July 29 – “Zombie dog”

We had an unusual doggie issue the other day.  When we were baby-sitting the boys one of them went into the laundry room to get a root beer for some root beer floats, always a crowd favorite around here after lunch or dinner.  He returned with some frightening news.  “Something is wrong with Fritz’s eye.”  Josiah, of course, made his way over to see for himself.  He came back into the kitchen declaring, “He’s turning into a zombie dog!”  obviously something was wrong, so I went to see what they were talking about.  And sure enough, he did look like a zombie dog.  One of his eyes was bulging almost out of his head.  It looked like he was returning to the roots of one of his parents (he has Boston bull terrier in his genes).  It was also covered in a white-ish yellow gunk that was seeping out.  Very gross, very zombie-like. 

We immediately called the vet to get in to have him checked out.  And their answering machine came on telling us to call back during regular business hours.  Well, that was odd, since it was 11:50 in the morning when we made the call.  And that had never happened to us before in all the years we have used that clinic.  We tried a few more times with the same results, so we decided that maybe they were having a staff lunch together or something.  We called when Kel and his crew left we asked them to see if they could tell anything when they drove past, but all they could see was a few cars in the parking lot.  At 2:00 we finally just loaded up Fritz into the car and drove over to the office.  And there in the window was a notice that they would be in a staff meeting until 2:30.  Of course.  Rather than sit in the parking lot for 30 minutes we just went home and waited. 

Chris finally made contact with someone around 3, and they made us an appointment for the next day at 1:30.  Again, very unusual for this vet clinic.  We have always been able to get in right away when there has been an issue.  Then about an hour later, someone called us back apologizing and saying we couldn’t have the 1:30 appointment.  Seems the “corporate office” didn’t realize that the doctor would be treating a horse at that time.  We could have a 3:00, though.  We agreed, very puzzled by now at what was happening.  Since when did this local vet clinic tie in with a corporate office?  Ah, well.  Why not blame it on a nebulous corporate entity?  It works for everyone else in America.

By the time we finally got seen the next day, the swelling had almost completely subsided.  His eye was still obviously irritated, but not nearly as bad as the day before.  They did a thorough inspection, and all Fritz wanted was a handful of those treats they give out.  The best guess they had was that he had been bitten by a bee or something.  We have to give him some eye drops for the next few days and he should be fine, so good news there.

They weren’t so happy to hear about our experience with the phones, however.  I don’t know how many times the doc said “It makes me sad to hear that.”  And, I’ll talk to our office manager about that.”  Interesting that she never mentioned the corporate office., though.  Hmm …

1 Corinthians 1:27-29 says, “But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things — and the things that are not — to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him.”

Father, thank you that Fritz is doing OK.  I know you care about sparrows, so I figure you care for a certain old bee-bitten mutt who has a family that loves him.  Amen.