Well, at lest house canine doesn’t have bugs
Well, at least she doesn’t have bugs. I don’t know what happened. Maybe we weren’t as attentive then as we are now. Or maybe pet medical science has advanced just as much as human medical science.
Either way I can’t recall having to take the house canine to the veterinarian more than once or twice during my pre-adult years. We always had dogs and cats, and, except for one bout of pneumonia because the crazy pooch didn’t want to go outside one winter, I don’t recall ever having to make multiple visits to the doggie doctor.
Now it just seems that dogs and cats are getting maladies that years ago no one ever heard about. Many of those ailments parallel what people get.
Case in point: Our loveable household canine, Ladybug, has allergies.
I don’t mean she is a little allergic. She is a lot allergic. To the tune of more than a hundred bucks at the vet visit last week.
For about the past month she has been scratching furiously. Red blotches have erupted on her tummy. She went through something similar last summer, which we thought was a food allergy. “Do you have fleas,’ my lovely wife would say in her most sympathetic tone, looking into Ladybug’s deep brown eyes. Then she (my wife) would turn and ask if I had put the flea repellent on the dog.
“Yes, I put it on,’ I replied.
But the itching and scratching continued. Ladybug started scratching frantically enough that she’d rock the bed and wake us up.
This time, my lovely wife said, “I’m calling the vet.’
Not that I thought we shouldn’t. After all, I want the dog to be well and sound. I gave her a bath, but that just seemed to make it worse. “Maybe she’s allergic to the shampoo I used.’
Well, the vet visit came and went and my wife stopped on her way home to inform me of the verdict.
“How much do you love your dog,’ she quipped.
“What did it cost?’ I said.
It was more than $100. And poor Ladybug was fitted with a basketful of pills she had to take. She also got a shot and was prescribed a bottle of special shampoo for a weekly prescribed bath.
Looking at the fistful of pill bottles I moaned, “How do you plan on getting her to take those?’
Our dog, unlike most that I have been associated with in my half-century plus, doesn’t gobble down her food with wolfish glee. Sometimes she sniffs it and tries to bury it under the throw rug. Ultimately she eats, but only after we have “sweetened’ her meal with doggie treats or some leftovers.
My wife figured out the best way to pass the pills down Ladybug’s gullet: encapsulate them in peanut butter.
Not a lot, but just enough to get her to take her medicine.
How my wife figured it out, I don’t know. She left me a note, however, telling me not to eat the peanut butter.
“Well, I’ll just buy another jar of it,’ I thought. Which I did. And proceeded to clean out the near-empty jar.
“Did you eat that peanut butter,’ she said accusingly when she came home later that day.
“Well, yes, but I bought another jar,’ I replied.
“That’s not the point. I have been using the same spoon to give Ladybug her medicine,’ meaning the spoon the dog licked went back into the jar of peanut butter.
Oh, well, I’m sure I’ve had stranger things get into my digestive system.
And I’m really grateful for one thing.
Ladybug doesn’t have bugs.
Have a good day.