Pinching and Pulling

Dear Amira and Brandon,
I hope you are enjoying your vacation in the Caribbean. PS. Lucy pooped all over my bedroom.
You may think this is from ‘texts from last night’ but this is real life my friends.
It all started two Mondays ago (Amira and Brandon went to St. Thomas for their one year anniversary and I of course begged them to watch my step daughter, Lucy) when I had been watching Lucy for 3 days already. Monday night when I went to take her out to the bathroom I noticed it was pretty messy to pick up if you know what I mean. I didn’t think much of it and figured it would pass. Boy was I wrong. That morning when I woke up I found Lucy shaking like a leaf on the couch in the living room. Well anytime Lucy shakes she is either freezing cold or has diarrhea. I didn’t notice any kind of mess and so finished getting ready. My roommate got up and as soon as she went into her bathroom I heard “Kandi, I think one of the dogs is sick”. Right away my heart sunk and I knew it must have been Lucy. I went in her bathroom and her rug was covered in liquid diarrhea. I wrapped up the rug and told her I would have it dry- cleaned. I put the rug in my trunk and headed off to work. Imagine how hot it can get in a car on an 80 degree day in San Diego. When I got in my car that evening to go home my whole entire car smelled of warm, old poop. I decided I didn’t want the hassle so I threw away the rug and bought my roommate a new one. The next day I came home to a shit storm-literally. I was keeping my dogs in their crate and Lucy was free to roam my room. When I opened my bedroom door on that dreary Tuesday night I was slapped in the face with the worst smell in the world. I looked around my room and to my horror there was liquid diarrhea all over. There were big piles and little piles! It was even splattered all over my slippers. I saw Lucy shaking like a leaf hiding under my chair. What I really wanted to do was close my door and walk away and move. I didn’t even know where to start…the thing is…if an animal goes to the bathroom in the house I totally prefer it to be poop over pee because pee soaks into the carpet and poop you can just pick up so easily. Well if the poop is actually pee-poop then it’s like your worst possible nightmare. There is no right way to pick up pee-poop. If you blot it-it just presses in further and it will take a year to get it completely blotted up. If you wipe it, it smears all over the place and makes a bigger spot. I tried the quick two sided swoop pick up. I basically positioned two paper towels on both sides and using both hands I swooped in towards the middle-- lightening fast. My tactic was okay but by the end all that’s left to do is wipe and smear. The little spots that were like the size of a dime I had to use the pinching method. I basically pinched the carpet that was covers in feces and pinched and pulled up. This tactic was okay but then I just started doing the push and rub tactic-- pushing the piece of carpet so far down hoping it would disappear or at best be hidden. It took me 45 minutes to smear all the pee-poop into my carpet. The entire time Lucy was shaking in the corner watching me. Just as I had pinched and pulled the last of the splatter I look up to see Lucy racing across my room in the hunched over position spraying liquid pee-poop all over. At this point I wanted to just lay in all of the pee-poop and die. They would walk in and find me face down in shit and the cause of death would be ‘pure and utter misery’.
I grabbed Lucy as fast as I could and this of course spooked her and so she started peeing; with pee dripping down my arm I carried her to my bathtub. This is the point I decided to ruin Amira’s vacation. I think I texted her something along the lines of ‘I got home and forty percent of my room is covered in liquid diarrhea from Lucy. Help!”. Ha-ha looking back I wish I would have waited and I do feel bad about making them worry. Although Amira would later tell me that every time I texted about Lucy’s poop status and said she was still pooping Amira and Brandon would buy me another gift from St.Thomas. Let’s just say I made out good
So anyways, of course Amira wrote back freaking out and saying she was so sorry. We just couldn’t figure out why she was sick. I was feeding her the food Amira brought and she hadn’t eaten anything else. We thought she might be sad they left but I am like her second mom and have watched her so many other times. She really just had an upset stomach. She had an upset stomach for the next 3 days. Luckily I made the decision to keep her in my bathroom while I was away. The night after the pee-poop massacre I was awoken at 2 am to find Lucy pooping again right next to my bed. When I woke up again at 7 to get ready for work Diego peed on my bed because I guess he couldn’t hold it. Well nobody should hold it anymore!!!!!…we should all just pee and poop wherever we please; on carpets, couches, beds, rugs!!!!!!!! In all of this the ironic part of it all is that Oscar was a pure angel. While I was scrubbing away each time Oscar would sit right next to me wagging his tail as if to say ‘mom, for once it isn’t me’. I mean you could really see the pride in his eyes.
At this point I just wanted to surrender. I took my comforter to the dry-cleaners, bought pedialyte for Lucy’s stomach and gave all of the dogs a bath. I was spent.
Luckily after this there were no other major incidents. She started feeling better and Amira and Brandon got back and showered me with gifts and apologized a hundred times. Looking back now I can laugh about it and hey…it gave me good writing material and so who could really ask for more. Ahhh, life

