"Corn Dog"

This handsome fur baby is my Buddy.  You may recognize him from my weekly Hairbrained Musings posts.  He is a bit of a local celebrity here on the Crazy Train.  He is the funniest, most ridiculous, most loving, most(ly) well-behaved (he is still a pup at 17mo) dog a girl could ask for.  He is also completely and undeniably stupid-- sometimes.

Dammit-- I AM smiling!!  YOU say "cheese" and I might look more excited.

Being a pup, Buddy still does "puppy stuff", like getting hyper for a few minutes and running around like a nut, or occasionally peeing in an "inconvenient" place (like on my mom's couch-- sorry Mom).  He gets a little "frisky" sometimes, too.  Especially around sweaty women-- and me.  (Notice I don't count myself in with the sweaty women, no matter what may be true.)  It's gross and funny all at the same time, the way Buddy will sit at your feet and whine with "desire" right before he jumps up on the couch and tries to make your shoulder his bitch.  Now that I think of it, it's actually gross and sad... oh, what am I saying?!  It's freakin' hilarious!  But I do hope that one day he outgrows his amorous side, or at the very least adjusts his sexual preferences to not include me.

Unlike his occasional attempts at lovin', Buddy is typically very polite when it comes to food.  He doesn't beg at the table, and doesn't snatch food out of your hand, or out of the hand of an inattentive child.  He will help him self to unattended food, or food that hits the floor, but so will most dogs.  The problem is, Buddy has a hard time figuring out what is and is not food.  (Thus, "the completely and undeniably stupid" comment.)  Anything that hits the floor and fits into his gigantic catfish-mouth qualifies as food to my Buddy.  

I know, I know.  You look at this massive, wrinkly, exasperated looking beast and you think "What's the big deal?!  That critter is going nowhere fast."  Welllll... don't let the lumpy body and indifferent countenance fool you.  Buddy uses his sad-looking face and lumpy physique to disarm you and lower your expectations.  In reality, he can be quite speedy for a fat dude!  He can be so speedy that I swear he must have some sort of instinctive, precognitive ability that gives him that extra something he needs to get to "food" before I can.  His ninja speed is really hard to believe until you witness it for yourself.  Really. hard. to believe.


The even bigger problem-- the one that led to this post-- occurs when you combine Buddy's loose definition of "food" and his freaky precognitive "food"-is-about-to-hit-the-floor radar, with my Birdie's Neanderthal-like table manners.  The result is very... expensive.


So what the heck happened?!  (I can hear you practically yelling wondering from here.)


Well, honestly, I don't really know for sure.  I wasn't there when "it" happened.  When I got home from my mandatory bargain-shopping coffee-drinking, lunch-eating trip with my sister, I was greeted with several "howdy"s, followed by an awkward silence.  Upon further inquiry, I got the following statement from my Mama:  "It was an accident.  It was all over so fast, and then it was gone.  I couldn't stop it."  (Now don't you think for a minute that there was panic in this voice.  No sir-ree.  I didn't detect any panic, just a slow Southern drawl filled with disbelief.  Go back and read it again the right way-- I'll wait.)


What the...?!  Did someone loose an appendage?  Is that the accident that was "over so fast" and left something "gone"?  The kids seem awfully happy to have lost anything!


I, being ever-so eloquent, said "And this accident waaaaassss?"

"Birdie was eating corn on the cob, and her fingers were all greasy, and she dropped the cob with the handle still in it, and Buddy swallowed it.  All of it.  Well, half of all of it.  It was an accident."

Whoa, nelly!  I could have sworn my mom just said my dog swallowed a corn cob with a spike handle still imbedded in it.  Surely, I imagined that.  Surely, she would have called me if that had really happened.  Or at least she'd seem, oh, I don't know--nervous, maybe?  My ears must be running low on caffeine.

"Come again?" was all I could manage.  It was then confirmed that my ears, in fact, were not running low on caffeine.  Buddy had swallowed a corn cob, with what was essentially two nails sticking in the end of it-- nearly two hours earlier.  (Well-- it was bound to happen sometime, what with Buddy's sad understanding food and all.)  My dad then proceeded to comment that "Boy, that rough thang is gonna hurt comin' out the other end in a day or two."  He chuckled.  I, personally, was not amused.  Dad also went on to rename my Buddy the "Corn Dog", which I have to admit is a little amusing.

My dad grew up around German Shepherds, and when they ate something stupid, he just waited it out.  They are big enough dogs that things probably wouldn't get "hung up" inside them.  Unfortunately, that's not usually the way it works with an English Bulldog.  In case you can't tell by looking, bullies aren't put together like most other dogs, and things tend to go wrong in these creatures whenever the opportunity arises.  Like when they swallow corn cobs.  With nails in it.  You know, the regular stuff.

Fearing the worst, I called my aunt's veterinary practice and spoke to the vet on duty.  She told me what I expected to hear-- that I had to take Buddy to the emergency vet hospital to have the "foreign object" removed.  Pretty sure this was a Fourth of July Buddy won't want to remember.  (And he probably won't remember anyway, since he was most likely cracked out on pain killers all day while recovering from his gastro surgery.)

If you look closely, you can see the hazy outline of the corn cob, too. :/

When I returned from dropping off Buddy at the emergency vet hospital (that even sounds pricey, doesn't it?), Princess and Birdie were waiting and a bit worried.  I told the girls that Buddy may come home with a few (dozen) stitches in a day or two, but that ultimately he'd be fine.  I also told them that they needed to start deciding which one of the two of them is going to go to college and which one will be resigned to the life of a long-haul trucker or Waffle House grill master.  They may as well start thinking about it now, since Buddy ate half of the college fund.  I suggested maybe they should rochambeau to decide-- it is a hard decision to be making at eight years-old, after all.  Unless, perhaps they can find a college or university that will take one "slightly used" bulldog as a tuition payment?  Either way, Buddy has swallowed up any chance they had to go to an Ivy League school.  Good thing he's cute!  Damn dog.


After having to pay to have the gold-plated corn cob handle and diamond-encrusted mini corn cob removed from my Buddy's belly, I am truly considering a bulldog-sized hamster ball to protect my Buddy from himself!  (Imagine Rhino, from the movie Bolt, only much, much bigger.)  Laugh all you want!  It couldn't possibly look any more ridiculous than the Cone of Shame does.