A Milestone Reached

Girly Girl has been very busy of late. She’s been learning to walk on three legs (and run on three legs, and pee while balancing on three legs, and hop up into the car with three legs, and…well, you get the idea). She’s also been visiting a lot of doctors. Surgeons, oncologists, radiologists, family vets, emergency medical personnel, orthopedists and on and on. 

She’s filled her days with chemotherapy. Adriamycin (Doxorubicin) which can be cardio-toxic and so she has also had an echocardiogram as well as blood tests with each visit and some times in between visits. The chemo causes her side effects (this happens in only 10% of dogs-oops). So Girly Girl spends much of her time between chemo visits dealing with nausea and diarrhea. She also has a pretty extensive regimen of a special high protein diet and a long list of supplements including Traditional Chinese Medicine formulas.

When she’s not doing any of these thing her mumma has been trying to get her back to some semblance of a normal life. In addition to visits to Grammy, whom Girly Girl adores, mumma has dragged Girly Girl to greyhound meet and greets where she has reconnected with all her favorite humans in our MGPS family. She also recently went on a week long business trip with mumma to Plattsburgh. This was a trip she used to make regularly “before.” She has been handling the return to regular activity like a pro.

With such a busy calendar it almost got lost in the shuffle. Daily life dealing with the “Big C” word can suck up all your time and energy. Focusing on the minutiae of serious disease has a way of excluding everything else. So much so that you lose sight of what is really important. This is why a big milestone almost got by unnoticed and under-celebrated. You see, Girly Girl turned seven years old on Monday February 15th while we were in Plattsburgh on our business trip. In December, I wasn’t sure we’d have any more birthdays together at all. Happy Birthday my sweet girl.

Naptime of the Living Dead

Sleeping greyhounds. All cute and snuggly. Makes you want to kiss them and cuddle them right? WRONG!!

If you’ve done any homework before you bring your new bony friend home then you have read it is not a good idea to disturb any greyhound while it is sleeping. And why is that? Well, gentle reader, because most greyhounds at some point in their lives (and many at some point in their day) will sleep with their eyes open.

This is a strange phenomenon, but true. You may mistakenly believe your loving pet is hanging out watching the clouds go by when in reality he or she is grabbing 40 winks. To swoop in for a quick smooch will, in short order, leave you lipless.

Girly Girl and Blue both enjoy sleeping with their eyes open. This is a hobby that I found quite disconcerting at first. Especially when they enter REM sleep. Their eyes would be wide open and jerking all around as though each eyeball were having an epileptic fit. Throw in the occasional growl from that days dream and can’t you just see yourself snuggling up with these furry four leggers?

Girly Girl also tends to roll her eyes down into her head so that her irises almost disappear into her skull. Then her nictating lids come up to cover the little bit of the iris left showing. Result? Zombie dog. She often lets her tongue loll out of her mouth to complete the dead dog effect.

You can get any old dog who snoozes in a cute ball or sleeps curled at your feet. These dogs are boring things. Or, you can get a greyhound. Approaching your fast friend while they are on their bed or in a recumbent position anyplace is always a crapshoot. Are they or aren’t they asleep? Will you get to keep your hand if you attempt to give them a fond scratch? Or will you scare the daylights out of a sleeping hound whose eyes are open? Are you brave enough for naptime of the living dead?

The Patron Saint of Blog Writers, Frozen Food and Cardboard Boxes….

My mother and I were having a conversation not long ago about the fact that I was leaving no stone unturned in my search for intervention for Girly Girl and her osteosarcoma. This extends to pretty much every area, financial, medical, emotional, and yes, even divine. So mom mentioned that there is a patron saint for dogs and his name is Saint Roch. I was raised a nominal Catholic. I never went through catechism nor was I confirmed or any of that stuff. In fact, we weren’t what you might call “church goin’ folk.” But I have my share of religious knowledge stuffed in the dusty folds of my noggin. I did not, however, know anything of Saint Roch.

For sure, I knew of his more famous compatriot, St. Francis of Assisi.  Patron saint of animals, the environment, merchants and Catholic action (though I didn’t know about the last three patronizations). St. Francis was friend and protector of all animals and is best known in that role though his actual story is very little related to animals at all. In fact, he had very little to do with merchants or the environment. But he is always pictured standing in the woods surrounded by all manner of beasts. And the blessing of the animals is generally conducted sometime around his feast day.

So I did a little Googling on Saint Roch. He is also known about town as Saint Roque, Saint Rocco and Saint Rock. He is the patron saint of dogs, bachelors, surgeons, tile makers and the sick and invalid (um, and a few other things). Saint Roch was traveling around doing saintly things when he contracted a nasty case of leprosy. I suppose there aren’t any cases of leprosy that aren’t nasty, but there you go. In the medieval times when he lived, leprosy was not welcomed so he hid out in the forest. He was saved from starvation by a faithful dog that brought him food every day. Eventually he moved on to the city he came from and they stoned him and threw him in prison. He was attributed as having said something along the lines of, “We should all treat dogs kindly for they are worthy of it.” A bit ahead of his time, yes?

Still, you have to wonder about the whole Catholic saint system. Was Saint Roch the best they could do for the patron saint of dogs? A leprous guy who was fed by a dog in the woods and said, “Hey, dogs aren’t so bad?” In that scenario, shouldn’t the dog be the saint? Is realizing that dogs are pretty cool about 700 years before your time really enough to make you the patron saint of dogs? What did he do for the dog?

Here’s how I think this all shook out back when they were naming patron saints:


Pope: Geez, it’s really hard to become a saint. Those are some pretty stiff rules we got there, aye?

Bishop: You bet ya. And we got this long list of occupations and animals and objects needing patron saints. What’s a poor cleric to do?

Mouse in Corner: Squeak, Multi-Task, Squeak.

Pope: Hey, I believe I have just received divine inspiration. We should multi-task.

Bishop: What is “Multi-tasking?”

Pope: Never mind that. Let’s assign each saint a bunch of different occupations, animals and objects to be the patron of. Nes pas?

Bishop: Brilliant! I’ll put in your application for sainthood right away!


And so Saint Roch who once touched a dog and was sick himself became the patron saint of dogs and sick people. Of course, in the end, they had far more occupations, animals and objects than they could possibly actually relate in some fashion to the saint, so each saint ended up with a bunch of things to patronize with which he or she had absolutely no connection what-so-ever.

Still, I figure it can’t hurt to appeal to good ole Saint Roch for some divine intercession on behalf of Girly Girl. I suppose she has as much claim on him as tile makers, surgeons, invalids and bachelors (um, and a few other things). But really I think I’m also going to send an appeal up to that dog who was feeding Saint Roch in the woods. I did say I was going to leave no stone unturned. And really. I think we all know who should have been given the saintly concession.