My Week With Ziggy

It's taken me nearly 2 months to recover to the point where I feel like I can write about My Week With Ziggy (sorry about this, Mom :P). Ziggy is my parents' German Short-haired Pointer, who is now a year old but still entirely an insane puppy (apparently they stay puppies for life.. oh ... fun!).  He is basically the most adorable dog in the world, but I'm pretty sure he's had it in for me since day 1.

Day 1

Whether he was chewing on my neck (or hands, or clothes, or toes), scratching my legs into a hives factory or trying to drink out of my water glass, Ziggy has been a tiny devil through and through.  Of course, puppies are made to be sooooo cute so you can never stay mad at them for long.  And sleepy Ziggy with his long wonderful silky ears is just about the cutest, snuggliest thing that exists.  When my mom asked if Jeff and I could puppysit while she and my dad jetted off to Cuba for a week I said sure.  I dogsit my coworker Laura's dog pretty frequently and like the excuse to get outside walking (what I look forward to most when we get a dog - our dog-adoption date is now pushed back to approximately 2017 if anyone's wondering :P).  So, armed with an extra large crate, treats, toys, food and a leash, we were ready for Our Week with Ziggy.  Sunday started off great!  Walking Ziggy through the forest was truly lovely - he found two other GSPs (what these guys are called in the dog slang world.. which may only consist of my mom) to play with, and the three dogs flew through the forest.



Hike at Starky's Hill (note airborne GSP just to my left)

 I remember walking Rusty-the-puppy and how good it felt when he ran and really tired himself out - you knew he'd sleep great later!  Ziggy probably covered at least 15 kms on that 4 km hike.  Jeff and I crated him that afternoon, went out shopping for fireplace tiles, came home and let him out of his crate.  Or, he exploded out of his crate.  Apparently the 1+ hour hike through the forest had done nothing to quell his energy.  This was an omen of things to come.

Then Ziggy started crying.  If at any time he was not being petted, cuddled, played with, or laying on top of you on the couch he was crying.  If you left him alone in the backyard, he was crying.  If you were out of his sight he was crying.  This became slightly difficult.  I worked from home that Monday to ease his apparent abandonment issues.  Ziggy also worked that day.. and admirable effort of standing beside my desk, staring at me, and crying.  I said to Jeff at the end of the day "I don't know what to do.  I can't make him stop crying."  Jeff let Ziggy lay on his lap on the couch for three hours that night just to keep him happy and quiet.  I began to feel a small pit of dread form in my stomach for what this week had in store for us.

Ziggy does not walk well on a leash.  My mom said "he's great off leash!  just take him where he can be offleash! *quiet voice* not so good on leash".  I'm surrounded by country roads, subdivisions, more roads and major roads.  There was to be no offleash.  But this crying dog needed to expend energy.  I got into the habit of driving him to different walking trails all over Guelph just so he could be offleash and run like his maniacal self.  Ziggy and I were most in tune during those walks, enjoying the last bits of fall outdoors and getting our exercise on.  He would of course cry for the entire car ride there; a cry which rose to a loud cresendo as he sensed we were nearing our destination (or when he was wrong and we were just at a stop sign).  He'd cry as we neared home, so I'd let him out of the car into the garage.  He'd cry in the garage to go into the house.  I'd let him in the house where he would stare at me and cry.  At one point I said "I just took you for an hour walk!  What do you want from me?!"  His reply?  A long low cry.  ZIGGY!!!!!

Tuesday I crated him and went to work.  At lunch we played an intense game of keepaway in the backyard.  I was exhausted after 20 minutes.  Ziggy was barely out of breath. 

Walking him on leash was an adventure in itself.  I kept thinking rollerblades would have been ideal.  Ziggy and Jeff ran a couple of times together in the morning.  Jeff ran while Ziggy gracefully cantered, a light jog for him, no more.  The Tuesday night with the freezing rain was a slippery adventure, half walk/half dog-skiing.  Our hair, coats and thighs were coated with solid ice when we got home.  Ziggy was fine!  Warm as anything, and just shook off a bit of water.  Then looked at up me.  And cried.

