Pawly

Snoopy is poorly or pawly to be precise. It started yesterday when (the world fell out of his bottom) the bottom of his world fell out, if you get my drift. After several hours of pure runny brown liquid ejecting from his rear end, I decided not to let him sleep in my bedroom, as is his wont (I have beige carpets - enough said), but to settle him down on the kitchen tile floor. I slept near him all night on the floor too. How's that for (stupidity) total dedication?

By this morning, he was still producing enough brown liquid to sink the Titanic let alone the bed he was sleeping on and was now unable to use his back legs to support himself. He just lay in his mess too weak to roll over. I rang the vet and we were in the surgery by 8am. The vet's verdict was that Snoopy was very dehydrated and needed painkillers to ease his gut and antibiotics as a precaution. We were instructed to try to get him to drink fluids - not easy when a dog does not want to drink. On getting home, Snoopy did not want to leave the car and could not use his legs at all. So Kay and I had to carry him out into the house on a makeshift stretcher made from a blanket. As the day progressed the antibiotics and painkillers made some difference, but he was still passing copious amounts of brown liquid all over every fresh bit of bedding I could muster. Our washing machine was working flat out and as soon as I had hung one load up, I was washing/disinfecting another, not to mention floors carpets and all. I was exhausted! The vet had told me to ring him back at 4pm to see how he was doing and, when I told him he was still reluctant to use his legs, he told me to bring him in again.

Kay I managed to get him into the car, but when we arrived at the vet's, we could not get him out of the car. He had no strength to stand up. Again Kay and I resorted to the blanket to carry him out, taking two corners each. We struggled to manoevre him out of the car and onto the pavement and, as I slammed the car door shut, I realised a split-second later that I had locked my car keys and handbag inside!! Not only that, but I had parked on double yellow lines. To add insult to injury, Snoopy took one look at our pathetic situation and strolled nonchalently from the confines of the blanket to the surgery. It was rapidly turning into a farce. With no time to dally, we decided to get Snoopy inside and deal with the car later.

To cut a very long story short, the vet has kept Snoopy in overnight to put on a drip to replace lost fluids. Snoopy hates to be parted from me so the vet will sedate him too. I think I'll need some sedation too after a day like today. The Automobile Association came to the rescue and got my car unlocked again (I have a spare car key - in the house - but my house keys were .... inside the car in my bag and Kay had not brought hers.) My neighbour has my spare house keys - but they are away on holiday! A lesson is to be learned from all this and I think it is that I shall leave a spare set of house and car keys with a local friend who never goes away anywhere.

We await to see how Snoopy will be in the morning, but it is all very worrying as Kay and I have been invited to Greg's aunt's 90th birthday party which is being held in Northumberland (north of Newcastle) on Monday and we are travelling up by train early on Sunday morning. All Greg's wider family will be there and we have been arranging it for months. I had organised for someone to dog-sit Snoopy in the house for three days, while we are away. So you can imagine how I am panicking, if he does not make a full recovery by tomorrow, I shall not want to leave him, yet I do not want to miss the party either. I shall definitely need that sedation tonight. A nice bottle of wine would not go amiss, methinks.