Another Single Word That'll Bring About Crazy Things

Jack has this rash on his belly that baffles me. He started with it last week sometime. The one spot was a perfectly round circle, which looked kinda like ringworm. Except not. Mostly because the other areas were most definitely not ringworm. In my "give it time and see what happens" approach to life, I waited it out. It didn't get better.

Because of the weekend fun, I didn't have work on Monday, so thought that would be the perfect day to get Jack to the vet for the rash that didn't clear up. The vet asked if we had fleas, and I replied with, "we've not EVER had fleas, knock on wood." It was about that time he pulled out a flea comb and combed out a flea. Apparently Jack has an allergic reaction to fleas.

It's just a bad year for fleas in these parts because of the mild winter we had last year. They weren't sufficiently killed off, and are rampant this year. And now, with it getting cold again, they're finding ways to move indoors quickly. So, we have fleas. Are you itching along with me, now?

So we spent nearly a small fortune on flea meds for the pack of canine that we own. And we'll have to repeat this monthly for quite a while to rid ourselves of these little pests. And we need to get an exterminator up in here to clean the house out for us, because I, for one, don't want fleas hiding in my sofa only to reinfest my dogs at a later date.

So I called an exterminator and begged them to come nearly immediately. We have a dog due to whelp any day, and with the snow we've got, newborn puppies can't be out of the house in the weather while the house is being rid of fleas.

And then the weather hit, and the power went out, and we had no heat for 17 hours. The awesome husband insulated the house so well that even though we had no heat for the overnight, the inside temp only dropped to 66 at the lowest. It's not a big deal, really, considering that the outside was this cold.

But then the pregnant dog decided that it would be an awesome day to birth a litter. Of course. The first rule of whelping puppies is "a cold puppy is a dead puppy." Thankfully the power came back on around the time the first baby was born, which meant that heating pads were an option until the house warmed up.

So I called the exterminator back and postponed the appointment to rid the house of fleas. The dogs are all wearing Revolution for now, so that'll have to do. In the meantime, I'VE GOT BABIES.