6/24/04 - 2:49 pm
"Sierra threw up today and Jack is pooping outside his box."
I'd just gotten home from a rather too-full day grooming dogs and my husband greeted me with this information. For a second or two I tried to see the relationship, decided they were unrelated except for the fact they'd both happened since he and I had talked last, and sure enough, that was the correct answer.
"What did she throw up?" I asked.
He gave the best description he could muster, "Chunky. Like popcorn."
I pictured popcorn from a movie theatre and couldn't imagine what she would have gotten into that would look like that, or be that, or have any resemblence to that.
We discussed the treat I'd given her as I left the house that morning, a new type of treat she hadn't eatten before. Showing him the other half of the product, a "beef knuckle" made of natural raw hide products and made to taste like beef. "Did it look like this at all?"
"No." He was sure. "Popcorn. And a little grass."
Sierra eats grass everyday. Books I've read say this is not an indication of any serious diet problem or gastritoric malidy. Some dogs just like the taste of grass.
The topic changed to the eternal What's For Dinner conversation, then deteriated into the never ending When Are You Off Again, Because The House Is A Mess And That Seems To Be The Only Time Any Cleaning Gets Done Around Here. Quickly we moved back to Sierra's vomit.
"What else was in it?" I inquired. He didn't miss a beat. "Just the popcorn, and you know, bile."
We never used>/I/> to discuss this sort of thing, before we had a dog, I mean.
We'd had Sierra for about 5 or 6 months when a friend of his, call him James, stopped over for a beer in the garage, something he's done for about 10 years or more.
He asked "So, how's the dog working out?" Somehow W. and I got onto the subject of Sierra's bowel habits and her last elimination and the details of it's color and firmness!
Yes! James was looking at us like we had definatelly crossed a line and took two long swigs of his beer, maybe to hurry up the visit and escape before we brought out actual samples or something.
I interupted W. who was saying how great it was that she always did her business in one corner of the yard, and rarely out in public so we didn't have to be like those other shmucks that carry around sacks of shit for an hour, till they get home from a walk and can dispose of it.
James was noding but distractedly, like he couldn't relate but to be polite-- you know, sure, whatever.
"I guess we sound like new parents, huh?" I said, to W. as much as to James. "Discussion her bowl habits like new parents talk about diapers and the baby shit this way for the first week, then like that for another ten days and did you see how the shit looked after she ate carrets?" I laughed, hoping this would lighten the moment and change the subject. There was a silence that lasted a bit too long.
"How about those Mariners!" said my husband.
Well, this was another moment like that. Suddenly we were both aware of how we were discussing the dog's vomit and, rather embarrassed, we both rushed to other things."Well, it's a mystery" I said, leaving the room. "Maybe we'll never know," he said, dissapearing into the backyard, in the oposit direction.
The next morning I found a chunk of styrophome backing from a raw pork rib package that was in the trash from the other day inside Sierra's bed. Her bed is in our bedroom, on the floor next to W.'s side of our bed.
I asked Sierra,"Where did you get this?"
She gave away no information, looking away inocently.
Rather than throwing the little peice away I guess I absent mindedly set it on W's dresser.
The next morning W. picked it up when he was dressing for work and, before I rolled over and went back to sleep, he asked me, "Where did this peice of popcorn come from?"
