Dog related vent... day shot to h*ll

[Horsefeathers!]

So it's, what, 9:30 am my time. So far, my day has gone like this:

Step BARE footed in poo someone drug in from outside (this is right out of bed... I'm not at my best right out of bed :-? ).

Do the shiver shudder hop on my BAD ankle until I find something to get it off with.

Realize that one of the cats has peed on the clothes I had laid out on the couch last night to wear today (cats have now lost the privilege to be out at night and will now be confined to their room which is the way it USED to be, anyway... now I remember why).

Am making tea when the pitcher basically explodes. Tea all over me, the counter, the floor, h*ll, the whole kitchen.

Hear an uproar and screaming to wake the dead and it's Peaches. A little insight to understand how this happened... for elevated feeders, we are basically using overturned milk crates with bowls bungeed down to them to keep them from sliding off. Never been a problem in all these years. Well, Peaches' collar somehow got hooked to the bungee strap (s hook) and that set into motion a chain of events that could best be described as comical... if it had happened to anyone else :x . Remember, Peaches is from an abuse case and is very easily spooked. She got hooked, food overturned, Peaches took off, milk crate attached to her neck, Peaches even more spooked, screaming like a banshee. All this time, I'm making the exploding tea and turn to try to figure out what's going on. I had to virtually sit on Peaches to get the thing off her because she was so freaked out and talking her down wasn't getting anywhere... she was already in a panic. I got the attached milk crate off her and let her outside because, let's face it, by then she's spraying pee and poo everywhere. Oh, great, my little wooden doodad thingy that hangs on my wall has fallen down and basically self destructed, my pictures are scattered across the floor among the wreckage and I now have a lovely fist sized hole in my wall where the corner of the milk crate went through. That's in addition to the tea droozlin's all over the kitchen which really doesn't look much worse than the half inch of mud that's been tracked in since it's raining. It looks right like we've been fighting in here.

I can live with the broken stuff and even the hole in the wall... sheetrock is pretty easy to patch, anyway, and I can clean up mud and tea and poop and pee and whatever else I'm likely to find among the wreckage. The thing is now Peaches is sooooooooo spooked. She's since come back into the house, but she won't have anything to do with me. She's afraid of me, as if I did it to her. I can understand how she might think that since I was very abruptly trying to get that crate off, but I wasn't angry at all. Just trying to free her from her "demon" and it was just one of those times you couldn't talk her down. She was flailing and flipping and I thought she was going to hurt herself and it was like she couldn't hear me, so I basically pinned her down to get it off. She's bolted into her crate now and won't come out. I've laid on the floor in front of her and talked and soothed and bribed. I know it's serious because she won't accept treats and there can't be a more food motivated dog. It hurts my heart to know how much we've tried to build confidence in this dog and now she's back at square one.

I've called my clients and cancelled today's appointments. I'm staying home. I can't leave Peaches here all freaked out and I also need to clean up this mess. It almost looks like a crime scene. If I learned one valuable lesson, it is to take Peaches' collar off when we feed her. :-?

All this happened in the span of about 20 minutes. So how was YOUR morning? :-?

[imported_Kat]

geeze HF thats one heck of a start to the morning :o Hopefully the rest of it will be uneventful :wink:

[rotten_two]

whoa nelly! *big pinch* just wanted to make sure it wasn't all some hel*ish nightmare! guess not! i will admit i had quite a chuckle about the tea pitcher because that happened to me not too long ago -- literally shattered my favorite pitcher! i was on the phone at the time and it scared the beejezus outta me so i screamed bloody murder, dropped the phone and my mom on the other end was ready to call 911! and oh my lord the mess it did make -- glass shards everywhere and sticky tea (cause being a southern girl i only drink sweet tea) all over my kitchen.

we too used the overturned milk crates but we don't bungee them down (now i am thinking it is a good thing). sorry about peaches. maybe the best thing to do is give her time and i am betting she's not gonna want to eat off the milk crate for a while.

i too think it is better you stayed home today -- start fresh tomorrow :)

[BuddysMom]

YIKES! I agree, best to stay home for Peaches' sake and yours! Sounds like a cosmically bad day.

