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.