Catch up :)

It has been a while since I have posted anything and Amira inspired me to get back on the blog wagon:) (Thank you Amira for being my biggest fan)
It has been 6 months since I have posted about my two boys. Diego turned 1 in August and Oscar will be 4 on September 23rd! It is crazy to think that Oscar will actually be 28 in dog years...so he and I will both be turning 28 this month.
Time has really been flying since I last posted and you will be happy to know that I have not purchased a third dog. I did however try to get my roommate to buy a puppy last weekend! haha. If I can't buy another one then the closest thing would be to have my roommate get one. Oscar and Diego have just become the best of friends but Oscar does still get a little jealous; he is my first born so it's only expected. Things have been fun with them although my social life is still 65% based around my puppies:) I know that it doesn't have to be this way but I wouldn’t have it any other way-and I am a good mother, what can I say!!
I took Diego to get groomed a month ago because he was starting to grow dreads. I decided to just go ahead and get him shaved. I also decided to get Oscars nails trimmed which is a very scary concept. Oscar is truly a freak and will not let anyone (even me) touch his nails for a single second. I thought that the groomer might have some kind of metal chain they could wrap his whole body in and hang him from a tree so that they could get to his nails. Unfortunately, they didn't. They took him and put him up on one of their white tables. There were at least 5 other dogs on all of the other tables just standing there like little angels. The minute they put him up on the table he started panicking. He was trying to jump down and he was literally screaming like a woman--I mean blood curdling screams. The other dogs were looking at him like "who is this pansy?" Then he started peeing. I was standing on the sidelines humiliated and I also felt so bad for him. All of the groomers had to go over to Oscar--all 5 of them. They all had to hold him down and throw him on his back. A groomer had each limb and the other ones had his body. He was screeching and spitting everywhere. They were finally able to clip a little bit off of each nail and then let him up. One of the groomers was bleeding because he scratched her! I felt so bad. They said that the screaming and wrestling wasn't nearly as bad as biting but I really think they were just being nice. Truth be told by the look on all of their faces they had never heard a screeching dog woman before.
Diego was just like the other little angles and when I picked him up he was shaved and looked like a different little puppy--but he was so fresh and so clean.
The devilish side of Diego is that he isn't a 100% potty trained and basically has a hard time holding it. If he has to go, he has to go. In the last 3 weeks he has jumped up on my bed and peed everywhere. It's as if his bladder just can't hold it any longer and pee just starts spraying everywhere. To top it off I can't really punish him because the minute I start yelling at him he pees. I have to chase him into the bathroom and then yell at him while he is in my bathtub. I know he means well...If this keeps up I might start putting him in pull-ups after dinner.
The dogs have actually been really great and I know my posts are usually a little more comical but I have really been thinking about my upcoming birthday and what I cherish in my life. I was thinking if Oscar was a human and we were celebrating our birthday together over a cold beer...what he might say to me as advice about life. I picture Oscar saying that the only thing that really matters in life is love and loyalty. I picture him saying that the ones that you really cherish-you should keep them close and have them as company as much as possible. He would also say that you should play a lot and laugh and take naps and eat well. I think he would tell me to not take life so seriously and just enjoy it while you are here; but mainly the love and loyalty part.

