April Showers Bring May Flowers But Golden Showers Bring F-Bombs

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Anyone visiting my house lately would do a double take.  The setting says you are most definitely in a house, but the smell would lead you to believe you  have entered a Salt N’Vinegar chip factory.  The pungent aroma is courtesy of Brie who surpasses Niagara Falls with output of liquid.  I swear she starts peeing it out, as she is gulping it down, something else we have in common.

I have tried various strategies to reduce the amount and frequency of her output… limiting her to a small bowl, supervised drinking and using a a bowl that has a float that limits her ability chug, chug, chug… but none of these options have resulted in an improvement in damming Brie Falls.   Increasing the frequency of potty breaks hasn’t had any better results.  The inside pee puddle situation continues to be a hurdle we are having difficulty getting over. 

The puddles that I appreciate are the ones that I can visually clock and avoid.  The ones that I detest are the ones that I find with my foot.  I’m walking through the house going from one room to the next and BAM… super soaker!  It doesn’t help that a few of my lights on the main floor have burned out bulbs and I keep forgetting to buy more bulbs.  You would think the 10th, 11th and 16th time stepping in liquid gold would have provided an incentive for my brain to remember and prioritize the purchasing bulbs, but it hasn’t.  I step, my sock squishes, I swear,  then say “Buy light bulbs dummy!!!!”, and the cycle repeats.  

Monday night Brie woke me up at 2:00 am totally soaked from wetting in her crate.  I took her out just to make sure she didn’t need to tap the other kidney and then gave her a quick sponge bath before cleaning and disinfecting her kennel.  It was hard to fall back asleep after my 45 minutes of whirlwind toileting and cleaning, but I managed to get a few more hours of shut-eye before I had to be up for the day.  

Tuesday evening was an entirely different story.   There was a new pee puddle every time I turned around.  We would go outside and have a celebration when she peed.  That pee was supposed to buy me at least a few hours of dryness, but if I turned my back for one second, a puddle would magically appear where Brie had just been.  By bedtime I figured that she had peed it all out,  given the sheer volume of liquid that I mopped up and deodorized with vinegar.  Seriously, there had been so much cleaning that my nostrils stung from inhaling the lingering vinegar vapours in the air.  

I was wrong… very, very wrong!

There is nothing like a screaming 4:30 am wake-up call to get the adrenaline coursing through the veins.   I hurried downstairs and rushed her outside, only to have her dick around for 15 minutes… no pee… no poo.

Irritation!

I tromped back into the house and that is when I found out the reason she was so nonchalant outside.  She had flooded the crate before I let her out of it.  My indignation reached critical mass and we had a “conversation” as I scrubbed and disinfected the crate.  Okay it was more of a swear filled monologue vs a conversation, but I think I made my point clear, wake me up to pee!  Don’t pee then wake me up!!!!

I’m not a big fan of the middle of the night wake-up call, but I tolerate it when it results in action when we go outside.  Wake me up to go play outside only to find out that I have more work to do  when I get back in the house and you run the risk of unleashing Beast Max who swears a blue streak and has fits.

Who needs a weighted blanket!

Ferg sensing my GRRRRRR ARRRGHH took it upon himself to pull weighted blanket duty when I got back into bed.   It normally works to calm me down, but I was so hot from exertion and irritation that being trapped under all his fluffiness made it worse, which meant I was too hot to fall back asleep.

As it turns out I was not clear in my earlier communication about how close she was to being left in the yard with a sign saying “Free Puppy”.   Brie decided a second wake up call was in order and timed that call to happen just as I finally started to fall back asleep.  Again this transgression would have been forgiven if round two of potty break had been productive, but it wasn’t and she took it as an opportunity to play and frolic!!!

VEXATION!!!!

Murderous thoughts started popping up in my head and I worked hard to deescalate my ire.   Luckily there were no inside messes to clean, so I popped her back in the crate and headed upstairs to meditate and work toward accepting that it was going to be an incredibly long, long day.  

When I came downstairs at 6:30  I made sure she was in the crate if I couldn’t have eyes on her.  Even with this extra effort  she still managed to pee in her “dining crate” in the 5 minutes between when she finished eating and the rest of the herd finished their breakfast… there is always a little bit of delay in her post breakfast potty break, as I’m Ferg’s food bouncer so Lyndy doesn’t pilfer it.  

We went outside so she could run around in the back yard for 20 minutes and then spent another 5 minutes on leash in the pee/poo fields of the yard, but nothing.  Yet it took less than 5 seconds to produce a large inside puddle when I turned to grab contraband out of Lyndy’s mouth.  That “gift” was found with my foot.  That was the straw.  I’m not proud to admit it, but I had a tantrum that would have made Rumplestiltskin blush and cower.    

