Dog hives and other nonsense...
Tonight, my wife fabricdragon and I stopped into a PetSmart following our dinner at Chili's to pick up some birdie nut balls (or nutty bird balls, depending on your point of view...) for her Scarlet Macaw™, Blake.
As we were checking out, her attention was grabbed by a NEW and AMAZING product being displayed on an end cap, whose name I don't recall, but which was basically a hifalutin pet brush. It came in two (2) models, one costing US$35.00 and the other costing US$70.00. Our budget, such as we have, being unprepared for such a purchase, objected, and bade us merely take a brochure for further contemplation.
Just recently, as we were preparing for bed and my blood sugar was too high (only the latter of which was responsible for my subsequent inebriated self-hysterical commentary), I observed that we have not been of late able to recall where we got/found our gray tabby cat, Smokey. I thought he was younger than our current dog, Max (a German Shedder(sic)), but Kirsten said he could be older, and thus date from the time of our previous dog, Frodo (a vet-proclaimed West Philly shepherd, looking like a scaled-down German Shepherd with black-and-tan markings, a curly semi-bushy tail, and flop ears). I said that it was possible that he was spontaneously generated from the dog shedding (being about the same color), and that that meant he must be from the time of Max. Kirsten said I'd forgotten how much Frodo had shed. I objected that, while Frodo may have shed a bit, he was unlike Max.
See, the last time we'd seen Max all smooth-coated and clean was last September, which was the last time we'd paid someone to groom him while he was being boarded. Within two (2) weeks of this, his butt had fluffed out with soon-to-be-daintily-drifting-up-my-nostrils underfur. We'd both done vigorous bicep work dragging a shedding comb (which is basically an overzealous hacksaw blade crossed with a ripsaw folded back on itself and clamped in a handle) over/through Max, which resulted in a few pecks of gray fur blowing about, no noticeable diminishing of Max's coat, and a mad desire to pee in Max.
Based on this, I speculated that perhaps all of our cats had originated with Max. He simply spent his winter building up his undercoat, while little cat-pods of fur grew to maturity inside. Every spring, we would inadvertently release these little furry podlings into the wild by combing the dog, whereupon he clearly completed the process of genesis by peeing on them madly.
Once fabricdragon started breathing again, I suggested that we should plant thistles or something in the back yard. She countered that that would merely result in the dog being covered in burrs that he would drag into the house. I said that all I wanted was to have some kind of bushes planted that would succeed in dragging the fur off of the dog as he passed, rather like bison roving is collected, except that, obviously, the bison do not provide as much shed as the dog.
Upon saying this, I realized what a fool I had been!
The real reason for all the fluff is not that the dog is shedding; rather, he is gathering fluff!
Clearly, our back yard must be populated with fur-bearing plants, such as cotton, which the dog, while we are not looking, gathers with fierce growls and then layers upon his thighs like a large, four-legged honey bee. The sounds of "Arf! {moof} Arf! {moof}" resound through the back yard as the dog dutifully gathers the cotton to stuff onto his hindquarters, prior to coming in to have us collect it from him with the shedding brush. He must be so disappointed when we merely toss his gatherings into the trash instead of carefully placing them into some unimaginable canine version of a honeycomb he must suppose we keep somewhere in the house.
With my remark that we do not want to see what the hive must look like, fabricdragon bade me post this nonsense on LJ.
So here it is.
As we were checking out, her attention was grabbed by a NEW and AMAZING product being displayed on an end cap, whose name I don't recall, but which was basically a hifalutin pet brush. It came in two (2) models, one costing US$35.00 and the other costing US$70.00. Our budget, such as we have, being unprepared for such a purchase, objected, and bade us merely take a brochure for further contemplation.
Just recently, as we were preparing for bed and my blood sugar was too high (only the latter of which was responsible for my subsequent inebriated self-hysterical commentary), I observed that we have not been of late able to recall where we got/found our gray tabby cat, Smokey. I thought he was younger than our current dog, Max (a German Shedder(sic)), but Kirsten said he could be older, and thus date from the time of our previous dog, Frodo (a vet-proclaimed West Philly shepherd, looking like a scaled-down German Shepherd with black-and-tan markings, a curly semi-bushy tail, and flop ears). I said that it was possible that he was spontaneously generated from the dog shedding (being about the same color), and that that meant he must be from the time of Max. Kirsten said I'd forgotten how much Frodo had shed. I objected that, while Frodo may have shed a bit, he was unlike Max.
See, the last time we'd seen Max all smooth-coated and clean was last September, which was the last time we'd paid someone to groom him while he was being boarded. Within two (2) weeks of this, his butt had fluffed out with soon-to-be-daintily-drifting-up-my-nostrils underfur. We'd both done vigorous bicep work dragging a shedding comb (which is basically an overzealous hacksaw blade crossed with a ripsaw folded back on itself and clamped in a handle) over/through Max, which resulted in a few pecks of gray fur blowing about, no noticeable diminishing of Max's coat, and a mad desire to pee in Max.
Based on this, I speculated that perhaps all of our cats had originated with Max. He simply spent his winter building up his undercoat, while little cat-pods of fur grew to maturity inside. Every spring, we would inadvertently release these little furry podlings into the wild by combing the dog, whereupon he clearly completed the process of genesis by peeing on them madly.
Once fabricdragon started breathing again, I suggested that we should plant thistles or something in the back yard. She countered that that would merely result in the dog being covered in burrs that he would drag into the house. I said that all I wanted was to have some kind of bushes planted that would succeed in dragging the fur off of the dog as he passed, rather like bison roving is collected, except that, obviously, the bison do not provide as much shed as the dog.
Upon saying this, I realized what a fool I had been!
The real reason for all the fluff is not that the dog is shedding; rather, he is gathering fluff!
Clearly, our back yard must be populated with fur-bearing plants, such as cotton, which the dog, while we are not looking, gathers with fierce growls and then layers upon his thighs like a large, four-legged honey bee. The sounds of "Arf! {moof} Arf! {moof}" resound through the back yard as the dog dutifully gathers the cotton to stuff onto his hindquarters, prior to coming in to have us collect it from him with the shedding brush. He must be so disappointed when we merely toss his gatherings into the trash instead of carefully placing them into some unimaginable canine version of a honeycomb he must suppose we keep somewhere in the house.
With my remark that we do not want to see what the hive must look like, fabricdragon bade me post this nonsense on LJ.
So here it is.