Now we crawl into bed with more or less clean sheets assuming that Harley has not pushed the decorative pillows out of the way so that she can burrow her way under the covers because Offspring No. 2 has turned the air conditioner down too low for her canine comfort. There are certainly no chocolates on the pillows. Occasionally there is an empty food wrapper that one of the dogs has so kindly foraged through the trash can to find for us. The flickering lights are due to the moths, which came in with the dogs after their last trip outside for the night, flying around the lights on the bedside table. And there are no crackling noises from a peaceful fire. At best, any crackling sounds are the voices of the hosts on some late night program on HGTV. At worst, they are our old and tired bodies.
We are still going to bed at a reasonable hour and getting up at a reasonable hour; well, reasonable by summer standards but we are in a lot of trouble when school starts in a few weeks! Uninterrupted nights of sleep are just a burred memory.
Because it has been so hot here, Adidas does not like to go outside during the day. His black lab coat just soaks up the 100 plus degree heat. He has decided that he would rather frolic outside it the cooler 85 degree temperatures of 1 or 2 am. Last night, Weber got up and let the dogs out shortly after 1. By the time he made a quick trip to the bathroom, Harley was ready to come in. When he opened the door, we were overwhelmed by the smell of skunk. Harley came running in. The last time we were met with such an evening odor, she had been sprayed. This time, it was Adidas and he had been hit good! He was two steps inside and the whole house smelled of skunk! I uttered a few choice words at him, which caused Offspring No. 2, who was working on her summer reading essays that were due today, to come flying out of her room to see what all the excitement was about. As soon as she smelled Adidas, she quickly disappeared back into her room with the hope that her door would create an odor barrier.
In the meantime, I have my hands on the collar of a seriously skunked dog. The kitten, Frankie, is in the bathroom where I usually bathe the dogs so I had to take Adidas up to the guest bathroom to bathe him. (Our bathroom has a shower and I was not going to get in that confined spaced with this awful smelling dog; it also has a whirlpool tub. Yeah right!) So, I had to take the #!*+ dog upstairs, which meant that more of the house was exposed to the eau de skunk.
Tomato juice is supposed to be the neutralizer for skunk. We didn’t have any tomato juice. I don’t like tomato juice, with or without vodka! I have used Oxi-Clean on a skunked dog. In a pinch, it works. That is what I used when Harley had her encounter with the skunk. But, I remembered that we had bought a bottle of some kind of miracle solution to get the skunk smell out of Harley’s collar. (She is a princess and had a collar worthy of being worn by a princess that we did not just want to throw away.) It didn’t work on the collar; I hoped it would work on the dog!
Poor Adidas! He knew he smelled terrible. When I looked at him I could see that all he wanted was for someone to make it go away. He walked upstairs and jumped immediately into the tub. He stood there calmly while I poured Nature’s Miracle over his entire body. When he got out of the tub he did not do that dog thing that requires shaking and throwing water like a priest baptizing the crowd. The poor dog did his best to spare us from his horrible stench.
The whole house still smelled of skunk but we could not tell if it was Adidas or if it was residual odor from our romp up the stairs. After a shower and a clean nightshirt, we all went back to bed. Several times during the night I awoke to the not so faint skunk smell. By morning, I had a sore throat and a headache. Without a doubt, the honeymoon is over!
Adidas spent the day suffering from PTSD – Post Traumatic Skunk Disorder.
He didn’t really want to go back outside and his head still smells. The other animals are not too sure that they want to get near him.Finally, Adidas decided that he needed some rest to get over his PTSD.
Perhaps he will think twice about wanting to go out in the middle of the night. Night time may be cooler, but the daytime sure smells better!
