It’s been quite a weekend here at LivingSmall. First, the gimpy dog has not recovered very well — turns out that his achilles tendon is falling apart, and his “good” leg isn’t really good enough to support his weight — it’s full of arthritis in the hock. So I think he’s having more surgery on Thursday to repair the achilles tendon, and then we’re going to have to order him some braces to support the poor arthritic hocks. With any luck, this will at least get him back on his feet and allow him to get around the yard and maybe go for short walks to the dog park etc. I’m sort of torn about all this — I’m not convinced that doing this much surgery on a dog is entirely fair to the poor little guy. He doesn’t understand why we keep hurting him, and I worry that there isn’t enough good leg to effect a proper recovery of the bad one, but there isn’t a lot of choice at this point. He can’t walk without a splint, and that tendon isn’t going to heal itself, so I guess we’ll give it a try. (Thank goodness I’m getting money back from Uncle Sam this year — I know there’s a war we should be paying for, but my contribution to gettting the economy going again is in the form of veterinary bills). But in the meantime — he chewed his foot out of the splint, and it promptly swelled up to at least twice it’s normal size, so the last 24 hours have been consumed with re-wrapping the splinted leg, then cutting him out of it when he starts mysteriously crying and chewing at it at midnight. It’s very loosely wrapped this morning as we wait for the vet’s office to open and he’s making little harrumphing sounds in the basket underneath the table so I don’t forget that he is not a happy camper.

And in the middle of all this excitement, our Raymond , my exhuberant (some might say hysterical) older dog, while on a thrilling run through the woods hunting spring bunnies and birds with his younger friend Jacques, managed to snag himself on some stick or old piece of barbed wire which left a six or seven inch long gash down his chest. So Saturday afternoon concluded with some serious doggy-first-aid. He was a very good boy and lay quite still on his back with his head in my lap as I did my best to shave his chest sufficiently that the butterfly bandages would stick. He too is waiting for the vet’s office to open this morning so he can go in and get a few stitches. He’s not even complaining about not having had breakfast.

I feel like the Clara Barton of dogs. I had a long talk with the emergency vet on call yesterday on the phone — she assured me I’d done what I could for the weekend, and that everyone would be okay until they open this morning.

And this morning we all awoke to a foot of new snow. A foot! Fluffy beautiful new snow that’s still coming down. It’s really very lovely, and although I’m growing tired of winter, the water is always welcome. And it’s very pretty — prettier than the brown dormant grass and unbudded trees that we’ve been living with these past weeks.