Pawcurious Vet Blog: Pet help, stories, and information with Dr. V

Where the Wild Pups Are

The night Brode wore his wolf suit and made mischief of one kind and another

His mother called him “Wild Thing!” and Brody said “I’ll eat you up!” so he was sent to bed without eating anything.

That very night in Brody’s yard a forest grew, and grew until the ceiling hung with vines and the walls became the world all around

And he sailed off through night and day and in and out of weeks and almost over a year, to where the wild things are.

And when he came to the place where the wild things are they roared their terrible roars and gnashed their terrible teeth and showed their terrible claws

Till Brody said “Be still!” and tamed them with the magic trick of staring into all their yellow eyes without blinking once

And they were frightened and called him the most wild thing of all, and made him king of all wild things.

And Brody the king of all wild things said “I’m lonely!” and wanted to be where someone loved him best of all.

So Brody waved good-bye and sailed back almost over a year and in and out of weeks and through a day and into the night of his own room

Where he found his supper waiting for him.

And it was still hot.

I was going to tell you about my day, about the poodle who collapsed in full blown anaphylactic shock 5 minutes after getting rabies vaccine and how insane it was, but to be honest I’m a bit exhausted so I wanted to cover an inane topic instead.

I found one.

My normal days, the ones without those life threatening allergic reactions and the like, are composed to a very large degree of three things: ears, skin, and poop. Because of that, you get inured to it after a while, and when someone comes in with a one inch lesion on their dog freaking out about how terrible it looks, your jaded response is, “That little thing? That’s nothing! Ever seen toxic epidermal necrolysis? Now THAT’S gross!”

We don’t get alarmed by poop on the floor, which few people can say with confidence about their workplace. We’re surrounded by it. We make off- color jokes about it sometimes, though scatalogical humor has lost its luster since the good old junior high days. When I ask owners if their pet’s diarrhea is soft serve, pudding, or water, I’m not trying to be amusing- it really does help me out. Bottom line is- poop is poop. It’s just a piece of digested material, not particularly funny or eew or anything, really.

Which is why this is particularly befuddling to me: The poopsqueak store at Monthly Doos. Out of respect for the love you all have shown me, I will refrain from showing you pictures and will let you click the link at your own leisure, should you choose to click on it at all, which I wouldn’t blame you for opting out of. If ever you wanted a fleece dog chew toy shaped like a pile of poo, and I know you do, I’ve found it for you. This is one stop holiday shopping, peeps. You’re welcome.

This begs the question  “Who the heck wants a poop shaped chew toy?” And the answer is, “I have no idea, but it must be a lot of people, because this site has a TON of options for all your scatalogical toy needs.” Greeting cards, chocolates, and, uh, a glittery Christmas ornament (which I kind of want to get to send to Amber as a thank you for her years of service.)

There is also the coup de grace, the 2010 poop calendar. Maybe you were thinking of getting the rescue group puppy calendar, or the one with those French soccer players, but let me tempt you with the idea of pictures of plastic toys surrounded by poop piles instead. I’m the last one to point fingers at adults taking pictures of toys for entertainment purposes, but I would support you in calling me a lunatic if I tried to make a Pet Doctor Barbie calendar. Especially if it involved feces in any way.

I’d be willing to forgive it if it were at least artistic poop renditions, but sadly, I’m a little underwhelmed at its artistic merit. In its defense, it did get my mind off my crummy day, but I’m pretty sure it’s something I could live happily without ever having to have seen.

I have a black cat. Most of you met him a couple of weeks ago. His name is Apollo.

We also call him Squeaks, Smelly, and “STOP MEOWING AND GO TO BED I ALREADY FED YOU!”

When we adopted him, I had the brief uneasy rumbling that being mildly superstitious might bring when one adopts a black cat. It didn’t last long, though. Honestly, black cats seem kind of lucky to me- as my neighbor so ominously noted when we first moved in, “the black ones last longer.” (If you don’t know what I am referring to, the story is here.)

I don’t even think about black cats in superstitious terms anymore, except around this time of year when everyone starts talking about black cats and how Satanists are on the prowl to steal them for their gruesome rituals. I’ve asked lots and lots of emergency vets if any of them have seen these cats come in with mysterious pentagrams carved on their foreheads or unexplained blood loss, and they always say no, all they see on Halloween are a bunch of labs who stole all the Halloween chocolate.

Many shelters do not adopt black cats in October, but the problem is less Anton Le Vay, more Anton the PR guy who thinks having a black cat would be a fun prop for the company Halloween party. These poor kitties are adopted out en masse only to find themselves re-abandoned once their novelty as decor has worn off.

I found a really fun list of black cat lore on About.com. Apparently in the UK, black cats are lucky. Maybe Apollo is an ex-pat? He’s been great to us; we love him to pieces and my life since adopting him has been anything but unlucky. When he’s kneading on me at 3 am begging for food, I may think he is evil incarnate, but when I look into his green eyes all I see is a certain wicked twinkle- much like my own. Poor maligned, misunderstood black cats.

I love having a black cat. Although there are always wide varieties of temperaments in all of cat-dom, I would say the black cats in general do tend to have pretty good dispositions overall, say, compared to your average man-eating calico. To be honest if you told me calicos were witches in disguise I would have a lot less trouble believing it. I wonder if this whole black cat = witch rumor was in fact a subterfuge initiated by a calico from Salem at some point in the 1700s. Someone should investigate this.

Anyone else lucky enough to have one of these onyx omens prowling their house? Aren’t they the best?

Wars are won and lost on the powers of diplomacy. Some people are born with the gift, while others need to work at it. Some people never learn. We all have one of those acquaintances, the one who is proud of “telling it like it is”- the one who says your butt looks big in those pants, she can tell you gained a few pounds, your new haircut makes you look like a Chia pet, and that your kids are being hooligans.

