The Spinning Nail File of Doom

The hubbs and I, hardly impervious to the charm of As Seen On TV! labels, recently bought one of those spinning pet nail trimmers to use with our squirming, grooming-phobic dog. Lola was suspicious of it, but then, she's pretty much afraid of everything, so we didn't push. We put it out a couple times, like the instructions recommend, letting her sniff at it. But the second we turned the thing on, she was up the stairs and under the bed in a whirl of white fur.

So this morning, tired of her falcon-like claws tearing up my legs, arms and sofa, I sneakily got out the trimmer and coated it in peanut butter, hoping her love of snacks would outweigh her fear of the machine. She circled it a few times, then cautiously lapped all the peanut butter off. I put some more on there, and turned it on. She hesitated for a moment, then went to town on the stuff, licking the trimmer clean. The buzzing must have thrown her off though, because when all of the peanut butter was gone, she started barking like crazy. For like 10 minutes.

I get her calmed down, pick her up and *gently* grab one of her paws to trim. She lashed out with her back claws so hard, I dropped her on to the couch. She tore off like a mad woman out of the living room, and I had to seek some antiseptic help for the wounds she left on me.

Next time, I'm sending her to the groomer.

Worse than getting rained on

The Hubbs and I are parents to an adorable dog, who we admittedly treat more like a child. Her name is Lola (go ahead, you closet Fanilow, start singing, you know you want to), and other than being an affectionate, shedding ball of love, she's also petrified of water. We learned early on to send her to a groomer for baths, to take her out before rain starts to fall, and that a squirt bottle is the best weapon against bad behavior.

A few weeks ago, we took her to a dog park by our house. She ran, she frolicked, she...got peed on pretty extensively by a Great Dane.

Trust me, yellow urine really stands out on a white coat. And the stupid thing kept standing there.

We tried to hose her off in the parking lot with one of the various bottles of water I always have around (not fun) and then took her home to give her a real bath.

I'm hoping the scratches heal eventually.