Animal Insting

Well, in case you weren't paying attention, I will just point out that 2010 is now so-last-year, and we have a whole new year to live in.  The new year is called 2011, which if you pronounce it "twenty eleven," sort of rhymes with "plenty of heaven."  I think this means that it will be a very good year.  Or at least it might be.

Here's Gabe wearing the Bite-Not collar.  You can see one of the scabby places on his chest.  Also you can see the pretty pink robe that Mom bought us at the thrift shop.

Anyway, now that we know what year it is, I am going to update you mostly about my brother, Gabe.  Mom is worried about Gabe because he has those funny scabby places on him, and he even has a couple of new ones.  He has taken three different kinds of antibiotics so far, but the scabby places didn't go away yet.  Which is why Gabe had to go last Wednesday to visit Dr. Senter, the dermatologist, and Dr. Senter did what is called a biopsy.  Well, actually he did two biopsies.  And what that means is that he cut little circles out of two of Gabe's scabby places.  Then he sent those parts he cut out to a lab somewhere.

It will take about 10 days to get the results from the lab, so we don't know yet what the scabby places are made of.  Dr. Senter says they have a lot of bacteria in them, but they might also have cancer in them.  Anyway, like I said, we don't know yet what the lab will tell us.  So in the meantime, Mom has to put this antibiotic ointment stuff on all the scabby places twice every day.  And because there are stitches where the biopsies got taken, Gabe has to wear a Bite-Not collar.

Here I am licking my foot while Gabe poses for a picture.

Gabe does not like to wear the Bite-Not collar, which nobody likes to wear, of course, and he tried to bite Mom when she first put it on him.  So she had to put a muzzle on him and then put the Bite-Not collar on him so that she wouldn't get bitten.  And this was very smart of her because she didn't get a single bite, even though Gabe tried really hard to bite her.

Anyway, besides that, Gabe also has this disk problem with his neck and back, and now he can't go up the stairs or even down the stairs.  Mom used to carry him upstairs at bedtime, and then he would go downstairs by himself in the morning, but after he sort of fell a time or two, he is now afraid to go down by himself.  Which wouldn't be a problem if he would just let Mom carry him downstairs.  But on Christmas morning, when Mom tried to pick him up, Gabe bit her on the thumb.  Except that he didn't bite hard enough to break the skin, so there was no blood.

One of Gabe's scabby places.

After that, Mom told Gabe he would have to go downstairs by himself, but he was afraid to do that, so he peed and pooped upstairs in the hall while Mom was fixing breakfast of dogs for the rest of us.  Finally, Gabe let Mom carry him downstairs, which is what he should have done in the first place, if you ask me.  But Gabe has funny ideas about things sometimes.

So now Gabe has to spend the night downstairs all by himself most nights, which he doesn't like too much, but Mom ignores him when he whimpers and whines, so after a little while he just shuts up and sleeps on the sofa overnight.  Then on Friday night Mom took the Bite-Not collar off of Gabe and put the basket muzzle on him instead.  So he got to come upstairs for the night, and he let Mom carry him down again in the morning without snarking or anything.


Mom would have put the basket muzzle on Gabe sooner except that she was making Mel wear it because Mel kept licking his leg where he got an IV when his teeth were cleaned, and he made his leg all raw and icky.  But finally his leg was healed up by Friday, so Mom put the muzzle on Gabe.

Then on Saturday Mom went to a movie with Aunt LaDene, and when she came home, she found out that Gabe had figured out how to stick his tongue through the side of the muzzle and lick the biopsy place in his armpit.  So he got all the stitches out and made it all be a red, ugly hole.  Mom was not happy about this at all.  She put the Bite-Not collar back on Gabe, and it is still there.  I don't know how long he will have to wear it.

Gabe and Mel hanging out by the heater.

And sometimes Gabe doesn't want to eat his breakfast or his supper, even though he gets really special food made of kangaroos and apples.  The rest of us dogs would be happy to help out by eating Gabe's food for him, but Mom won't let us do that.  Instead, she keeps coaxing him until he eats it, and she has to sit on the floor and hold his dish way up for him because it's hard to eat when you're wearing a Bite-Not collar.


Gabe still looks pretty skinny, but he is gaining weight, and every time he goes to the vet's office, he weighs a few ounces more.  Dr. Patricia says this is good because it means that maybe Gabe's IBD is not getting worse, like Dr. Patricia thought maybe it was.  And if Gabe keeps gaining weight, maybe he won't have to have an endoscopy, which is where they stick a tube in you and look at your guts with a tiny little camera.  Mom hopes Gabe does not have to have an endoscopy because she is running out of money to pay for vet bills.

Well, okay, I guess that's all I need to tell you about Gabe.  Sometimes I wish he didn't get so much attention from Mom, but I don't want to have scabby places on me like he does, just so I can get more attention!