PB & J(ack Juice)

J got an email the other day.

J looked over her computer screen at me. I can’t believe it’s rolled around already, seems like I just took you.  I was very relaxed, stretched out in the sunny spot on the living room rug, but I opened one eye and stared back at her.  If it wasn’t going to happen right that second (and she looked pretty comfy in her narco-lounger), I thought I would continue dozing. 

J read the email again. What’s this? We recommend a stool check.  Oh, good times.  Stool. What a weird word. J mulled it over for a minute, then tippity tap, she was back at the keyboard.

Apparently J and a red football helmet named Brian share the same perky curiousity, and someone named hermione was right there with an answer.

J called the vet to make my appointment. It was set for Friday at 4.  So,  for that, uh, stool check, do you need a specimen, or…?

Well, if he does go that morning and you want to bring it in, that would be great.

I’m sure Maxwell will oblige.  They laughed.

Well. I wasn’t that excited about my most personal bodily functions being discussed but we dogs have learned to live with the strange and undignified ways that humans treat our poop.   We would just as soon leave it lay to disintegrate, but no, they pick it up and carry it in little bags.  I don’t get it but whatever. 

Buzz says that a Jack Russell such as himself prefers the more proper term, “spoor”.  And when his business is being bagged, he refuses to get anywhere near it and pulls as hard as he can on the leash the other way, nearly gagging.   You can tell he’s repulsed by JK’s actions.  I would never touch that. Are they nuts? He has said this to me more than once.

So anyway, last Friday we went for our usual walk and I sat at stool (thanks hermione) sooner than usual.  J collected it in a Wal-Mart bag.  Normally she would have tossed it in the trash barrel by the church path, but this time she put it alongside a tree, right off the sidewalk. 

We can pick it up on the way home she said to K. 

Oh, that’s classy, Buzz murmured to me. 

Near the end of our walk, just after the cemetery, we ran into Macy!!  And her lady! We were all very happy to see them because it had been a few weeks, since before Christmas.  So we stopped to talk.  K went on ahead to get going on work and J remembered after a minute and called to him through the line of trees separating them, Hey darlin’-- don’t forget Maxwell’s bag of poop by that tree. The neighbors were sure to appreciate her melodic trilling.  Buzz rolled his eyes.

K yelled something back, J thought it was, Already got it.

Macy’s lady looked at J.  You call him darlin’ pretty much all the time, don’t you? I got the impression she didn’t often hear “darlin’” and “bag of poop” in the same sentence. 

Pretty much, J said.

We all strolled back to our house and then said goodbye and they headed back up the street.  Those two ladies never run out of things to say! 

When we came in, K opened his office door and said down over the railing to J, That bag of poop was gone.

Gone!?  What in the world, who…I thought you said you got it?

No, I said it’s gone.

So who in the heck would have picked it up?  It’s not like it was in front of anyone’s house.

I don’t know. But it wasn’t there. 

Oh my word.  OK, so now who thinks we are these total lazy slobs who would bag up a load of dung and then leave it forty feet from the barrel for someone else to pick up. Sheesh. 

I  know.  Crazy.  But what about your sample for the vet?

I’ll tell them someone stole our stool sample. I’m not that worried about it. Oh well. I didn’t want to store it around here all day anyway.

And that was that.

At 3:30 J put my collar and leash on me, and told me to hop into K’s car.  Here Maxie, take your ball. You can play with it while we wait.  My ball AND the car! What a great surprise! 

Until I saw our destination.  I have to say, I do like the people in this building but it is very hard to go there. Bring in the noise, bring in the funk.  The smells, the barking, the anxious energy, the way they examine every inch of me, stick needles in me … -it’s very worrisome.  At least I think so. Buzz says he doesn’t mind it at all – but I happen to know that when he’s on that examining table, he sheds about forty pounds of fur.

J made me drop my ball once we were inside, then told me to jump up on the scale. I hopped on. Sit, Maxie, SIT.   Good boy.  Fifty-seven point six pounds.  You’re a big boy. 

After they recorded my weight, we were escorted into a big examination room with a bench around two sides of the walls.  An examining table extending into the middle of the room separated us from a sink and some cabinets. I chewed on my ball and looked around, but there wasn’t much to see. Just a little yard through the window and a picture of a naked dog on the wall.

The picture on the wall creeped me out. The dog was naked!!

On another wall were about a dozen brochures.  WHAT TO EXPECT AS YOUR PET AGES.  IMPROVING YOUR DOG’S SOCIAL SKILLS. TEACHING FIDO TO STAY HOME. Things like that. Nothing we needed.

