Dozer went on a hunger strike, sort of. Well, what he was really doing was just not eating his breakfast. This was perplexing to me, because Dozer usually goes on hunger strike when he feels that he has been slighted somehow, and I was left scratching my head as, each morning, he stood over his filled food bowl and gave me a mournful gaze of pitiful disinterest. Of course, by evening he was so hungry that he ate breakfast and dinner all together, like a starved beast, so it was not a real hunger strike.
I thought, at first, that Dozer was upset because Felanie (who is on medication that makes her pee constantly) had to be baby-gated into the kitchen during the day. Dozer, meanwhile, was free to roam the house, except the bedroom, which I kept closed off because otherwise Dozer would sleep on our bed while we were not home. But that didn't make sense to me; Dozer was the one getting the special treat of freedom, not the other way around. Nothing to pout about there. Then I thought perhaps Dozer realized that Felanie had cancer, and he was so sad about it that he didn't feel like eating. But when he continued to act like a big selfish buffoon during playtime (he loves to yank toys right out of Fel's mouth, and the poor old dog can't do a thing about it), I put that idea out of my mind. He couldn't be that sad about Fel if he's such a jerk to her. (In fact, I doubt either of them has any idea something's wrong with Fel.)
Then one morning, as I dumped Felanie's two pills (one to slow the cancer but increase the peeing, and one to stop the peeing) into her food, I realized that Dozer, who was still waiting for his breakfast, was watching me carefully... and drooling... and licking his lips. I thought he was over his pout, so I gave him his portion of food with a flourish--and the excitement faded from his eyes, and he glared at me sullenly.
It took me a moment to put two and two together. But suddenly I knew how he was being unfairly treated, and I knew why he was pouting. Felanie was getting medication, and he wasn't!
So I took an empty pill bottle, filled it with dog food, and made a big show of taking a piece of kibble from the bottle and dropping it into Dozer's food. The kibble instantly became indistinct from every other piece of kibble in the bowl, but Dozer didn't care. Satisfied that he was also getting a "special treat" in his food (whatever it was), the D gobbled down his breakfast without hesitation.
Score one for Mommy, score... well, score one for Dozer too. Clever, selfish little brat! :)
1 comment:
Wonderful observation about Dozer's powers of observation.
This is not quite the same, but...we once gave Wilbur, our pug, and Mitzi, our standard schnauze, each a piece of cooked broccoli with their dinners. Wilbur carefully removed his and laid it beside his bowl for later. While he was chowing down on the stuff in the bowl, Mitzi sneaked up behind him and gingerly removed his broccoli. He never made that mistake again.
Arlo, our beagle, once laid his chew bone parallel to a pair of dumbbells on the bedroom floor.
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