Papa's Afternoon Bath

Angel is starting to look pretty shabby. He hasn't been to see the groomer in quite a while. On top of that, while he and Jackie enjoy their big backyard full of grass, bushes, trees, and places to explore, they have also encountered this Summer far more fleas than we ever had at our condo. Papa's lack of maintenance, and combined with those nasty little fleas have made for a dirty, messy, matted little furball we once knew as Angel.

Angel will see the groomer, of course, but I decided to start cleaning Papa up before he goes. The first thing I wanted to do was to give him his flea medicine. Once the fleas start biting the poor little guy, he begins scratching and biting at himself, and will even pull out his own hair. All that stops once the fleas are dead, so it was imperative that I get the medicine for him as soon as possible.

I bought some Advantage for dogs between 11 and 20 pounds on my way home from work, but when I got home I decided to give Papa a bath before I put the medicine on him. Advantage is applied to the skin of the animal, usually between the shoulder blades so that they can't lick it. It spreads out over their body, and kills the fleas and their eggs. It is really effective. I have used it on all of our pets for years and I can tell you it kills fleas dead! The only draw back is the expense. It can be very expensive, but if you buy it from 1800petmeds.com, you can get it at a reasonable price.

Papa hates baths. Or perhaps a bit more accurately, he hates the idea of a bath. Once he hears the water running in our bathtub he heads for the hills, and if I don't get him before he crawls under something large enough that I cannot get to him, then I might as well turn off the water and read War and Peace because it will be a looooong time before he comes back out again. But, if I can fool him, or distract him long enough to get a fair amount of water in the tub before he knows what's going on, then I have it made, and Angel will get his bath.

This is Papa taking his very first bath. We made it as pleasant as possible because we knew it would set the standard. The look on his face tells it all; he ain't diggin' it. But he was good about taking his bath until he got to be about a year old.

Once in the water Papa is fine. I guess he just hates getting in is all. As I gave him his bath I could see the little buggers crawling around on my poor boy's back. I knew that just a simple bath wouldn't rid him of the fleas, but I am always amazed by how tenacious they are. They were able to hold on even after I dumped an entire pitcher of water directly onto them. They also held on despite my rubbing soap into Papa's hair. I didn't waste too much time on the bath because I wanted to get the flea medicine on him so that he could find some relief, so I rinsed him off throughly and got a towel to dry him off with.

Drying off is Angel's favorite part of the bath. (Based on my experience with other dogs, I bet it is every dog's favorite part of a bath.) If I don't hold him down on the bathroom rug, and wrap him up in his towel, he takes off like a shot down the hallway, and will rub himself all over the living room carpet. I usually never give him the chance, though, because I wrap the towel around him while he is still in the tub, and then I lift him out, towel and all onto my lap. There I can get him fairly dry before he runs out of patience, and wriggles so much that he wears me out, and I am forced to put him down.

Then he zooms down the hallway like a bat out of hell, and rubs himself all over the living room carpet.

He and Jackie always get treats because daddy is a big ol' softy, and figures every time a doggy gets a bath they should also get a treat so as to make them, (or me,) feel better about the whole traumatizing event. Both dogs get a treat because you can never just give one dog a treat in front of another dog. It just isn't fair, and the treatless dog will follow you around putting a guilt trip on you that would make a Jewish mother blush until you give one up anyway. The way I figure it, you might as well give up the treat right up front, that way you won't have a little dog following you around as if you were a mother goose or something.

Angel fresh out of his bath. You can see by the look on his face that he is happier than all get out, because he just got outof the bath.

It makes absolutely no difference to him that I got a towel for him to dry off on. He likes for me to hold the towel up, and then drop it on him so that it completely covers him up. Then he can rub his face on the towel while I dry off his body with the rest of it. Then he likes to roll on the towel, but it gets away from him, so he just rolls on the carpet instead. This reminds me of how my mother used to wrap a towel around her hair when she would get out of the shower. Papa made a burrito out of himself!

Jackie helps her big brother dry off. When Angel gets a bath, Jackie is right there at the bath tub watching the whole thing. I don't know if she does it because she likes to watch him be tortured, (like a little human sister would do with her brother,) or if she is there for moral support. Probably the latter. In any case, if I close the bathroom door with her outside of the bathroom, then she will paw and scratch and whine at the door until I let her in. Papa, on the other hand, is such a big chicken about baths that he will hide while Jackie gets her's.

Well, he is sort of dried off. After his bath he and Jackie had dinner. Then, once he was almost completely dry, he got his flea meds. I have since hacked off some of the matted hair, and I will make an appointment with the groomer soon. He will look better, and he will be cooler.

So there it is, yet another exciting chapter in the lives of Jacqueline and Angel. Until next week, please stop by the Carnival of the Dogs at Mickey's Musings for more interesting dogs, and don't forget the Friday Ark at The Modulator which is just filled to the rafters with all sorts of animals.

Posted by Jeff at June 28, 2007 3:08 PM