I mentioned a few posts ago that we had to say goodbye to our beloved little hard luck case Zuzu this summer. I’m understating that, acting like it was no big deal. I can tell you that it was absolutely devastating, that I can barely think about her without missing her so hard and painfully that I burst into tears, and it still can’t encompass how terrible it has been.
Our other pets, Aveline and Jincy, are also impacted by our family’s loss. Avi has been basically depressed — and I’m not projecting that, she refused to play for months. To complicate things, we moved across the country, which meant she had to go in a plane and live in a climate that is basically hostile to brachiocephalic dogs, so she couldn’t leave the house for weeks and weeks. And while she now has a walled yard to claim as her own, it doesn’t have grass, so it’s basically a walled yard of gravel, which is just weird to her. And quite frankly, us too.
As such, we have been giving her a lot of indulgences. Probably too many.
We established with a new vet her in Las Vegas in September, at which point she was weighed and assessed and generally granted approval. She was a little “pound positive” for her frame, but we figured that she was always trending on the heavy size due to all the additional treats she got just being near Zuzu, who frequently got to eat peanut butter as part of her seizure management protocol — Avi was happy to also eat peanut butter at that time and basically for any reason, thank you very much.
However, she managed to sprain her elbow last week jumping off the wrong side of a recliner, so I took her into the vet and she had gained over a pound in just six weeks. For you or me, that’s like gaining 20 pounds in 6 weeks.
Apparently food is love in our house. And thinking back, I did definitely order an entire CASE of “nom food” for Jincy, which normally I never do, but I had rationalized it that it was wet and she needed more hydration. And of course, Avi got more treats too, and apparently she eats her grief just like any red blooded American dog.
Someone is now on a diet. As such, we had to find another way to indulge the dog, which is one of the ways that we deal with OUR grief.
Enter Truly Giant Bear.
Our living room now looks like a budget day care facility. But the dog is thrilled to finally have a worthy opponent for her Ninja Attack Throwdowns, which frequently occur in the living room while we are trying to watch old episodes of The Great Australian Bake Off.
TGB is large, TGB is in charge, TGB is best of all completely gluten-free and zero calories.
Lest you think that Avi is the only pampered pet in our Las Vegas household — Jincy also has been indulged. She used to have a fabric play tube from IKEA when she was a kitten that she used and abused with frequency — it had the added benefit of terrifying the pug, who is inexplicably terrified of crinkly bags. However, over the years, the play tube lost its ability to stand on its own and frequently got shoved under tables and trapped shut. However, the New Improved IKEA tube is twice as big (and cost twice as much) and has some kind of support that keeps it always standing proud.
We’ve stowed the tube on the other side of the couch, however, so that on one side of the living room, TGB is taking many forms of pug-related abuse, while on the other side of the couch, there lurks a dangerous Tube Cat ready to inflict Maximum Impact upon any unsuspecting villains, squirrels or feathers on a string that happen to walk past the various openings.
All in all, we’ve spent less than $40 on indulging the pets and have enjoyed a fantastic return on investment. Sometimes when life throws a big pile of shit at you, you cobble together some kind of reaction plan and hope it’s enough to hold you all together. Sometimes, if you’re lucky, you can still get by.
