Walking With Paul Anka

For any of you who haven’t been watching Gilmore Girls lately, my title will make absolutely zero sense, however those of you who have no life and have been watching obsessively (like moi) know that Lorelai recently adopted a puppy and bestowed him with the mystifying name Paul Anka. All I’m saying is that the writers of this show HAVE to have adopted a dog before, or at least spent time with a shelter puppy, because they’ve hit the nail right on the head. This dog, much like Jack, is afraid. Of. EVERYTHING. So, I’ve taken to calling Jack Paul Anka 1) because it’s funny 2) because I think it annoys him and that’s even funnier. Not that he probably even knows his real name since I usually call him Peanut, or Bunny, or Bug, or some other sickeningly sweet term of endearment.

Anyway, yesterday I took him for a walk, and his antics were even more creative than usual. Before we go out for a walk I always take him potty in our special potty place where I don’t have to pick it up, because no matter how many times I pick up dog crap, I just don’t think I’ll ever really get used to it. So he did his thing and then we proceeded jauntily on our way. Typically about 5 minutes into the walk he’s dragging behind and begging me to “pleeeeeaaaaase go hoooooooome”, but being the tyrant that I am, I keep dragging him along for at least 30 minutes. So I didn’t think much of it when he started lagging behind on our way up the first hill… until I noticed that the people in the car driving by were laughing… at me… So I turned around and Jack is just trucking along behind me in his little poop squat with an impressive poop trail in our wake. I hadn’t brought a poop bag with me, so I found a stick and did my best to scrape it into the gutter. (Also, it's just now occurring to me that I talk about poop way too much.)

After this adventure we met with the usual--fear of fire hydrants, large bushes, bags of leaves, large fake rocks (??), gutters, etc--but we kept walking and we came upon our friend Yappy Dog, whom I would very much like to shoot pet and love. It’s so bizarre, because most barking dogs don’t have too much of an effect of Mr. Anka, but for some reason he starts getting all excited when we come withing a 200 foot radius of Yappy Dog's house. He starts dancing and prancing around, trying to dart across traffic to get to this dog, practically drooling in his zeal to go bark in harmony with his little friend. I kept him reined in, and got a fabulous arm workout out of it, and made it by the house creating a cacophany as every dog in the neighborhood decided that they wanted to play too. Then, with my ears still ringing Jack seems to decide he’s had about enough of this whole walking business. He planted himself in the middle of the sidewalk, and no amount of sweet talking or tugging would convince him to move on—even when I promised to stop calling him Paul Anka, he still just sat there and stared at me glassy eyed. Finally I got his butt moving again and we made the slow, painful progression home and collapsed in a heap in front of the tv--where we truly belong.

So all in all it was quite the adventure, and when we got home he proceeded to cough the entire rest of the day and of course into the night and through the morning, so it’s back to the vet we go this afternoon. They know us by reputation now “Oh! Is that the little shelter puppy?!” It’s cute and yet sort of sad at the same time. He really needs to stop with the whole sick thing though, because mom is totally going to Washington in a couple of weeks and he needs to be healthy enough that I can desert him at the vet to be boarded for three weeks. I’m not thinking they’ll take too kindly to my dog coming in and spreading pneumonia amongst the masses.

Comments

[J]

Aww, I hope Jack feels better soon. I'd be scared they have given you a very sick puppy, that might not be able to cure himself. Demand that they give him the best meds. Very sad. I hope he feels better soon.

[Angela]

Well, yeah, I knew when I got him that he was pretty sick, but the great thing is that the animal shelter has covered all of his medical costs so far--woohoo! (And thank God, because otherwise I'd need some kind of puppy blue cross!)

[Queen]

Ok...Scarlett. Walking contradiction. Now my very favorite Gilmore Girls...are you ME 10 years ago? I see your future. And you will one day be Queen.

[Becky]

That's hilarious! I have to admit that I do kind of have a stomach churn every time I pick up the poop, esp. when it's not solid. I love it when one of my dogs finds the widelia (sp?) groundcover so I don't have to pick it up.

[kenju]

I'm all confused. I almost didn't recognize you since you've changed the colors and stuff on the blog. That puppy sounds so cute -but exasperating too.