[behle]

:o :o Words fail me.... :o :o

Poor Peaches.....

Poor HF.....

I hope it's all under control now.

[courtnek]

Laurel got her collar hooked on the tines in the dishwasher, and we had basically the same scene. she couldnt escape because the bottom doesnt come out of the dishwasher, but she avoided me for quite a long time too.

Peaches will come around in a day or two. Put treats in her crate and walk away. dont lay in front of it, just act like you normally do. that will ease her tension sooner. you may be making her nervous by paying so much attention to her now.

poor HF....

[hicksstar]

Wow not a good start to the day. Hope todays a better day for both you and peaches. Let us know how she is getting on now shes had some time.

[Horsefeathers!]

Pheh, I was so shook up this morning that I finally just left in frustration, though I did NOT go to work (went cell phone shopping instead). I wasn't frustrated with Peaches, but was just pretty unnerved at the entire morning's events, so I decided to give her time to cool off and me time to calm down since having me around the house shaking like a bird crapping peach seeds couldn't have been good for her already shaky morale. It must have worked because I had a great rest of the day and Peaches seemed good as gold by the time I got home this afternoon, glad to see me and all, and trying to flip me over with that shovel she has for a nose. I just hate that she seems to take everything so personally. It happens all the time... she trips over something or bangs into something and seems to "blame" the person closest to her, as if it were an intentional act of abuse.

Oh well, we both survived the day and tomorrow is Friday, so if we can just get through that, it's a downhill slide (as opposed to a downward spiral?).

Wish us luck!

[StarFox]

Glad to hear that Peaches is acting normal again and isn't holding you personaly responsible for the mishap this morning. And I'm glad you didn't have any more accidents today either.

Now may I say that I probably look forward to reading your post more then anyone elses for the simple fact that most of your posts have me laughing so hard I need to pee. For example:

Horsefeathers! napisał(a):

shaking like a bird crapping peach seeds

That visual had me peein' in my pants. :lol: Seriously HF I love the way you write. :lol:

[Horsefeathers!]

Poor Peaches... she's not still running from me like I have two heads, but she's still very scared of her "food bowl." Actually, for Peaches, we use a big c@t litter tray strapped to an overturned milk crate. She doesn't get an actual bowl because she just snarfs her food down in a few gulps, but scattering it out in a litter tray and tossing a ball in it slows her way down. This morning, she was slowed WAY down because she's too scared to eat, which you can't possibly imagine... Peaches? Gut almighty? I slid her collar off before feeding to avoid any more drama, but she's decidedly afraid of her "bowl." She'd snatch a bite and run to the door. I had to all but hand feed her. Oh well, this, too, shall pass, I reckon. :-?

[Horsefeathers!]

StarFox napisał(a):

most of your posts have me laughing so hard I need to pee.

Seriously HF I love the way you write. :lol:

My poor best friend... yesterday, I showed up at her house whining and bitching about how my morning had gone. She's always a good ear. However, she was also quite amused by my animated replay of the whole thing with full visuals and me acting the whole thing out because, well, I can't just talk with my mouth. Hand and body language are very important in the retelling of any story. I wanted to bitch and moan and she couldn't stop laughing at me doing the shiver shudder there's poo stuck to my bare foot hop on my bad ankle. :oops:

[courtnek]

you DO crack me up HF....I gotta agree with the rest.

I have a question though....Why do you feed your dogs with the bowls elevated? is this somehow better than having them on the floor? I see people doing this in commercials too, and never really understood why...

do you raise the water bowls too? I'd be afraid to do that, mine is a huge
old crock pot basin, china-like and would break if they knocked it down, and they ALL insist on drinking out of THAT bowl, and not their own...

also, for Peaches, it might help if you moved the bowl to a different location, (like swap it out with another dogs bowl). itmay not be the bowl she's afraid of, but rather that she is associating where it is with the accident. I read of someone where a baby gate fell on the dog while he was eating, and he refused to eat anywhere in the kitchen after that.
they put away the baby gate and moved his food elsewhere, and he was fine. maybe move the food and use a different crate? to them I bet all the crates smell slightly different too.and it was crate that caused the problem right? not the bowl?