullet proof.  Of feeling young and invincible in the ways that only being young and naive allows one to think.  I know I will miss it as I do now, for my itching does tell me so. 


For a few days now I've been itchy, and I've been staying up late at night,  furiously googling for leads as to what it might be, all the while the itch seemed to spread on a daily basis, one small discouraging place on my skin after another.  Taking me on an emotional rollercoaster of hope and despair.  Oh it's better now, oh it's worse, oh it's better now, oh its..lemme google again and see what I find.

By the time tiny chumley made it into my top three list of possible culprits , I knew it was time to stop speculating and start getting to the bottom of what I can only describe as a periodic but very annoying problem. And lucky for me my dermatologist had an opening yesterday.

The good news,  it ain't tiny chumley, it ain't contagious, nor was it any of the frightful stuff I found online. After scratching an x on me and watching it turn red and I guess a bit raised, she thinks it's dermatographism, today's word of the day.  Although I don't get nearly the level of raised effect as you will see when you google images for it, thankfully.  Phew, at least it's not something creepy and at least tiny chumley doesn't have to suffer thru dips and pills and the like.  But the frustrating news is, that doesn't really help identify the source causing my body's overreaction.

If I were a good girl who always followed doctor's orders, I'd be starting myself back up on zyrtec at night and taking an allegra in the morning for two weeks, then maybe remove the allegra but keeping doing the zyrtec for another two weeks, and voila, hopefully be fixed. Or then I just keep doing it for longer.  But one of my top suspects as to the cause of  my problem has been a phenomenon that has been reported only anectdotally on the web, and that's an itchy withdrawal response to the long term use of cetirizine.  Cuz thanks to the crazy weather,  I've been on it for three months now, a month longer than I'v ever taken it.  And I don't want to be a zyrtec junkie.  I don't want to be a pill junkie of any kind if I can help it.    So, I'm thinking of toughing it out for another week, or at least another few days to see if things get better on their own.  I am sure it will be a test of my willpower but I figure it's worth finding out. 

Oh, so I'm TMI sharing this because I am also thinking about whether or not tiny chumley and I will  be able to post daily during all this.  So don't be alarmed if there isn't a post tomorrow or if posting is not quite on the regular schedule that it has been in the past.  In the grand scheme of things, know that we are fine, and hope to get back to regular programming as soon as possible.  Have a wonderful weekend my friends!  :)

hello wednesday

why hello wednesday! i hope you like my freshly nubbed, nubby nubby cute cute nails!  :)

brush brush brushy brush!

hello friends! it's me, baxter, your roving rover reporter, reporting to you about interesting christmas list ideas for your letter santa.  today i want to talk to you about my favorite tasty night time treat, poultry flavored toothpaste, which also happens to be very good for you so chances are if u ask for it from santa, you will get it. unlike the master blaster poopie disaster series 5000 biomechanical megatronic hazmat superstink ray gun and amazing limited edition pleatherette  holster accessory kit with invisibility shielding and stink spray, both of which your mom won't even let you put on your list for santa this year even though u and your duk friend want it really badly and it is on sale now from stinks r us  with free shipping and everything.

anyhoo, so like i was saying, poultry toothpaste!  not only is poultry flavored toothpaste tasty,  but it is very very easy to use.  in fact, here, let me show you...just get your mom or dad to squirt some on your toothbrush (mind u - your toothbrush and not your mom's, bcuz u know, my mom says u can lick your butt, and you can lick your toyfriend's butt, but apparently after doing all that, u must not lick your mom's toothbrush). anyhoo, squirt some on your toothbrush and then...

yep, brush brush brushy brush, and that's it - you're all done! i like my toothpaste so much that when i was little and i was training in AKC good citizen class with my mom, well, they tell u to bring like a super motivating treat for your mom to hold at the other end of the room when learning the "come" command and i had no problem at all coming over to that super tasty reward!  and i got like megateethbrushing with the stuff after sampling a VERY tasty treasure from my kittyfriends' treasure box so it was super double bonus that day. 

