I’m sitting here watching Abigail kill a toy Aflac duck I got from an Aflac rep a few weeks ago. She’ll pick it up, toss it up in the air, and watch as it plummets to the ground and its violent death. Once it hits the ground she stares at it for a few seconds as if to make sure it’s dead, and then starts all over again.

I’m so jealous. I’ve wanted to do that to that stupid duck so many times.

This morning Abigail let out explosive diarrhea in several places in our house.

At 6:30. Good morning to us!

I hesitate to say which places those were as I'm afraid none of our friends would ever come over again if they knew the gory details. She's been sick since Sunday morning when she woke us up at 7:45 with the first round of explosions, effectively ruining any chance of sleeping in. So, this morning, after cleaning up her and our house, I dropped her off at the vet. I'm sure it's nothing serious. This has happened before, so it's either the colitis flaring up or a bacterial or parasitic infection in her colon.

On an up note, Otis informed me this morning that he was going to take me to Target tonight and let me pick out "whatever steam cleaner my little heart desires". I'm not sure if my heart has ever previously desired a steam cleaner, but after cleaning up what I've had to clean up the last couple of days, these words were like angelic praises to the Lord. I think I almost started crying, and if I hadn't been wrist deep in dog poo at that very moment I would have jumped up and given him a huge kiss. I think he appreciated the thank you and the kiss I blew at him from across the room. Very far away from his white shirt.

Click Here

I'm going home and labeling ALL of Abigail's dental hygiene products. Right. Now.

Because sometimes her cuteness is the only thing that saves her, and sometimes it's the only thing that saves me.

Do you know how much I wish my dog would let me do this to her?

From Dooce.com

It will never happen, though. She won't even sit still long enough for me to put the plate with my meat discards on the floor.

Since I live so close to work, I will go home for lunch from time to time. The only thing is I think it confuses Abi. She has a very set routine during the week, and any variance tends to magnify her already pathetic nature. Case in point:

This is the look she gave me right after I told her she had to go back in her crate so I could go back to work. She eventually got down off the chair and droopily plodded to her crate. You would have thought I was abandoning her for eternity.

She also has the ability to make us feel like crap for enjoying our lives, like the other night when we were playing Guitar Hero II and completely ignoring her:

She is so very neglected.

Abigail is going through another one of her no eating phases, complete with excruciatingly loud stomach rumbles which are guaranteed to be followed by either A) massive diarrhea and/or B) projectile vomitting. Usually if I shove her stomach pills down her throat and can get her to eat, everything will be ok. But getting her to eat is a slightly bigger challenge than you would expect.

Case in point:
So far I've tried smothering her food in chicken broth topped with her most favorite and tempting treat - cheese. Except this time I thought I'd get really tricky and put shredded cheese in so she HAS to eat the food with it. I'm such a smart human. Except she practically rolled her eyes at my attempt to out-whit her and simply licked around the food bits and, in the case that she actually got any food in her mouth along with the shredded cheese, spit out the unwanted food as if it could poison her.

After two hours of listening to the painful (to me) stomach rumbling I decided it was time for her to hit the hard stuff - straight cheese. Except she wanted nothing to do with it, which is a pretty good sign something is really wrong. However, it was Swiss cheese, and seeing as how I can't stand the stuff, I thought she might take after me. Bread is always a good standby. She has eaten a fair amount of that off the counter top (especially the really expensive gluten-free kind), so I gave it a shot. No go. Now it's Defcom 3. Her stomach is starting to sound like if I don't get something in it soon it's going to expolde, leaving me with a huge mess to clean up. But with cheese and bread out of the picture, I've run out of ideas. The dog doesn't eat anything that grows out of the ground. Period. Unless...

Unless I leave it on the counter and leave the room. She has eaten more stuff off of our counters that she would never consider eating even if I offered it to her smothered in furry squirrel carcasses. She seems to delight in the naughtiness of doing what she knows she's not supposed to do. Just like a child. And then she stares up at us with her big, sad brown eyes, begging us to forgive her because how could we be mad at such a cute face. And it totally works, because just like every modern day, co-dependent parent, we're totally spineless and reinforce her bad behavior by showering her with love and cuddles and cleaning up all of her messes. She'll soon start smoking crack and ask us for money to support her habit until we can no longer afford to do so and she has to start whoring herself out. And that's just our dog. Imagine how great our children will someday turn out.

Otis found this cool site all about dogs and dog breeds, which is one of the best I've ever seen. On it is this great list of different characteristics that male and femal dogs typically exhibit.

* Female dogs tend to be more subtle than males. They're affectionate on their own terms. They'll request or demand petting, then reassert their independence by walking away when they've had enough.

* Female dogs tend to be quicker to learn and are not as easily distracted during training sessions.

* Female dogs are less likely to be openly defiant or to engage in blunt power struggles or dominance challenges -- yet they can be clever, passively resistant, and manipulative about getting their own way.

