Wuff with the Smooth: The howling

Have you ever gone to the hairdresser / barber only to be informed you have nits?

Thanks be to God, I haven’t either, although I assume the feeling is similar to that which a person might enjoy when they take their dog to the groomer only to be informed said mutt has a tick.

That was the feeling I encountered last week after picking up the Waff following his wash and blow-dry.

TWO THINGS

I was inordinately (though perhaps a little irrationally) annoyed with Waffle for having fallen victim to the blood-sucking tick. Was this me lashing out in an irrational way? Most likely.

Also, I never imagined that adult life would require me to take my stupid dog for a wash and blow-dry. Times have certainly changed.

DIFFERENT THING ALTOGETHER

The day after the tick discovery was Saturday which, as you might remember, was blue-sky-ed and hot and the perfect weather for beers and a barbecue. That being the case, a barbecue had been lit and I was sitting out the back soaking up the rays with a first bottle of suds when such a kimsey got up that I knew at once something was wrong. But was something actually wrong? Or just Waffle wrong?

YET ANOTHER THING

Earlier that morning I caught Waffle eating the fluffy seeds from a willow tree (much like those which emanate from a dandelion), small drifts of which has accumulated along the kerbs at the house (see photo for evidence). I noticed Waffle trying to chow down on a small ball of nebulous seeds and promptly concluded that nothing good could come of it. That is an example of something being Waffle wrong.

BACK TO THE DIFFERENT THING ALTOGETHER

After the willow seeds fiasco, when the kimsey got up on the Saturday, I was none too enthusiastic to see what trouble Waffle had once again fallen into. Had he been bitten by another tick which had engorged itself to the size of a turnip? Or was Waffle boking out clouds of willow seeds like a hairy choo-choo train?

FINAL THING

“Dad, you better come down here!”

This summons, I did not take as a good sign. If I was a betting man I’d have put money on Waffle having tried to eat a tick which had then latched onto his tongue and started burrowing in. Dutifully but reluctantly, I set my beer down and set off down the garden to see what botheration Waffle had invented.

The first thing I noticed was that Waffle was howling – not just whinge-y howling but proper I-am-in-agony howling. He was also lying on the grass at the bottom of the garden flanked by the two little humans on their knees. And he couldn’t move.

I will tell you plainly, dear reader, despite my Waffle-shaped cynicism and constant canine misgivings, my heart sank. Such were these howls – keening, mournful and hard to bear – and the way that he was struggling to move, I finally realised that this wasn’t a fire drill situation.

By the time I made it to the Waff, his shrieks had only intensified and he was obviously favouring a hind paw. I sank onto my knees beside the two little humans, who by that stage had taken to holding onto Waffle to stop him from trying to move.

I rolled him onto his back to see if I could discern what manner of foreign blade might have cloven his hoof in two and such a howl erupted from his hairy maw that I’m surprised the windows in the house didn’t shatter.

“What the…”

Until that point, the ear-shredding yowling was intermittent but as soon as I physically touched Waffle, they became intensely continuous. He struggled to stand again and I frantically tried to hold him down, rolling him onto his back. At one point I touched his left hind leg and if I thought the previous howl was loud it was nothing compared to this new wailing. I have said before that Waffle is very vocal but this was like a staccato chittering of a bird or a Native American’s death song.

“Cha-chit-tat-tee-aaooooOOOOO!”

“There’s something in his back paw,” someone said and, as gently as I could, I held Waffle down with one hand while taking hold of the offending paw.

“Cha-chit-tat-tee-aaooooOOOOO!”

To be continued…