anyhoo, i hope you enjoyed my teethbrushing lesson and hope you will consider asking for this very wonderful item in your stocking too. i am baxter your roving rover reporter wishing you a very happy sunday. :)

nightmare on poop street

A certain little goblin didn't particularly appreciate his pre-Halloween surprise annual checkup visit from the tushie man, even though he complimented on his weight, teeth, and nails.  

mom, i know the tushie man and his assistant are very nice n all, but, considering how scary my tail still thinks they are, do u think we can invite them to me and duk duk's halloween party so they can scare everybuddy else too? bcuz right now i can think of nothing scarier...

tartar barter

okay mom, u can check my teeth for tartar but today can we please go to the swimming store so me and duk duk can get our matching swim caps and nose clips?  we only have a week to train before the synchronized swimming event starts and i really want to medal in duets. :)

weigh in

mom, i really do not like how that big dog looked at me when we came in here.  didjoo see how he looked at me? and are you sure this weigh in is really necessary? cuz even though my tummy has been very unhappy about it, i have been really good about doing this diet thing for almost a month now. and i have been doing my sit ups every day and skipping the monkey chow milkshakes when me n dad watch cartoons on saturday mornings and u know i have been chasing bunnies, like, every day.  even dad says i look thinner now.  and my orange dud is all flappy on me.  why, i betchoo that i'll be needing 25% more food after we see how much i...

noooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

i still need to lose 3 pounds?  three whole pounds? that's like, the same amount i needed to lose a month ago, only now i am hungrier...so much hungrier....

mom, i know i have lost the same amount of weight before and i know it will take more time than just a month to lose it, but do you think we can call doctor tushie man and make sure he meant an ideal weight of 17 to 18 pounds on planet earth and not on the planets venus or uranus??? cuz my tummy says he would me more than happy for all of us to relocate to either planet if that would help us achieve our goals faster. :) :)

no thank u

no thank u doctor tushie man.  there is no need to put me on the table, really.  i am very comfortable right here and my neck feels just fine.  :) :)

- baxter, 5.4 years old, hoping to pass off a partial white fib in hopes of avoiding the veterinary inevitable.


Yep, it's true. Baxter's momentary moments of pain made a small comeback appearance - once on this past Weds which prompted his vet visit, and once we think on Sunday though neither big boyfriend or I saw what he was exactly doing to know for sure if what we heard was indeed a  quick pain yip.  And of course ever since then and between episodes the little chum's been acting quite normally.  We're monitoring the pain's frequency and duration to determine when best to pursue further diagnostic, but for now and under doc's orders, other than losing weight and playing nicely with his toyfriends, tiny chumley can continue living a low impact, pokey free lifestyle.  :)

the long and pokey road

Hee hee, yep, the doc called and gave us the all clear yesterday to release this little hound. We will take things slowly and of course be mindful of his jumping about, but here's hoping that baby dog's days of waking up with his mind on set on freedom are over for a very very very long time. :)

lessons from the pokey warden - lesson 1: never show the inmate your escape route..

A happy skippy little boy met me in the middle of the hallway upstairs, a sure sign that somepuppy has been keeping tabs on his mom and dad while he's been in the pokey.  Watching and learning with one eye open all while he was pretending to sleep under cover of warm blankies, woozy and sluggish from muscle relaxers and intellectual under stimulation.

"baby dog!", I did declare to the happy-to-be-free dogggie before me. "How did you get out?"

Baxter's tail wagged proudly as I kneeled down to scoop him up and put him back in the pokey that I had only moments earlier set up in his dad's office so I could get dressed and buy a few goodies to pimp out tiny chumley's zippy trailer.

Oh there it is, I realized when I put the little kielbasa back down and he started again in the direction of his path to the promised land where freedom reigns and walkies happen every day.  The ex-pen walls I had set up amidst all the boxes that were awaiting a trip to the thrift store had unintentionally created a mini funhouse maze, a perfect  lowrider pathway for little pent up doxies anxious to stretch their legs and roam free again.

