Foxy Foot

The canine saga continues. Although this time it is Mother Nature who sucks and not Rudy. I can honestly say that Rudy has been a champ this past week with his manners and his attitude has improved greatly since his precious tennis ball was removed from the premises. So... why does Mother Nature suck? Foxtails. That's why. California also sucks for having like 90 zillion of them covering it's landscape. We have reached the time of the year when these prolific grasses have dried out and have gone to seed so the ground is literally covered with them. For those of you east of the Mississippi who don't know what a foxtail is....

It's a type of barley grass that has a seed pod that can seriously F-Up your dog. The seed pods are barbed and if they hook in to your pets coat in worst case scenarios they can work their way all the way in to the lungs, heart, cause blood infections... well, you get the idea. It's bad news. Rudy had a foxtail incident once before in Utah after we left him for the weekend at a doggie dude ranch so we could go hiking in Zion National Park (no dogs allowed on park trails.) His paw got really infected and the foxtail which had entered through the bottom of his paw ended up coming out the top. It was a seriously ouchy mess. So the other night when we noticed that Roodles was paying insane amounts of attention to his back left paw licking it and actually cramming his entire foot in his mouth and sort of chewing on it we knew what was up right away. We pinned him down and found a tiny little nasty spot in a swollen area between his paw pads where it looked like a foxtail had crept under the skin. CRAP!

Yesterday morning I called a vet up in Fort Bragg and got an appointment to bring him in to get the thing out of his paw. Meanwhile Rudy was doing the three legged dog act hopping around and not putting any weight on that back paw. To tighten up the end of this story... in a nutshell.... we went to the vet and we got his piggy little ass upon the examing table and as we all leaned in to check the paw we found nothing. No swelling, no funky business.... nada. A miraculous healing had taken place apparently on the car ride in to town. Great news! But a stupid sort of moment for us as we stood there like idiots with our perfectly fit and trim dog on the table. So yeah... we found out Rudy weighs 20 pounds and got confirmation on the fact that "he is really a cute little dog" as we paid our bill at the front desk. Ahhhh well. Better safe than sorry.

On the way home we stopped off at Jug Handle and let old foxy foot have some fun for being a good boy at the vet. And we let our brains shut off for an hour and just soaked in the beauty of the rocky beach. It was a really pretty day yesterday. Here are some shots I took while out there...

Rudy in exploration mode... he's a brave little bugger.

This is my absolute favorite shot from yesterday. The dichotomy of it is so cool. It looks like a surreal painting to me somehow. Rudy is caught in the corner in dark shadow on the craggy rocks with turbulent waters surrounding him while Billy is laying back completely at ease out on a big sun soaked boulder...it's a yin and yang sort of thing... see what I mean? You will probably have to click through on the pic to be able to spot Billy in the distance.

Billy and his Magical Seaweed Lasso.....

Close up of the magical seaweed lasso stuff.....

We call this "The Stink Roll."

Chasing sea birds along the shoreline...

And as always.... the boys share a deep philosophical moment on the edge of the vast Pacific Ocean.