Last week was kind of insane. You know, the kind where you already have a lot on the calendar going into the week but then life throws all manner of curveballs your way and a couple of them manage to hit you right in the arm. And they leave a big imprint of laces on you. Did you know that can actually happen if you get hit really hard by a baseball? It’s true. I’ve seen it.
But this isn’t about baseball and now I’ve gone too far with my analogy or metaphor or what have you and will need to bring this back around to the real story.
As I mentioned last week, we brought Piper to the vet Tuesday to get spayed. I knew from when we had Mabel spayed last fall that this would mean we’d need to keep Piper relatively still and calm for ten days afterwards and the part of that equation I’d failed to remember was that Blue Lacey dogs have a lot of special gifts, but being calm and still isn’t among their main assets.
Piper spent Tuesday night at the vet being monitored as planned, but what I did not plan on was her kind doctor calling me by 9 a.m. on Wednesday morning to inform me Piper was a little bit of a “non-compliant patient” and suggesting I should come get her as soon as possible. Apparently she refused to eat or go to the bathroom or take her pain pills and it was implied her social skills might be lacking.
So I ran up to the vet to get Piper and brought her home where she promptly used the bathroom for around twenty minutes because she’d been holding it for so long and then she and Mabel rejoiced at being back together before I had to separate them since STILL AND CALM. This is Piper after I finally got her to relax.
(I posted that pic on Instagram and someone named Michelle made the comment “Draw me like one of your French girls, Jack” and she is now one of my favorite people I’ve never met.)
Right about the time I finally got Piper settled in her bed, the school nurse called to tell me that Caroline had been in her office three times over the last two days complaining about her ankle and needing to have it iced. She suggested that I might want to take her to the doctor to have it X-Rayed and part of me wanted to ask if X-Rays could also detect drama but I refrained on the off chance that Caroline did actually have some sort of fracture and I would thereby seal my fate as the winner of this year’s Worst Mother Ever Award.
I put Piper in her kennel to help with the keeping of the STILL AND CALM and then drove to school to pick Caroline up and take her to get X-Rays. The X-Rays did actually show drama in the form of nothing is actually wrong with her ankle. Except for a bad hematoma. For those of you unfamiliar with medical terminology, this would be a bruise. But the doctor did suggest it might be helpful to wrap it or wear some sort of supportive sleeve for a few days so there’s that.
Then we ran home so she could finish her homework before soccer practice and let Piper out of her kennel, but I’d forgotten that we had a repair guy coming over to look at some things we need done in the backyard which meant I had to corral Mabel while keeping Piper STILL AND CALM. Let’s just pretend that all went smoothly.
But all of that is just a long lead in to Thursday. Caroline had soccer practice again on Thursday evening along with finishing the Science project requiring her to design a space suit. (Speaking of the space suit project, I was so tickled that one of my fellow moms put on Facebook that her son told her about the project and said, “Not even Pinterest can help us this time”. Which is how you know a project is a bunch of bull because Pinterest has EVERYTHING.)
She got most of the space suit project finished but we had to leave for soccer. Then afterwards we drove through Chick-Fil-A to pick up dinner because P was at a school board meeting and it was just us. I told her to hurry up and eat as soon as we got home since she still had to finish her project and shower before bed, meanwhile I went outside to feed the dogs. This sounds so simple but the reality is we have to feed them all separately, so I brought Piper in to feed her while Mabel ate outside and Scout just had to wait patiently because this whole explanation is so tedious that I just died of boredom.
But I looked outside and saw Mabel was in hot pursuit of something which, on closer inspection, turned out to be a toad. I tried to distract her as I yelled at Caroline to go outside and catch the toad and remove it from our yard, but Mabel was too fast for me. She ran after that toad and caught it just in time for Caroline to see that she had it in her mouth. But, much to Mabel’s surprise, that toad didn’t go down without a fight and sprayed or spit or oozed or whatever it is toads do in Mabel’s mouth.
And that’s when Mabel dropped that toad and began to foam profusely at the mouth. And gag. And throw up. And just generally LOSE HER MIND. None of which was helping Piper – or any of us – remain STILL AND CALM. I tried to rinse Mabel’s mouth out with the hose while Caroline googled “What to do if your dog eats a toad” and ran out to report that toads can be toxic to dogs and we needed to get her to the vet immediately.
This is the exact type of scenario that requires P. If he’d been home, he would have talked us down and taken the time to read further on the internet to assure us that truly toxic toads are mainly not located in backyards in San Antonio.
But STILL AND CALM aren’t really hallmarks of mine or Caroline’s personality which is how we found ourselves loading up a foaming Mabel and driving hurriedly to the Emergency Vet Clinic at 9:15 p.m. on Thursday night. Here she is while we were waiting to see the vet. Doesn’t she look like a dog in distress?
The good news is Mabel was fine, the bad news is we spent $70 for them to rinse her mouth out with water, tell us to give her a Prilosec when we got home, and an informational lecture about Bufo toads and where they live and don’t live.
And when we finally got home well after 10 p.m., she curled up in her bed. I’d like to entitle this photo “I Immediately Regret My Actions”.
Naturally, Mabel has written a couple of haikus about the whole experience.
Toads are deceptive
Jumping, playing, poisoning
They are pure evil
Oh vile tasting toad
Do not trust amphibians
Venomous liars
Yet she clearly is still struggling to process her new information as evidenced by the fact she caught another one yesterday. #slowlearner