Our dog needs some ativan...

Here's a little random story for y'all out there in blogland...

I spent yesterday afternoon in ortho clinic (sigh, it's still February) with the casting guy, Dave. His job literally consists of putting casts on folks postoperatively. That's what he has been doing all day, every day, for thirty years. So, needless to say, he's really good at it. He offered to teach me some of his mad casting skills, so after lunch I appeared for my lesson.

He showed me a short-arm cast by putting it on my forearm in a nice shade of bright purple. After sawing the thing off (my GOD..that part was terrifying...), he went to throw it away, but being the mom that I am, I decided to take it home and show it to Julia. What kid wouldn't want to play with a cool purple fiberglass cast?

I guess I did not think things through well enough. Julia did like the cast. She thought it was fun and tried it on, parading it around the kitchen. Psymuhn, however, did not like the cast one bit. It took me awhile to realize this.

Our dog is usually pretty sedate in the evenings unless we're in the kitchen with him. If you walk by, he'll come up to you wiggling his butt (he has no tail, so that's the best he can do.) He gets excited by visitors, running children, and meat. His most annoying habit is how he MUST lick your hands if you've put lotion on in the past five hours. Hand lotion is a doggie delicacy and needs to be consumed promptly. Other than that, Psymuhn spends his time on his cushion in the corner of the kitchen. He rarely barks or chews and doesn't drool.

Last night I was playing with the girls in the living room. We were home alone (papa was working), and Psymuhn started to growl. At first, I thought he might be dreaming about a Pit Bull or something, so I ignored it. When the growling grew louder and turned into deep, gutteral barking sounds, my "mommy radar" went off. "Oh Crap," I thought. "We have an intruder standing in the kitchen ready to do away with us."

I rushed into the kitchen preparing to club the jerk with a high chair. To my surprise, there was no intruder. Psymuhn was standing in the corner of the kitchen, squatting low to the ground with a terrified look in his eyes. He shot me a glance that seemed to say, "stay away from It. It's coming to get us. I haven't killed It yet." Yet, there was nothing even mildly scary or out of the ordinary in the kitchen. When I tried to pet Psymuhn, he jumped a mile and his fur stood on end. I was perplexed...did Psymuhn suddenly become psychotic? Were there voices speaking to him that only he could hear? I wonder if he was getting subliminal messages from the radio? Wait, No...he's deaf. That can't be right.

I looked around the kitchen for anything out of the ordinary. There was a piece of cheese sitting next to the high chair on the floor. Psymuhn LOVES cheese. Why hadn't he gobbled it up yet? Next to the cheese sat the purple short-arm cast. Was he afraid of the cast? I picked up the cast and set it in the middle of the room. Psymuhn growled and showed his fangs.

Whoa.

I could have some fun with this.

Instead of taunting my innocent psychotic dog with a piece of purple fiberglass, I set it down in another room. With the cast out of the kitchen, Psymuhn immediately turned back into himself, licked the lotion from my hands, and gobbled up the cheese.

After I had the kids in bed, I tried it again. Psymuhn was sleeping in the middle of the kitchen floor, so I crept up next to him and put the cast about an inch from his snout. I stood back and jumped on the floor. The vibrations caused him to open his eyes. Upon seeing the cast, Psymuhn's eyes shot open and he shot across the floor so fast that he ran right into the wall. I shot a few pictures of our dog as he glared at The Cast from his corner:





Animals are weird. I guess that when I want to punish the dog, I don't need to roll him over or "yell" at him....all I need to do is haunt him with The Cast for a few minutes. It will scare the living daylights out of him.