New Addition

So for the past few months I have had the urge to add to my family. When I got Oscar, Amira (my best friend, roommate and basically my sister) had gotten Lucy and so Oscar and Lucy were the best of buds. Now that I no longer live with Amira because she had to go and get married ( )…Oscar is now an only child. I don’t think he really minds all that much because I am his obsession and he wants his alone time to focus on only me. Well, I kind of mind. I mind because I feel guilty that when I get home all I want to do is lounge on the couch and watch ‘The Office’. Unfortunately, Oscar has been lounging all day in his crate and he probably wants to go on a walk or run around and play. Don’t get me wrong, I take him on at least one walk a day and I play with him too. I just feel guilty like I am boring him. So, in the back of my mind for a while I have kind of been on the search for a new little guy.
The thing I told myself is if you already have one dog then what is another one? You wouldn’t even notice the difference. I don’t recommend this thought process when thinking about children (dogs, or human beings). So I kind of put it on the back burner and knew that if at any given minute there was an opportunity to get another dog I would be all over it like white on rice.
Two weeks ago, Leslie (friend from High School) wrote to me on Facebook to tell me that her mom had two puppies left and they were Schnorkies. Well, stick a fork in me because I knew I had to have one. I knew I was getting one before she even sent me the picture; this is how eager I was to have another dog. We communicated for a week while she gave me information about the dog and sent pictures and we worked out a time for me to go see him. I felt like I was adopting a child. I went and bought a dog bed and set up his sleeping area. I bought a new leash and stocked up on dog food. I was excited to say the least.
I picked him up a week ago. I have named him Diego after Frida Kahlo’s husband, Diego Rivera. His Birthday was on August 18th, 2010 so he is just over 5 months old. He is really cute. Him and Oscar love each other and are the best of buds. However, Oscar is struggling with jealousy.
Anything I do with Diego, Oscar has to do it too. If I give Diego a bath Oscar hears the water from the other room and comes running and dives into the bathtub. He pushes Diego out of the way and sits right in front of me waiting for me to pour water on him so that HE can take a bath too.
Oscar started sleeping on the couch instead of sleeping with me (this teenage attitude phase started about 3 weeks ago) Well guess what? He sleeps in the bed with me again because Diego does. Oscar wedges himself in between me and Diego at night.
If I brush Diego, Oscar has to be brushed too. If I tell Diego to go potty, you better believe Oscar will go potty first.
It’s pretty funny. I am making a conscious effort to treat each child the same. If I kiss and hug Diego then I make sure to do it to Oscar right after if not at the same time.
Oscar really does enjoy him though. They go in the front yard each morning after our walk and chase each other around like maniacs. They cuddle together on the couch and play tug of war with their stuffed animals.
Diego is a great addition to the family. I do have to say that one day I was headed to Amira’s house and I had to pack up double the stuff to bring both dogs…there was a second where I was carrying two crates and the two bones out of my hand dropped and I got a glimpse of what it might be like to be the Octo-mom. It’s hard work having multiples, don’t let anybody fool you.

The Untold Stories of the backyard

So I decided to take my chances and leave Oscar in the house without putting him inside of his crate. Every time I decide to do this I always immediately regret it. I was gone for 4 hours. I came home, opened up the front door and was basically slapped in the face with the pungent smell of crap. I was disgusted. I was looking everywhere for Oscar and I could not find him. I was looking everywhere for a pile of poop and also could not find it. So I went outside to the backyard and Oscar came running up to me panting. When I bent down to say hi to him the smell that was radiating off of his body was indescribable. I have smelled poop many times in many different situations; this was like a bag of crap that had been sitting out in the sun for a few weeks and then crapped on again. It was really, really bad. I can't even fathom what had happened in the past 4 hours but I did know that my dog had been double dipped in shit. I threw him outside and closed the dog door so that I could investigate why the house smells like it was bombed with a diarrhea grenade. I looked everywhere and there was nothing...then I checked his blanket on the couch and it smelled horrible. Basically the house stunk because Oscar was in it and there was a dark cloud following him around the house...we can call him Pig-Pen. So I threw the blanket outside, lit every candle in the house and opened every window. I then went and grabbed Oscar to throw him in my bath tub. I had to wash him 7 times to get the smell off of him and then after that I was still so grossed out that I shaved him with my brothers hair clippers (Sorry John Paul). After he was clean I had to investigate. I went outside to the gate where he sometimes sneaks out of and noticed there was a brick covering the hole that he gets out of. This means that someone put him back in the yard and covered the hole with a brick so he couldn’t get out again. This means that someone picked up my dog and put him back in yard when he was covered in straight feces. This person didn’t think to leave a note so that I could bake them cookies for the rest of the year? Who are these freaks...just picking up dogs covered in shit and placing them back in their yards with no recognition. They deserve some sort of an award. I just wish I could get the story. I am so interested in the story and I will never, ever know it. Did Oscar escape and when someone tried to capture him to bring him back he splattered shit all over himself in fright? Did he decide to get out and go roll in 40 day old poop in the alley? Maybe a neighbor had to put him back so many times that they decided to throw crap at him to teach him a lesson? I just have no clue. My imagination runs wild. So needless to say..it will probably be another few months when my memory fails me and I decide to try to 'trust' him again. Keep you posted.