Those people are usually pretty lonely, as a general rule.

Such champions of the unvarnished truth find themselves the victim of misunderstandings and contempt, which they can never comprehend. How sorrowful their mistreatment, the crushing weight of the cross they bear because of their need to always tell the truth no matter the cost. So gallant.

What we call ‘being diplomatic’, they call ‘lying’. I don’t see it the same way. One can dance around the obvious insulting truth sometimes in order to help people feel better about themselves, right? There are times to be straightforward, particularly when someone is in harm’s way, or when someone asks you to be honest. But there are other times when it simply is not necessary. And if someone is paying you to take care of their beloved pet, your ability and willingness to engage the art of diplomacy can make or break your practice.

Pets can be fractious. They are in a stressful environment full of strange noises and smells, sometimes sick, often being poked and prodded and violated in the name of an accurate temperature. Who can blame them for struggling a little? But we don’t say ‘fractious’ to an owner, do we? I prefer ’stressed’. ‘Muzzles’ become ‘party hats’, always accompanied by the sympathetic aside that I understand poor Fido is not an evil dog, he’s just ’stressed’. Most of the time this is even true.

It’s not lying. It’s being polite. No one wants their pet to be insulted, and I don’t blame them.

We have a tell it like it is tech here, though I think her approach is more based on youthful inexperience with the world than a die hard dedication to being a crusader for veritas. She is truly a nice person, and she is normally fantastic with clients. Unfortunately, in a moment of sweat inducing wrestling with a nervous terrier, she made the mistake of making an offhand remark to the client about Fluffy being a bit of a pain on that particular occasion. She said it in the lighthearted way she always does, and thought nothing of it.

Unfortunately, she chose the wrong client to say that to. Mrs. Fluffy was extremely affronted. Extremely. Sadly, after a series of tragic losses in her life, Fluffy was her sole remaining companion, an anchor in a storm of uncertainty. And now we took poor Fluffy into the back, tortured him into a state of hysteria, and had the nerve to then refer to him as a pain. Mrs. Fluffy asked for the manager. And the manager’s manager. And the manager’s manager’s manager, as high as she could go to make sure we all knew of the egregious insult lobbed on her by our unprofessional Comic the Insult Tech.

And it was a poor choice of words, to be sure. I can understand why she was upset. We talked to this tech, who was surprised at the reaction since, well, Fluffy really was a wee bit of a pain. But, she has learned the lesson so many people before her have not, and rather than running from the client the next time she came in, she went right into the room and gave a sincere apology.

And guess what? Mrs. Fluffy now refuses to see any technician BUT her. Another win for diplomacy.

“Well, Ranger looks great,” I said to his owner, straightening up and brushing off my pants. “His pyoderma is completely cleared up.”

“Great,” said the owner, an older guy- maybe a few years into retirement. “Hey doc, since you’re here-” he held up his hand- “do you think this is blood poisoning?”

I peered at his finger and reflexively gave the stock answer I am required to provide when asked for human medical advice. “I don’t know. You should ask your doctor.” I looked more closely at the ugly purple bruise on the knuckle and the swelling on the whole finger. “What happened?”

He shrugged. “I got stung by a bee yesterday.” We both stared at the finger. “It itches a little.”

“That looks awful,” I said. It looked like a black eye, coagulated and violet with little red splotches radiating from it. “It’s swollen like a sausage! You need to get that seen.”

“Well of course it’s swollen,” he replied, irritated. “It was stung yesterday.”

“I’ve never seen a sting like that,” I said. “That worries me.”

“Eh,” he said, waving his sausage-like fist in my direction. He decided to go the macho route. “You’re just a pansy.”

“I sure am,” I said, affronted. “You asked my opinion, right? I don’t take chances with big swollen fingers. Not with MRSA floating around.”

“What’s MRSA?” the owner said, stroking his dog who had just recovered from a staph infection.

“The flesh eating staph,” I replied, washing my hands.

“I bet you go running to the doctor every time you get a little bump,” he taunted. It brought back fond memories of my navy veteran dad tormenting me as a pre-teen, calling me a wimp every time I sought medical treatment for broken bones, bleeding extremities, severe sprains.

OK, those memories weren’t fond at all. When I was 16, I found him trying to siphon battery acid out of a car battery with a hose and his mouth. “Must be hot today,” he said, patting his chest. “That’s not the weather,” I said. “You just inhaled hydrochloric acid fumes into your lungs. Don’t you have asthma?”

“Your father is usually pretty smart,” Mom said later on when they returned from the ER. “But he’s a man. They do stuff like this.” With that in mind, I decided there was not much I could do for this guy except let him demonstrate his bravado at my expense.

“Yes,” I said, “I’m a pansy. I make my living with my hands and I like them with all 10 fingers attached and well. Good luck with that septic knuckle!” He waved a stiff goodbye, unable to bend his fingers.

Officer, we’ve had reports of a serious crime at the home of Dr V. while she was out on vacation.

Our forensics expert is examining the victim, one wooden toybox.

It’s gruesome. I’ve seen a lot in my years, but this one still unnerved me. How could anyone do this to a poor defenseless box?

Make sure the kiddos aren’t looking over your shoulder.

Dear God! Can someone cover this with a sheet?

We’ve nabbed the perp, a cocky little guy who seems to think we got nothin’ on him. The owner of the house swears he broke in and usurped the place of her sweet puppy Brody, who she insists is much smaller than this beast. Plus this guy has all his adult teeth, and the dog she left only had 2. Something fishy is going on for sure.

When confronted with the overwhelming evidence, the perp gave in.

Book ‘em, Danno.