Oh CRAP!!!

So, on Tuesday my friend Rudy and I were running errands and one of our stops was PetSmart because that's where I get my cat food. While we were there I noticed that they had bacon and cheese flavored beggin' strips on sale and I though, "what the heck! He loves cheese, I bet he'll love the cheese + bacon flavor!" So I picked up a bag. When we got Buster he came with a bag of California naturals food it's actually herring and sweet potato flavored. Now I looked at PetSmart and couldn't find this food there so I assumed it was going to be like a Whole Foods kind of dog food that would be way expensive, knowing that we could probably find him a different kind of dog food that was more in our price range, we decided to change his food. He also has very, very dry skin that leaves him itching a lot so we tried a few different things and came up with a combo that was working pretty well. 1 cup Purina Beneful (much cheaper but still good for his coat!) 1 cup the California Naturals (just until it's gone) 1/4 can of chicken and rice wet food and 1 tablespoon of olive oil (for his coat!).

So, with all this in mind, when we bought his first dog treats I got him all natural treats with wheat, carrots, chicken, cranberries and peas and they actually smell like apples. It's kind of weird but he's been eating them for a few weeks now and likes them. So when I saw the bacon flavored beggin' strips I thought Buster would be thrilled! I brought them home and tried to give him one. He sat down and then I held it in front of his nose, he sniffed it a few times and then just stared at me. Gage took the treat from my hand and kind of half shoved it in Buster's mouth and still he wouldn't take it. I kind of laughed and got out one of his apple scented treats and held that out to him, he took it quickly and went into the living room. This caused me to send out the following text: So...um....our dog....there's something wrong with hiim... I mean I've never even heard of something like this before....he doesn't like bacon!!!!!

I got varied responses ranging from 'WTF!!!' to 'you have a defective dog' and it was all good. When Eric came home he didn't believe me about the bacon so he attempted to give Buster a bacon flavored treat, this time though, Buster must have had a change of heart because after a minutes hesitation he carried the bacon into the living room and laid it on the floor, then after another minute he ate the treat. So at this point, we're thinking, "maybe he's just never had that before?!?!" who knows.

Well, I know you guys have been wondering about the title and where this whole post is going and here's the wonderful piece of wisdom I acquired and am passing on to you, "if your brand new dog lives on a very healthy, fruit/vegetable and lean protein diet and he is hesitant to eat something that is flavored with bacon, it's his way of telling you that it's not that he doesn't LIKE bacon, it's that bacon doesn't necessarily sit well in his stomach"

That's right y'all.....EXPLOSIVE DIARRHEA!!!!

I cleaned up so much poop yesterday it's ridiculous because along with this discovery, Buster decided to really break out of his box and show me some new things yesterday.

1) although he will stay in the living room (which has laminate flooring and an area rug that's ours as in, we won't have to pay the landlord if it gets stained) all night long, just fine, but if I leave for 45 minutes to take the kids to school and Buster has diarrhea he will jump the gate and run up the stairs so that he can poop on the carpet in the hallway.

2) apparently he can't go diarrhea outside because he's embarrassed about the farting noises that he makes so he will wait until you're done walking him outside and then jump the gate and run upstairs and poop on the carpet in the hallway.

3) also, did I mention that when Buster poops on the carpet in the hallway that my cats have to retaliate-poop so they can still claim the upstairs hallway as their territory? Well, they do.

I took him outside to poop so many times last night it was ridiculous but then, I went from being frustrated to really feeling bad that he'd eaten the treat at all, I felt almost like I DID THIS TO HIM, much like I imagine a mom feels when they give their child peanut butter only to have to rush them to the hospital because of an allergic reaction. Even though there was no way of knowing that this would happen I just am sad that it did.

We had a long, long talk with the kids this morning about not feeding anything to Buster with out express written consent, ever, for any reason. I'm tucking this one in the archives as a live and learn kind of situation and I have to say that now with Gage sleeping on the couch on one side of me and Buster sleeping in the recliner on the other side of me that I'm pretty happy that it all seems to be out of his system, so to speak, and that we're not too much worse for wear. Buster still seems to love us even though we poisoned his asshole.

Now, who wants an almost full bag of cheese and bacon flavored beggin' strips?