Tuesday after work I FINALLY, FINALLY got Ziggy to go into the backyard by himself and amuse himself with the various smells from the farm behind us (cows, chickens, mice, cats, etc.) and the wonders of our backyard (.....).  After 20 minutes of no crying, I started to feel worried.  I tiptoed up to our bedroom window which overlooks the backyard and gently pulled up the blind.  His superhero senses heard me, and he looked up - right into my eyes - and I looked at him - right into his mouth - where the tail of a mouse was hanging out.  Oh dear god.  I raced downstairs, threw on my boots and rushed into the backyard screaming "drop it! drop it!". Personally I didn't want to see what "mouse" looked like coming out Ziggy's other end.  Ziggy of course thought it was time for another game of keepaway, so another 10 minutes ensued of this (only this time I wasn't saying "I'm gonna getcha ya little fella!", but "I'm going to f*&!*ing kill you, you crazy moron!" - nice soundtrack for our backyard neighbour Farmer Joe to hear!).  I finally lured him to the top of the deck with a cookie and got him to drop the poor, dead... chewed (I'm sorry).. creature.  Which I then got to pick up with a plastic bag and dispose of. *shudder*

Wednesday at lunch Ziggy miraculously stayed outside for 20 minutes while I ate my lunch in peace without a long licking tongue propelling towards me with every bite.  Very nice!  Good Ziggy!

Wednesday after work, Ziggy and I were walking along the Speed River trail in the north end of Guelph when I noticed he wasn't looping back to me like he usually did every 30 seconds.  Rounding a corner I saw him ahead of me, mowing down on a pile of food and garbage.  I ran towards him, yelling no - once again, full eye contact while he continued to eat popcorn, orange peels, and to my horror, a plastic bottle cap.  I actually got him to drop it for a second, but he picked it up again and as I reached into his gross mouth to grab it.. gulp.. it was gone.  I put in calls to my vet friends, friends of vets, boyfriends of vets and received some advice about "waiting it out", or "inducing vomiting" (sounds like a fun afterschool activity).  After googling for awhile about "intestinal blockages" and reading a few horror stories from pet owners, I decided I just couldn't live with it if this stupid bottle cap got stuck and ended up costing money in surgery, or worse putting his crying life in danger. It was time for a trip to the vet's for some barium-induced vomiting - fun.   Ziggy terrorized the vet's office, jumping on the counter, on the receptionist, on the vet, on me, on a chair, on a child and worst of all on a bereaved couple just leaving the room where their dog had obviously just been put down. I was embarassed and of course, crying (Ziggy-style) because I felt bad for having not been there to get him away from the bottle cap in time, bad for what he was going to have to go through, and in terror of the bill that was surely to follow.

The vet and his assistant took Ziggy away and brought him back within about 10 minutes.  The assistant said "he's .. umm.. wiggly.  Has he been exercised today?" "Yes, we just got back from an hour hike where he ran full speed for 3x the distance I went." "Oh.  Wow...".  Yes.  I know. Thanks.  The vet then told me Ziggy threw up a full three times - a lot, he was surprised.  With the bottle cap emerged some other interesting items, including what looked like an entire bag of carrots, banana peels, something resembling seaweed and a melange of other rotten fruits and vegetables.  Oh no.  An ominous voice in my head said: "THE COMPOSTER". Which I then repeated to the vet: "THE COMPOSTER". The dog got into the backyard composter when he was being "miraculously well behaved" in the backyard at lunch.  How does one even break into a locked composter?!?!  The vet said, helpfully, "he probably would have thrown up anyways today with all that in his stomach".  Then presented me with a bill for a $250 worth of medically induced barf.  Awesome.

