Friday. May 22
3:45 pm
We took our second walk, instigated by Bubba. We walked out to Selva by the mailboxes, and the my mother went by on her way to the park, moving quickly for exercise. Buddy decided that we were supposed to be walking with her, and was pulling to try to pick up our pace to keep up with her, while Bubba was oblivious and checking out the scenery. We went across to the park, almost to the first set of stairs, and ran into my mother again, on her way back. The guys turned around to walk with her, and we followed her back home.
We walked about 25 minutes. Both guys pooped.
12:30 am
We did a Walk Check, and got a unanimous ‘no’ decision.
10:40 am
After we got back from the walk, Bubba started going to town on the dry food. He looked like he was really hungry, the way he was eating. I tried to take advantage of that. When he paused to swallow some food and clean off his muzzle, I swiped the food dish and tried giving him some medicine. I mixed liver treats with Filet Mignon to mask the pill bits. He wouldn’t eat very much, though. It wasn’t the medication this time, because he took a couple of bits of the medicine out of my hand that weren’t mixed in with treats. It seemed that I got in too late, and he’d already filled up enough that the food wasn’t temping.
But after I put the food dish back down, he attacked it again. So apparently liver and Filet Mignon was not as tasty as the dry food in chicken broth. We managed to get out 30% of the medication down so far, though.
10 am
We took our first walk of the day. We went across the street. It was a short walk. We got to the first grassy area, and Bubba turned to direct us to cut across the parking lot back home. But Janet came along walking Brandy, so the guys had to visit first. The visit was prolonged by Janet and I chatting about our fantasy of turning Selva into a residents-only private road to keep out the beach goers. After the chat and visit, Bubba forgot which was the exit was, and turned us to go back the way we came. We also stopped to visit with some other dogs we had not met before.
We walked about half an hour. Buddy pooped, Bubba did not.
8:30 am
One down; one to go.
Dog psychology is an art, as much as a science. I wanted to get the easy one medicated to start the day off. I mixed up Buddy’s pill into some wet food. He hovered in the kitchen the entire time I was mixing it. But when I crouched down, with a spoonful of the food in my hand, he sniffed, then licked, then rejected it. The medication was too obvious – not diluted enough.
So I dropped it on the floor.
It was gone in a flash. Food that tasted too much of medicine when offered by hand was suddenly a valueable and rare treat when it was “accidentally” dropped onto the floor.
Bubba woke up playful. I sat down on the couch while looking up something on my phone, and he stood in front of me, whimpering because I wouldn’t play. But he wore himself out in just a few minutes, and jumped into the bed in the bedroom. I didn’t expect him to be active after groomer day, so the short life of the gaming energy seemed about right.
It’s damp and grey out, and neither guy wanted to go out. There were no accidents.