Things change

Probably because I said in my last blog post that nothing'd really changed, things changed.

The first thing that happened was that Haku brought us another dog - we're calling her Curly, and she's a very sweet little cockapoo type dog, who is now safely ensconced with Haku out by the garage. Curly will be delivered either to the humane society or to a new home soon - she needs a bath, but she's clearly the kind of dog lots of people want - cute, small, friendly and not scary at all.

By 'soon' I don't really know when I mean. Maybe a friend of ours will come out and take her home (a gift for her mom, who needs some cheering up). Or maybe we'll actually have to surrender this dog to the humane society, during their draconically limited admissions hours (9-6, but at least 7 days/week). Either way, she's going to be just fine. She deserves to have the good home that she'll find for herself.

Then, shortly after the arrival of Curly, our dog Sally started having problems. It began on a Tuesday morning at like 3am - she woke us up crying and yiping. Just lying on the bed - but yiping in a way that was clear she was serious. John stayed home with her that day - and she was yipey and stressed and clearly felt TERRIBLE. So, we called our vet and made an appointment to bring her in - Thursday morning was the soonest they could see us. In the meanwhile, our vet suggested giving her some of the Rimadyl that we had left over from Roxie's near-spay experience. That seemed to help a lot.

Thursday morning was this morning - I took Sally to her appointment, and the vet drew blood so that they could check for valley fever and tick fever, among other possible causes. Happily, Sally was feeling much better, even without any Rimadyl. So, it could've been just a muscle strain or something...at least we hope so.

We'll get some of the results of the bloodwork tomorrow or Saturday, but other tests will take longer; so it'll be maybe a couple of weeks before we have a complete picture of what's up with Sally. And, while we were there I was chatting with the vet about Roxie's situation.

Roxie is a few days away from being done with her antibiotic for her tick fever. I was under the impression that we could make an appointment for her to be re-tested, and possibly schedule her spay for very soon after that. But, our vet told us, the special, accurate tick fever test she'll have to have can take 20-30 days to come back. So, it could be another month after she's done with the antibiots before the spay can come - and that's if they worked! Otherwise, longer.

And I learned how to tell if a dog is in heat, and I can now safely report that Roxie is, in fact, in heat. She's visiting Haku often, and so, well, there you have it.
We're hoping for the best w.r.t. spay before pregnancy still, but with the possibly extra month or more of waiting, it seems very unlikely. AND our vet said 'well, you don't want to have puppies that were conceived when the mom is on doxycycline, either...'. This was followed by a facial expression that one might expect from someone who'd just sniffed poo or something icky. I'm guessing, but did not ask for confirmation of the guess, that if Roxie gets pregnant while on the antibiotics, there's a strong possibility of pups with birth defects. But, of course, we'll do our best to be sure there's no pups at all...

...but, of course, that'll be up to the universe more than it'll be up to us.