This was, actually, mostly my fault. Baxter's new found maze management skills, that is. For days now we have been able to get by with sloppily placed walls and giant gaps and haven't had to worry at all about the little kielbasa actually busting out.  The trick, I knew, was in keeping things seemingly precarious enough so that Baxter wouldn't even try to nudge at things, as strong as his skitter instinct is.  But all the lifting in and out of the pokey has taken a bit of a toll on me ergonomically speaking, and so these past few days I've been moving parts of the gate like a fence so I could get in and out more easily, and sometimes yes, encouraging him to take a step or two down the maze-like path of freedom so that I could more easily pick him up and take him where he needed to go.  Little did I know how this would sharpen somepuppy's stealthy navigational skills.

So now the walls are much better secured for my little pokey break puppy.  No gaps, no connections to make hidden pathways to the promised land.  But the whole experience makes me wonder, what else has he learned while watching me through the golden wires of his pokey prison walls?

pssst - can u keep a secret?  don't tell mom but i know where she keeps the snackies by her desk and i know where mister tiger goes to sleep when we are not playing with him!!

where toyfriends dare

(whispering) pssst - hey, duk duk! i got the ipad u baked in the cake u gave me yesterday but i do not know how turn on the netflix. maybe we should get lil pink puppy to squeeze thru the pokey bars with chocobot bcuz lil pink puppy is the only one who knows how to work this thing and then by the time u climb over we can all start watching and hopefull finish before mom gets home.

  hurry up duk duk, wonderpets is starting and it is the one about the unicorn!!

um, pardon me, but besides not telling mom about this, u r welcome to join us but before you do, would you please close the curtains so we can see the screen a little better? thank u :) :)

poopillon

dear diary,
well it is my fourth day here in the pokey and bcuz he is lying right next to me i am whisper writing to tell you a very big secret.  r u ready cuz here it is - not only does he snore really loud and steals your kibble when u r not looking but scooby doo stinks at solving mysteries.  especially ones that involve getting u both out of the pokey if u know what i mean.  so next time if u ever have an opportunity to choose your pokey mate, think twice about choosing scooby doo.  and even though she is a girl u might want to pick strawberry shortcake bcuz at least she smells like strawberries and cake.  which is more than i can say for useless scooby poopie bottoms doo.

anyhoo, i hope u r having a wonderful sunday and i promise 2 write again soon.

toodley-doo!
b. :)

the poopie dumpling gang

 



 


well boys, i see we have ourselves a bona fide d-i... d-i-l-l-i...no, no, wait, d-i-l-i-m-m-u-....i see we have ourselves in a fine predica-dica-dookiement we do.  chocobot, how's about u trade in them keys u found for some grub for us whydontcha and in the meanwhile me n duk duk will think up another way to bust me out of this here pokey..

- baxter 5.25 years old, upon realizing he probably should have paid more attention in his spelling and vocabulary class, and that the keys his poopie dumpling gang rustled up to break him out of the pokey won't work without a keyhole to put them in.

chopsticks please :)

 

Hee hee, yeah, somebuddy is feeling better, and he has been loving his six times a day fauxshimi mini meals.  :)

mom, even though my tummy is feeling better now and we agreed i would slowly try my kibble again, may i please have at least a few more fauxshimi mini meals bcuz me so wants to learn to use chopsticks and i will wear a napkin n everything!

tummy war

my unhappy tummy
woke me up early again.
guess i will eat grass.

- baxter, 5.1 years old, now resting comfortably and reflecting on his yacky sunday morning.



It's a bit of a puzzle really.  The little kielbasa's whole yack business this weekend that came with rather unfortunate timing as there are so many factors to consider. The tasty forbidden bunny poops of spring time.  The transition from both old can and bag of food to new ones.  The tiny tomato past its prime.  His willingness to stand out in the cold wet backyard to graze on more grass. His otherwise fine demeanor and ever bright eyed desire to consume tasty tiny bites the foods he loves, save for the new kibble that was willing to eat yesterday with some mild convincing, that he now most vehemently schnubs. The fact that he had cha-chingy overnight stay at the emergency vet for hemorrhagic gastroenteritis, or HGE,  roughly four years ago. The only time since he was adopted that we were separated for the night.

