As I came up the steps, Lin's voice was urgent. "We need to take Biff to the vet, right away."
It was early evening and we'd been out for a bite. While we were away, Biff found and ate a small box of raisins that was in a bag, that was in another bag, that was under a stack of newspapers, that were on the kitchen table, that was surrounded by chairs (that lived in the house ... never mind - this is serious). It doesn't matter how he did it. Maybe aside from me lovingly calling him Biff the Wonder Spaniel, he also has radically major ninja skills.
Dogs (and cats) and raisins don't get along. Kidney failure.
Ten minutes later we were at Santa Barbara's CARE Hospital, grateful that the 24-hour emergency and critical care facility had reopened under new ownership just a few months earlier.
Biff spent two nights in their loving, attentive care, in a cage (he's used to hogging the bed, testing if his stubby sausage tail fits inside my nostril), front leg shaved to take the IV tube, probably wondering why his humans had misplaced him, and missing his Wi-Fi access. (I'm kidding about the Wi-Fi; his iPhone was in the shop.)
For Lin and I, it was days of worry and deep pangs of guilt. We had an ASPCA (American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals) brochure in a drawer somewhere listing all the toxic stuff our opposably-thumbed species should be more vigilant about: medicines, fertilizer, anti-freeze, cleaning products.
And plants.
Read more at Fine Gardening...
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