Party Animal

Walter is now wearing the dreaded doggy cone. I think he looks like he partied too much and came home wearing the lampshade. His expression, however, does not say "party".

We are trying to cure his hot spot at home. Mom took Winston to the vet with this and they put him under (all I can hear are dollar signs), shaved his leg and applied medicine.

So instead, last Friday night while you were, undoubtably, doing something fun, I was at home shaving the dog's leg. Amazingly, he allowed this. I had his leg hanging in the air like a chicken bone while trying to get all four million hairs off. Every few seconds I would croon, "Who's a good boy?" and his tail would do a half-thump. I have to give him tremendous props for being such a good sport.

I then applied peroxide and soaked his wrapped leg in tea bags for five minutes. Do you have any idea how long five minutes lasts? The tea bags (with their tannic acid) don't really seem to be doing enough, so we've graduated to hydrocortisone.

All the while the real fun is in the cone. Immediately after I put it on him, his tail curled completely underneath his body and his face hung to the floor. I've never seen a dog look so humanly depressed. But the awkward thing is trying not to laugh as he bumps into everything in his path. That would just be rude. But yet, it's like having your drunk Uncle Larry follow you all over the house. Every few minutes you hear a thud behind you and then you watch as he tries to extricate himself from whatever has befallen him. He no longer attempts to make it into the bathroom with me (not a bad circumstance) and I've seen him get stuck only to have to put it into reverse.

It is, however, less funny when he runs into the back of your legs with his cone. Or if your Mouse's height, the back of your head.

Going downstairs is a breeze. Coming up is altogether different. Every step he gets the cone stuck on the step above him. The first few times I had to help him up every step as he looked at me with a, "wouldn't it just be easier on us both to take off the torture device?" But as with everything, it's a learning curve and he can now make it unassisted with only a few bumps along the way.

So I try very hard to not laugh, smirk, or even benignly smile in his presence. But what I do in tight spaces he no longer fits into... well, that's my business.