It's the HGE that really has me in overthink mode.  HGE is one of those things that happen without much firm root cause and there are lot of suspicions as to what might cause it. And of course in the past few days, it seems he has had opportunity to come in contact with all the prime suspects.  My worst and possibly uneducated theoretical concern? That if I don't manage the morning empty tummy yackies, if his tummy stays empty for too long,  all the gurgly acid that his tummy seems to produce in protest would make its way down his digestive tract, and all that extra acid in an empty environment would trigger the inexplicable bloody horror of HGE.  So giving his tummy something to do after a morning yack is critical.   Job number one.

Normally a few bits of kibble does the trick, but this past weekend the kibble he so normally gobbles down without a thought has been spat back out.  At first, I wasn't sure if he was schnubbily protesting the lack of fishy kibble that I had sprinkled in the old bag.  But this morning, even after his kibble container was thoroughly stunk up with the stinky turkey patty I left in it overnight, his tummy told him to  schnub his kibble while accepting eagerly licking at the spoon of wet I subsequently offered him.   Okay, that's it. Tummy you win.  Let's try a different bag of fresh kibble, and yep, let's get some white rice too, just in case.

Tiny chumley is snoozing comfortably by george under cover of blankie as I write this, and really he seems no worse for wear, no different than any other day at this time.  But as he sleeps, as his dad is off to get a new bag of kibble and a small bag of white rice, I wait.  Wondering what next his tummy will choose to do, and wondering what I will do next.   

the tushie man cometh

Tiny chumley's ever twinkly halo of lucky charms and green clovers took a temporary tumble off his head yesterday, falling to the ground with a giant thud the moment he saw the big white van pull up and stop.
  
nooooooooooooooooooooo, the little kielbasa barked in protest as he sensed this familiar impending doom. it is only april and i do not see the tushie man and his lady for another six months!

Baxter, of course, was right.  He wasn't due for his annual checkup til October.  But yesterday was special.  Yesterday was rabies shot day. And despite the fact that everything went quickly, and no tushie invasion was required, and friends were made again all around, the little kielbasa still decided to voice his discontent one last time after left the van and reached the top of our driveway.   Barking, in no uncertain terms, that it was time for this unwelcome disruption to his day to come to an end.  And guarding his precious tushie all the while.


it's been great, come back again - when pigs fly.  hasta poop-ego. don't call me, i'll call u.  uh-reeve-uh-poopies! smell ya later!

curr tailed

Our first dachshund Digger was always a spry little fellow, robust even in his old age when I knew him and all we really worried about we minor health concerns in the grand scheme of things. Bad breath, an occasional ear infection, the mysterious bulge in his cheek which we thought might be a tooth problem but proved at the vet's office to be nothing more than his secret squirrel food pack. And this, the little nubby dry end of his tail that sometimes needed a little TLC when Digger's happy tailthwacking into walls and legs and furniture disturbed the tiny scabs on the relatively bald tipped end of his tail.





Digger's follicle challenged tail tip was a reminder of an earlier incident in his youth when his tail wasn't fast enough for the closing door. I am told that not soon after it happened, swelling caused the hairs on the tippy tip of his hurting tail to poofter out and then the hair on the last inch or so of his tail grew sparsely after that, but I suspect Digger's pain long subsided before that of his dad. Nobody likes to see a dog in pain, much less be the cause of it.






So making sure a little dog and his tail are completely out the door before we close it is always something we are mindful about doing, but maybe a little less so when the weather is weird and blustery and it's raining and it's o-dark thirty in the morning.  Which is how both our hearts sank the instant we knew early yesterday morning that tiny chumley's  tiny yelp meant that his tail also fell prey to the tail munching door.  Only thanks to Big Boyfriend's quick reflexes, tiny chumley's tail was barely munched at all, and other than being minus one morning poop and pee from being so rudely awakened, the little kielbasa and his happy tail are no worse for wear.  Crisis curr-tailed.  :)

it's beginning to smell a lot like christmas

With the furnace purring away and the house now a balmy 66 degrees, life on the inside has thermally gotten back to normal. Which somehow made me think more about the outside, and how our light jacket, squirrel chasing, paw washing days of November may soon be over.