Ziggy took me for a few more walks, did some more crying (to the point where Jeff and I just started crying back at him to alleviate our tiredness of listening to it - he just looked at us like we were bat sh*t crazy.. as anyone would have done I imagine, then went back to crying), and sometimes would fall asleep on the couch and be a perfect, content, sleepy angel.  Sometimes I would be so tired of the deafening squeals that I'd pull him onto the couch in my lap and pet him and say things in a soothing voice like "shut up" "yes" "aren't you nice when you're quiet" "you're driving Kristyn crazy".  Every single day that week I got an average of 5 hours of sleep at night, because I had to take over some morning walks and Ziggy tends to make grunting noises in his sleep, hence the nickname "Ziggy the Piggy", waking me up hourly. I was extremely tense all week, and stressing about not sleeping, which was leading to less sleep. I would sit at my desk like a zombie in the morning at 7:30 a.m., prompting sympathetic looks from my coworker John who I NEVER beat into the office (but did every day THAT week!), then roll home, try to nap (just 20 mins.. please just 20 mins!) to a cacophony of crying and then just give up and ask Ziggy helplessly "what do you WANT from me!?".  (answer: more crying).  I also caught him tearing a chew toy to shreds and found him chewing on the tiny plastic squeaker.  Which I promptly grabbed out of his jaw and threw in the bathroom garbage and closed the bathroom door because, really, one could go broke on vet barf bills (though, quick shout out to my parents who footed the bill for the vet and gave us a generous gift for looking after him all week!).

Friday afternoon it was time to bid farewell to our furry friend.  I took a half day from work and took him for one last walk on that gorgeously sunny afternoon before we headed back to Stouffville to greet my parents who were arriving home that day.  I let him off leash on the conservation trails down the street from us so he would be tired for the car ride (ha.. ha ha).  When we neared the retention pond where the mallards hang out, Ziggy took one look at them and decided for the first time in his life he was going to go swimming, and catch me a duck.  For the first time all week he listened to my screams of "ZIGGY! NOOOOO!!" and actually came out of the water before reaching the terrified, squawking ducks, perhaps because he remembered he doesn't swim, or perhaps due to the exact pitch of my voice (exasperation meets desperation meets terror meets duck lover).  He was back on the leash for the rest of that walk home. 

Then I loaded up the car (while he cried/screamed, certain I was going to abandon him too); put his favourite toys in the backseat and headed out down Highway 24 en route to my parents'.  Ziggy decided to cap off our last bit of time together that week by crying at a higher, more intense, more insistent pitch than I'd heard for the entire week.  I pulled over twice to make sure he hadn't caught his ear in the window (why else would he be crying that loudly!?), or lost a toy.. or a limb.. what could be wrong?!  Nothing was wrong.  Ziggy just wanted to cry.  Loud music drowned out the crying to some degree.  I did some experiments with classical music, rock music, loud music, quiet music.  Conclusion: no effect.  My mom texted their plane had landed.  Not having been able to contact them all week I immediately called and asked if this crying was normal. Her answer: "oh my goodness, is that ZIGGY making that noise?!"  She told me he should stop.  45 minutes later on Highway 9 he hadn't stopped.  10 minutes later I began to sob.  Uncontrollable tears of the overtired brain who was in the throes of noise-torture (that must be a thing).1.5 hours later we were at my parents' place.. that was quite the car ride.

I spent that night at my parents..........Ziggy didn't cry once.  My parents' barely believed my stories - "Ziggy doesn't cry!".  I asked my dad the next morning "what's wrong with Ziggy? he's so quiet" and he answered "umm.. this is just what he's like."  I kept looking suspiciously at Ziggy who would only wag his tail and gaze with a goofy doggy grin back at me.. but I swear there was a glint in his eye...

In our drafty bathroom at the office that I sit across from, the wind whistles through a certain vent making a high pitched screaming noise.  For 3 weeks after taking Ziggy home, I cringed whenever I heard this noise and found myself looking around for a certain freckled, grunting, mouse-eating, compost-loving, mischevious little dog.  Oh Ziggy.....