Ghandi Griffon

My brother's girlfriend bought a puppy- a mini pin named Rondo. Basically if I had to describe Rondo I would say "Tasmanian Devil". My brother brought Rondo home after a trip to see his GF and we had the pleasure of taking care of this 9 week old puppy for 2 1/2 weeks. Well Rondo took a liking to Oscar...and when I say took a liking this means a liking to biting, pulling, scratching, and snipping at Oscar's face 24 hours a day. Rondo literally would not stop pestering Oscar. Oscar would try to go to the bathroom and Rondo would be biting at his ankles while he was pooping...it was horrible. The first week I was just following them around yelling at Rondo and trying to protect Oscar. It started to be a joke in the household because Sam and my brother kept saying "Oscar will not defend himself...if Oscar was faced with death he would just curl over and kill himself" Everyone would sit there and laugh because Oscar would literally just stand there and look at you while Rondo hung by Oscar's bottom lip. We were all waiting for Oscar to finally get sick of it and bite Rondo back...we kept saying "Oscar, come on and get him back!!" he never would... he knew if he wanted to get away he could jump up on the couch but he could rarely get away unless I smacked Rondo's butt. I felt so bad for Oscar...he would just sit there and get tortured by this little annoying dog. I think he did secretly like it though because in the mornings Oscar would wait patiently by John Paul's door waiting for Rondo to wake up. Basically Oscar found himself in an abusive relationship...you want to leave but you just can't. So Amira came over last night and she got to see the abuse face to face and she said "Oh my gosh, Oscar is a Saint....Oscar is a dog Ghandi". It really cracked all of us up but it was true. No matter how bad Oscar was treated he never bit back. He will be the perfect dog when I do finally have a family and that just makes me love him sooooo much. Rondo left yesterday and although Oscar might miss him a little bit, I think he is finally at Peace:)

Being Butted

Oscar has a funny way of telling you he likes you. When he decides he likes someone he puts his butt on any part of their body he can get to. This has become a joke in my house and my brother says "uh oh--you are about to be butted". It is just so funny--he usually puts his butt on my boobs for whatever reason. The silly thing is it's not like he is just sitting on you....every part of his body is making sure it isn't touching you--only his butt. So it has become obvious that if I am dating someone then they need to be butted..or they aren't approved by Oscar and ultimately I have to stop talking to them. This whole situation is probably a double-edged sword because when a guy comes over I am waiting to see if he gets butted and when he does I am so happy inside..but the guy is thinking "why is this girl's dog putting his ass on my white shirt and she is smiling over there...this is disgusting!" hahah so in the end there is a fair chance I will be booted for being butted but I am telling you...Oscar's ass is my guiding light:)

Oscar and the tortured screen

So a while back when I had my Honda civic, it was stolen and dropped off in the ghetto of Escondido. The only thing they took was a picture of Oscar that was on my dashboard and his travel crate which was in my trunk. For many nights after, I held him closely thinking they were coming to get him from me! haha. They never came. Anyways, since then I haven't purchased a new crate because they can be pretty expensive. So I found this one at right aid that was made out of a vinyl material and zipped up (what was I thinking with Houdini in the house) So I decide that I will put him in the mesh crate while I go to the zoo with Caleb. We have a blast and when I get home Oscar is greeting me at the door shaking his butt left and right and so happy to see me...he is of course out of breath from the anxiety he has had with me being gone all day. The first thing I think...is how the hell did he get out. I had put him in the crate and put the crate in my room with the door shut. So I go in my room and the crate is torn to shreds. So I am looking all around and my first instinct was that someone came in and let him out of my room after he escaped the crate....but no one was home at the time. So I am just mind boggled. Then I see it...the shred of screen on my hamper. I look up and I see my screen hanging out the window with a huge hole in it. Oscar had chewed a hole in the screen and then busted out of it--jumped out the window to the backyard and went in through the doggy door and was waiting for me when I walked in. It was so unreal that I couldn't even be mad...I laughed. He is the most unreal dog I have ever met. Please see photos.