BarkingProse

It started out okay. Mom asked me to climb up on a small table in the garage. I figured she was going to brush my fur and cut out the hairballs.

There were all the normal tools: brushes, combs, scissors and clippers. Ash and Jack were looking pretty nervous but I wasn’t worried. Not then.

Mom began mumbling about my hair balls. My fur is fine as cat hair. The minute it gets wet it clumps into a horrible tangle. When I came from the shelter my skirts had been shaved to the skin.

Mom has cut dozens of hairballs off me. This time she decided to do something drastic. She gave me a full body haircut!

The haircut didn’t hurt or nothing but it tickled and made me nervous. It didn’t help that the boys kept staring at me and whispering back and forth. As mom cut more and more fur off me the dishpan filled up with red and white locks.

Finally mom said she’d done enough damage for one day and let me off the table.

Ash told me not to look in the mirror. Jack pretended he didn’t notice anything different.

I felt a whole lot lighter and there weren’t any hairballs tugging at my skin. When I saw myself in the big hall mirror I wasn’t sure it was me. My dark red hair was gone replaced with strawberry blond fluff.

Once the boys quit laughing at me I think I’ll like my new haircut. Besides, I know Ash is sweet on me with or without fur. That’s what matters.

Stay tuned. Jack gets his spring bath next week and he’ll be spending some time on the table. We’ll see how he likes it! Respectfully, Tess.

If you look real close you can see a little pink lump just under the left side of my nose. Mom has been watching this lump real close and decided that it had to come off.

Mind you I could care less about a silly little lump. But many years ago mom found lumps on Codie and they turned out to be mast cell tumors. Now she won’t take any chances.

I knew this lump was no big deal, but there was no talking mom out of her decision to have Dr. Brad remove it.

So off we went to the vet. We had to take Jack with us because the big crybaby can’t be left alone. As soon as I got to the vet I remembered what they did to me the last time. They always stick something up channel nine, but last time they drugged me and pulled a seed out of my ear canal. That was no fun!

Dr. Brad thought he could zap the lump with electricity. But whenever I heard the buzz sound I jerked around. Dr. Brad decided he would grab the lump and clip it off. I sat real still for that after he told me it wouldn’t hurt. Dr. Brad said the kind of lump I had doesn’t have nerve cells and I wouldn’t even notice anything. He was right.

Before I knew what happened he clipped that little pink lump right off my muzzle. He quick put some stuff on the spot so I wouldn’t bleed. In no time I was back with mom in the waiting room. I was soooo happy to see her I jumped right into her lap.

I said a quick good bye to Dr. Brad and hopped in the car with Jack while mom paid the bill. I fell asleep on the drive home. Soon as we got out of the car mom gave me a frozen turkey neck to help me feel better.

I hardly noticed I had major surgery. The lump was nothing to worry about and I’m gonna be just fine. Life is very very good. Thanks Dr. Brad!

Remember me barking about my pals the Labradors? Maybe I forgot to mention that their dad is a reporter. He writes all kinds of stuff but this time he wrote about mutts and put Libby’s picture in the story.

The lead to the story got lots of his readers upset. “Medical researchers have long shown that contact with pets can often help both the physically and mentally ill. But now, veterinary scientists say sleeping with your pets increases the chances of contracting everything from parasites to the plague.”

Check this out. Letting Sleeping Dogs Lie in Your Bed Can Kill You

Mom started laughing when she saw the picture of Libby all curled up. We’ve seen Libby do a lot of sleeping at Asherpark. She’s either using me as her private tug toy or grabbing a quick nap. She’s the first to hop on the bed in mom’s studio. Then she hogs the whole space. Look here at this picture Libby’s dad took a couple of years ago. There she is on the bed at their cabin!

Tess is real upset about the story. I’m not too worried. I prefer to sleep on the floor anyway. But Tess is stressed. Tess says she has to have some bed time or she’ll get cranky. I got news for Tess. She’s cranky even with bed time.

Me and mom talked it over. She explained that when we’ve been rolling in nasty stuff or hanging with the goats, we can’t get on the bed. That makes sense. She doesn’t want us bringing all the dirty bugs with us. But when we’re nice and clean we can each spend a little time in bed before it’s lights out.

I had a hard time with one of the words in the story. Zoonoses! What a silly word. Being kinda literal I thought it meant all the noses at a zoo. Nope. The news story says zoonoses are diseases or infections transmitted from animals to humans.  Hmmm. No mention of the diseases people could give us.

The story says us mutts can make people sick from licking them. I want the world to know I’ve licked my mom a hundred million times since I was a pup and it’s never  made her sick. She says my kisses are magic because they make her laugh even when she’s in a bad mood.

Libby’s worried that she’ll get blamed for the story her dad wrote. I don’t think so. We’re worried that maybe Libby won’t get as much bed time now that her people got all this science stuff in their heads. Don’t worry Libby. You’ll always have a nice soft bed at Asherpark!