The furry herd scattered like leaves in a gale.  They know better than to stick around when Beast Max unfurls and the F-Bombs start being bandied about.  A minute latter when composure returned, I herded Brie to her crate until we needed to leave for work….my grip on calm was tenuous at best and there was no sense in risking stirring the beast again.   

We were headed out the door when my bladder reminded me that I had been so busy cleaning up Brie pee that I had forgot to pee myself.  Since she was already leashed I brought her up with me figuring she couldn’t get into too much trouble.  Wrong!  She took that as an opportunity to work on our tandem peeing skills.    

Crickey!!!!!!  (Insert Serenity Prayer here) 

Now one would think that is a truly horrible, rotten,  no good way to start a day… it was… but it wasn’t over quite yet.  I headed to Timmie’s for a “It’s okay, you are going to survive” breakfast, only to find out that my bank card wasn’t in my wallet.  

What in H E double hockey sticks!!!! I went through my pockets three times, emptied and sorted through  my wallet four times, felt between the seats, but no card.  I went home and searched the house, other jacket pockets and sill no card.  There was no choice I had to phone the bank and cancel the card.  Thank goodness I had a bit of cash in my wallet to tide me over.  

After such an eventful day I couldn’t wait to go to bed that night.  I made sure Brie had no access to water after 6:00 and took her out to tap a kidney twice before her bed time.  I’m pleased to say that Brie had a quiet and dry night, in part because Lyndy decided to mess with my head.  

I was out cold when Lyndy barked, jumped off the bed and flew down the stairs to bark again at the door.  I feared someone was breaking into the vehicle and head to the window to look. 

NOTHING!

Well I was up and I could hear Brie stirring so I decided the smart move was to go and take her out.  Success in the form of a quick pee.  

PARTY, PARTY, PARTY!!!!!

While we were out, I checked the truck and the side door of the house just to make sure and confirmed that everything was locked.  But why had Lyndy barked???? Maybe she needed out?  It was an easy fix.  I sent her out and she quickly peed, but as she finished her body became rigid and she hard stared into the darkness of the backyard/park and barked again.  

What was back there????

My paranoia level was high.  I called her back into the house, locked the door and started going from window to window to see what had her on edge. I couldn’t see anything.  Either they or it was good at hiding or Lyndy played me and got me back for the Beast mode moment earlier in the day.  

The next day was a pee coaster with extreme highs and parties and monster let downs.   The biggest let down was the partial accident on the couch which necessitated stripping off and washing all the protective coverings… this isn’ t my first trip to Puppy Town.  Thank goodness a water proof single mattress cover fits my couch cushion perfectly.  The only drawback is it takes forever to dry so the couch has been out of commission for the last two evenings.  

I had high hopes that today would be a dryer day and for a few hours it was, but then Brie managed to flood both crates multiple times to the point where she needed spot washing so that she didn’t track pee all over the house.  Well if anything, she has provided me with an opportunity to problem solve and perfect the pee cleaning process.  Now the vinegar reserves are running dangerously low and I am feeling defeated…..

Get a puppy they said….

It will be FUN they said…..

One last note before I head out to buy more cleaning supplies… oh yah and light bulbs.

I went upstairs to use the facilities and as I walked out of the bathroom I saw a lake of liquid in my small room.  When I say Lake, I am not exaggerating!  I could have boated across it… okay maybe not boated but it was large. 

FUDGE NUGGETS!!!

Lake Wee Wee

When did that happen?  Brie had been in the crate for pretty much 95% of the day.  

Seriously, HOW???? How did she manage it?

The more I thought about it, the more I doubted it was Brie. But if it wasn’t her who could have done it?  

Lyndy? 

Hazel?? 

Whisper???

Notice at no point did I think it was Mr. Bladder of Steel as he is the bestest of best boys.  There was no way it was Ferg. 

Well when I went to let the dogs out at the end of the day I found out who it was.  The evidence was irrefutable… it was Whisper.  The underside of her onesie was soaking and a dead give away that she was the guilty party.   Wee Wee strikes again!

I love that Whisper is a supportive Mom, but I could do without future attempts to help Brie flood the rest of us out of the house… hmmm now that I think about it maybe I should add hip waiters to the shopping list.  

She is dang lucky she is cute!

Airing out her Who Ha in Puppy Jail!

May your Saturday be filled with adventure and your socks remain dry!