J let go of my leash while she talked to the girl taking notes. I sniffed in the corners.  There were a lot of sharp smells that I didn’t like. Soapy and animal-ish, with a lot of fear at the same time.  Mostly dog, some cat, some I didn’t know at all. Buzz asked me later, Flying squirrel? Mole?  How would I know? 

Let’s just get out of here. I tried to tell J but she was busy talking.

She told the note-taking girl about the stolen spoor. Not a problem the girl said, we can get it. Well. I didn’t like the sound of THAT at all.

Then they started discussing my feet.  I have a problem with red feet. They get hot and itchy, and sometimes I just have to bite at them.  Hot spot spray doesn’t help – actually, nothing really helps. It comes and goes.  If I get to worrying at my feet, JK will say nicely but warningly, Maxie. Uh-uh.  Leave your feet alone. I get embarrassed then and usually get up and walk into another room.   I hate it that they are unhappy with me, but sometimes I have to scratch my feet. And the easiest way to do it is with my teeth.

J said to me, Drop your ball, Maxie. DROP.  I dropped it.  The girl picked up my leash and took me into another room.  They poked me and prodded me and checked me out.  I felt very lost and exposed in there. I hated being separated from J, and really, all I wanted was to be back in my familiar house with the smells I knew and understood.  But sometimes you have to endure being uncomfortable-- and this was one of those times.  I knew JK would want me to behave. So I did. 

He was so good.  The girl opened the door and I bounded through. J was still there! I was extremely happy to see her.

The rest of the appointment was typical – I stood on the table section and the vet (a nice lady) looked in my ears and then gave me a shot (NOT happy about that) and talked to J about my feet and told her it was allergies and gave her some pills for me, and some special shampoo.

He needs to take the pills till they’re gone. They’ll probably make him hungrier but don’t feed him any more than normal. And he should be bathed with this shampoo two to three times a week.  I could see J’s excitement over the thought of bathing me three times a week.    

 Can we just get out of here!

Later at home (I was so happy to be there!), Buzz gave me a good sniffing.

Vet, huh.  Glad it wasn’t me. 

J gave me the first three pills. They were light blue.  She tried to disguise them in some canned dog food but I rolled them around in my mouth, got the dog food off them, and spit them out.  Buzz stood by and watched with great interest while J tried a couple more times. She finally opened my mouth and put them in and said swallow, Maxie. These are steroids that will help your feet get better.  I swallowed.  The pills went down.  But I didn’t like it.

Buzz sniffed at me again.  Steroids, huh? So what’s your pleasure? Jack juice? 

I was confused. Jack juice? What?

Russell roids?  

What are Russell roids?

He got impatient.  The pills! What’re you taking? Russell roids? Jack juice? JRT Sauce?

I’m not…I don’t…

Oh man.  Buzz rolled his eyes.  I forget you’re still a pup. OK.  It’s like this. We Russells have naturally occurring steroids that other dogs have to take.  Like for instance, me, I am ripped, with these pipes – he gestured at his gut – because I’m a JRT.  You probably have some JRT blood in you but not enough to pump you up to juice standards. Those pills will help some, but, well…he coughed in his most purebred manner and toddled off to his bed.

J looked the steroids up online.  These aren’t anabolic steroids, Maxie, they are cortisone, to suppress the allergies. The two kinds are totally different.  Later she said to K,  I’m doing this whole thing with a major grain of salt; I hope it works but I just don’t know. 

After a couple of trial and errors in getting me to take my pills, JK hit on the idea of using peanut butter, and now I can hardly wait to take them.  A spoonful of peanut butter definitely makes the medicine go down. 

And the vet was right about one thing for sure.  My appetite is enormous. I can never get enough to eat. I feel like I’m never full.  I’m inhaling my food.  But JK don’t feed me any more than normal, except for the peanut butter. It’s very frustrating!  Buzz isn't very sympathetic, he says now you understand what it’s like to be a juiced-up Jack! Who wouldn’t be hungry under all that muscle.

I can't lick this peanut butter fast enough.

A week has gone by since I started the pills.

And today is K’s birthday!! Happy birthday to our favorite man in the whole world!!! We dogs have a great day planned for him. First we’re going to take him for a walk to the lake. Then we’re going to celebrate with a big breakfast and some biscuits later. We do all this to celebrate K! J says she better make K a crow-shaped cake because since my feet are getting better, she’s got some to eat. 

I have another week to go on the pills, another week of starvation.  Believe me, if she doesn’t eat the crow, I will.