The Ruffles Report

Excuses, excuses, I am full of excuses. But this time it is a good one.

For the past 3 weeks or so I have found it difficult to breath. Not just after a good run chasing birds but even when I am just lounging (which we all know I love to do). I do not believe I am that out of shape that I should get winded walking from my food bowl to the couch but there you have it. I wheeze and whistle when I breathe. My two-legs thought it was funny at first. Chalked it up to my getting older and being out of shape. Then I started hacking when I got excited. I never coughed up anything, just clearing my throat I suppose; however, it started to get less funny for my two-legs. Then, on Saturday, it got even less funny, I began to cough little specks of blood.

I am very upset. I am going to jump.

My two-legs and the skirted-one took me over the Animal Wellness Center on Main. They recommended I go to the Pet Medical Center to get some X-Rays. Little-big-bro was left at home for all this. He missed out on the fun.

I did not like it there. First off, there was a non-dog 4-legs just hanging out in the lobby. My two-legs went over and had the nerve to pet her! I got so upset that I promptly hacked and coughed blood on their floor. They then proceeded to whisk me into a little room. I guess they do not like it when you get your fluids on the middle of their lobby floor.

In the tiny room my two-legs proceeded to perch me on top of the little metal table suspended a good 4 or so feet off the floor. I did my best to claw my way back on to my two-legs but neither he nor the skirted one would let me down.

I went through the normal exam. Weight. Thermometer (not in my mouth). And then prodding by the V-E-T. She said my breathing was not normal. (She also said I seemed a bit skinny, suck on that two-legs and feed me more dinner!) Next on the agenda was X-rays. My two-legs was not invited to join us. Frankly I blacked out once I left the room. When I awoke I was in a cage, yelling. I do not like cages. I especially do not like them when I can see my two-legs standing 6 feet away looking at pictures of my innards. I was not a good dog.

They drew some blood (again I had blacked out at this point as my two-legs and the skirted one had left me alone in a cage) and soon I was back in the arms of my master.

Tests are currently being run. Word on the street is I have largish specks in my lungs. It could either be fungus or cancer. I am rooting for fungus as I do not think I will look good bald.

I should know more this week and will keep you posted. And in case you missed it, I posted another one of my back dated posts. I can’t believe in another 3 months I will have been here a year!

My humblest apologies for the lack of updates. But I have a great excuse… and pictures to boot!

I used to get spoiled before I lived with my two-legs. I could anything I wanted. But now I have to scrounge. I only get his hand me downs. Take my computer for instance. You would think a hip young pup like myself would be rocking a MacBook Air or something. I do have an Apple computer, I suppose I should be happy about that. But being forced to this this jury-rigged computer is just sad:

A beatup PowerBook G4. My window to the world

My two-legs has had this since before I even existed. Both of the hinges have broken off so the screen just flops around like a dead fish. He “fixed” it by adding decorative string and gaffers tape to hold the screen up. Classy eh?

What’s more, his rigging put serious stress on the screen power cords. Now, every few minutes the screen shuts off. I then have to close the lid and reopen it, hoping it will come back on. If not, I close and reopen. Repeat ad nauseum. I think the power brick cord has a short in it… I keep burning my little paws.

Ugh! Forced to use inferior products.

So I have been pouting, and dealing. You have no idea how long it takes to get stuff done when you have to constantly open and close your laptop, are only surfing the Internet with Wireless B speeds, and have to download photos with a USB 1.1 speed port. Slooooooooow let me tell you.

I have a new system in place though. I just log on to my two-legs nice computer when he is at work. Ha! Suck on that two-legs.

Stay tuned for more of TheRufflesReport!

My two-legs leaves me alone for a week for big-little-bro and the skirted one. He comes home, things are great. We have a nice weekend together, life seems good.

Last week, he might as well have been out of town. I never saw him. He would leave the house early, the skirted one would still be sleeping, I would be nestled in my little bed. He would just get up, shower, and walk out. We were all still asleep. Sometimes he would not even pet me goodbye. How rude!

I would have to sit at home all day, napping and dealing with big-little-bro. He would stumble in with the skirted one at 2000 or 2100. Then we would take a quick jaunt around the block. Then he would go back to bed. Is that lame or what? If I was lucky he would pet me for 20 or 30 minutes before going to sleep, but those days were few and far between.

On the weekend, which is supposed to be our time, he mostly just slept. No 4-legs park. No long walks. No nothing.

Yesterday he was all grumpy because a hard drive of his failed. I do not care if lost tons of data. I want to go for a long walk dammit! (He apparently had most of it backed up somewhere, but not everything. Always backup your data, and never buy Maxtor drives.)

Today he left early again. I can only hope this trend does not continue. I am in dire need of attention.

Two-legs ran the sucky thing again. If only I knew what it was maybe I wouldn’t have to bark at it all of the time. He just pushes it back and forth, back and forth. And if it gets close to me… you’d better believe I’m going to nip at it. After all, I’m only canine.

After the stress of that wore off, I slept on my chair. All day.