* Female dogs are prone to mood swings and emotional theatrics. They can be sweet one day (or one hour!) and grumpy the next.

* Female dogs are experts at The Dirty Look and The Sulk.

I've never had a male dog, so I can't tell you if the male characteristics are accurate. I can tell you that Abi exhibits every single one of these female characteristics. Especially the last one.

I can also tell you that if you replace the word 'dogs' with 'humans', the characteristics will still apply.

From giantmicrobes.com

Mange

Heartworm

Rabies

I found this blast-from-the-past photo while looking through a friend's flickr site:

Abi was about 5 months old in this picture, and a very, very bad puppy.

A few weeks ago Abi began expressing symptoms indicative of allergy problems. It started with her rubbing her nose on the carpet as if to scratch it. ALL THE TIME. I expected to, at any moment, walk into the living room and find her nose laying there on the carpet. Then her hair seemed to be falling out at an unusually faster rate than normal, and she was constantly scratching at her ears. Finally, she started getting little bumps all over her body. A few days later these bumps started oozing, and that was when we finally decided we had to do something for the poor dog. We took her to the vet, who recommended allergy testing. This was something we had actually been considering for a while due to all of Abi's food issues, so we decided to go ahead with the testing and treatment. I do not feel comfortable saying how much this cost because, well, it's a number that kind of makes my stomach drop.

It turns out the expensive hypoallergenic food I've had her on for the last 4 years, the one that cost $90 a bag? She's allergic to it. We've switched her food to something she's not allergic to (which is not easy to find), and she does seem to be doing somewhat better. Our pocket book is also recovering quite well from the endless hits it has taken from the ridiculously expensive and impossible to get prescription dog food. It should be fully recovered in a few months. Abi also started on allergy injections for regional air inhalants on Saturday. I also will not be discussing how much that cost because, *gulp*. We learned how to do them at the vet's office, and we will be administering them to her at home from now on. And by we, I mean Otis, because I don't know if I can handle sticking a needle into her.

Soon we will be having her limbs replaced with bionic ones, and then we will be taking her on tour around the country. If this dog is going to spend so much money, she should be contributing to the family in some way. There will be no free-loading in the Otis household.

I am reading this blog post and laughing hysterically at it because - OH MY GOSH - this sums up Abi to a tee. Those of you who know the levels of gloom and doom this dog can emit from her being know exactly what I'm talking about.

This part especially reminds me of Abi:

Me: Are you punishing me for being away for several days? I was at a FUNERAL, you know. It wasn't FUN.
Dog: How would I know? You didn't take me. You left me here with only one human to look after my needs. One human is NOT ENOUGH.

The dog refuses to eat unless both of us are home. It's kind of cute, but mostly just really pathetic.

Earlier this evening Otis and I bought a laser pointer, not because we need it for our stimulating Friday evening Power Point presentations, but because we recently discovered this is an excellent way to keep a dog entertained indoors. We justified this $9.95 purchase to each other by noting that the weather outside is very cold and dreary and the puppy inside is very VERY hyper. Otherwise, who in the heck would spend $9.95 on a laser pointer?

This has proven to be one of the best investments we've made this year. Forget the stock market...get a dog and a laser pointer. Abi is now obsessed with finding and eating this light, even when it's not on. She'll walk around the apartment for 20 minutes after we've stopped with the laser trying to find the light. Suddenly every speck of fuzz and dirt on the floor is a potential light beam she must consume. In fact, Otis and I are presently sitting in bed and Abi is still wandering around the living room. Poor dog. I'm afraid we may have scrambled her brains. At the very least it appears that we've flipped her OCD switch, and there's no off mode.

I'm going to go with the later.

I had kind of a crappy day today, at least emotionally, so when I got home I decided to grab the dog and the camera and spend some time doing 2 of the things I really enjoy. Abi and I played fetch for about 40 minutes, and I got some great pics of her. This is my favorite:

Abi is officially addicted to dog crack, otherwise known as the red laser pointer. We've tried to help her stop, but she's gone all Amy Winehouse on us and when we tell her to stop looking for the laser and for God's sake just lay down and be still, she says 'no, no, no' and continues her endless pacing around the apartment. Yet more proof that awarding a drug addict 5 grammys will destroy the youth of America.

As annoying as her pacing is, the entertainment value of watching her stalk a red dot like it's her sole purpose for living completely makes up for it. And, I know what you're thinking...wow, they need to get out more. Which is probably true. But the other part, that part about it being completely hilarious to watch her freak out when I shine the laser on her foot, that's totally true.

Also, that is not our messy apartment you see in the background.

Anyone want to go in on one with me? Juiceboxes?

More proof that Abi is one of the awesomest dog breeds ever.

Via Dooce

We found Abigail crashed out in our room about 20 minutes after we returned home from a long day of working on the house. I totally feel her.