I love dogs.
Everyone who spends time with me, or reads my blog, knows this. I am like the parent of a toddler, constantly snapping photographs of my puppy as if he was my first born. My children laugh at me...my husband rolls his eyes...and even the dog grows weary of the attention from time to time. But what can I say? Since my children are all but grown, he has become my newest baby. But like all babies, sometimes he smells.
Today was one of those days.
Indy was laying on the bed, in a pile of my husband's clean laundry, when my husband proclaimed that he smelled like a dog.
I tried to put things into perspective...Indy is, in fact, a dog...and therefore should smell like one. That wasn't good enough. My husband wanted Indy to have a bath.
The problem with that is this...we no longer have the spacious shower we used to have, and Indy won't fit. I tried the groomer thing a few weeks back only to regret my decision. The only solution was the self-grooming baths at the local Petco. It was cheap (only $10 no matter how big the dog) and convenient (just a few miles away). So Mike and I piled Indy into the car and headed to the Petco for a bath.
I had no idea that the "bath" would be a group event!
We checked in and were directed to the bathing area. The attendant suggested that we try putting Indy into the stainless steel tub. Mike and I just looked at each other, and then the dog, and laughed. There was no way OUR dog was going into THAT tub!
She just smiled and nodded her agreement and pointed out the shampoo and cream rinse and showed us how to adjust the water. She then said we should "hook" Indy to the tub with the attached tether to keep him in the area.
I adamently vetoed this idea, and Mike agreed. Indy would have pulled the tub from the wall. We were going to have to wash him by holding his leash and hoping he would stand still.
It certainly sounded easy enough.
It wasn't. Indy didn't want to stand still. He wanted to investigate everything in the bathing area. Lucky for me, he was familiar with the bathing process and he let us wash him without putting up a fight. Unfortunately, he stands about waist high, so when he would lean against us or shake, we got very wet. Not to mention the fact that the hose was not easy to control, so Mike got even more wet than I when I accidentally aimed it right at his shorts through Indy's legs.
Add a few more vigorous "shakes" and my cotton apron was completely soaked through.
But thank goodness for that apron. It was my only bit of intellegent forethought in planning this little outting as I was wearing white capri pants and a thin white t-shirt. I can only imagine my embarrassment if I had been forced to walk out of the petstore in my see-through whites after the bath I took inside!
All in all, Indy was a very good boy while he got his bath. It was only at the very end, after he had been thoroughly towel dried, when I tried to use the blow dryers to further dry him, that he grabbed his leash from the floor with his teeth and bolted for the back of the grooming area.
I suppose I couldn't blame him...the blowers were very loud, and strong enough to nearly blow my flip flops from my wet feet!
We gave up on the dryers and piled a damp Indy back into the car. He rode home with the most content look on his face, and spend the rest of the evening sleeping on a pile of clean blankets that I laid out on the sofa for him. He smells very nice now.
Hopefully Indy will stay clean for at least a few weeks...it may take that long for Mike's shoes to dry out!
Until the next time...I'll be leaving my flip flops out in the sun to dry!