I peeled back the roof from tiny chumley's igloo.

blink. blink. what'd u do that for?, the chum wanted to know.

"It's time to chase some squirrels!" I told him, and headed for the back door, listening to the sound of tags jingling behind me.

Brightly colored leaves gently wafted down to the ground while Baxter chased the squirrels from the birdfeeder, and for minutes we basked in the glory of autumn.

There was enough going on that Baxter didn't feel urge make progress on Project Down Under, the archeological dig that he rather frequently mines to test his theory that squirrels live underground.

No dirty dig dug paws yet - maybe I shouldn't push my luck, I thought, and whistled for him to come back inside with me.

Exhilarated by his romp, tiny chumley happily obliged.

Odd, I thought as Baxter trundled in. Why doesn't he smell like sun baked dog? And why does it suddenly smell like Christmas in here?

Baxter pressed his ears back in semi annoyed fashion as I sniffed him over, his little twinkly happy rays slowly fading as I tried to find the source of his holiday odor.

Paws. Front paws.

And there it was. Sticky, gooey pine tar. On fur.

my new cologne mom! u like it?, his eyes asked optimistically.

Yes baby dog, but let's go get some cooking oil and a washcloth, shall we? Cuz little dachshund paws and pine tar really don't belong in a sentence together.

mister beefy

Twenty two pounds. My jaw nearly dropped to the floor when I heard the vet tech call out tiny chumley's weight on Friday. The last time he weighed that much, tiny boyfriend was our little mr jigglypuff, our chubby checkers, our newly adopted boy whom we immediately put on a diet and exercise routine to lose the four pounds he needed to get to his then ideal weight of eighteen pounds. The last time he weighed twenty two pounds? Almost three whole roly poly years ago.

I was kinda shocked, but then I started thinking. It wouldn't have been the first time that wiener weight would have gotten away from us. Every doxie we've ever owned seems to have enjoyed a period of obesity, that blissful time in their lives when we lose perspective and their sad puppy dog eyes and sometimes outright demands yielded them a bounty of snacks and treats. Fattened, so much so that they looked butterball turkeys disguised in smooth red fur coats, ready for roasting and so generously marbled that they would most definitely be the self basting variety. A momentary lapse that we always managed to correct once the blinders were taken away from us.

But with Baxter I figured we were more aware, more vigilant to that kind of thing. We limit his snacks or at least make up for it at meal times, we go walkies and let him romp in the backyard, we train for his meals. Dang. Maybe I wasn't subtracting enough dry kibble when adding his nightly scoop of fiber and wet food. But how could I have missed this?

Busted, I sheepishly asked how many pounds Baxter should shed.

"Maybe a pound, but he's not far off from where he should be really."

What? Three years ago we were told he should be around eighteen pounds.

"I can feel his ribs and he's not got much of a belly. That extra four pounds is muscle weight," said the vet.

Wow. Wait, what? Muscles? On a dachshund? Our dachshund? The new Mister that's-not-junk-but-muscle-in-my-trunk? I looked down at Baxter, who seemingly gave me a wink before happily trundling off to investigate all the strange smells on the exam room floor. Twenty two pounds. The new weight standard for my beefy four legged boyfriend.

total recall

A curious email in my inbox notifying me about a pet supplement recall prompted me to check out the details at the FDA website. Possible salmonella contamination for all the supplements listed here. Thankfully, Baxter's joint supplement was not on the list. Whew.

But the moment of heart palpitations I felt while scanning the list made me realize I could do a little better on staying informed, do better than relying on word of mouth, or curious emails that could have ended up in my spam folder. So I signed up to receive FDA emails for product recalls and safety alerts. The least I can do, I figure, to make sure this little boy stays bright eyed and waggy tailed.