Friday, September 24, 2010

Just a reminder, there is less than a week left to enter the raffle for the painting above of Sol that benefits the Sol Sunshine Memorial Fund.
Complete raffle details, along with how to enter can be found here.
If you have purchased a raffle ticket and have not received your raffle numbers from me yet, please leave a comment below.
Have a great weekend!
Thursday, September 23, 2010

If Henry's super power is using his height to peer on table tops, Benny's is his ability to tame any pillow pile and arrange the pillows for maximum comfort.
Wednesday, September 22, 2010

As far as pugs go, Henry is longer and taller than most. At the very least, he has the distinction of being the biggest of his pack. Sometimes his size doesn't work to his advantage, but to Benjamin and Luna Henry's size gives him a super power. He can stand on his hind legs and see on to the table!
Henry seems to understand that this indeed a super power because he does not wield it very often. Instead he reserves it for extreme cases. Like when pugkin bread or noodles are just hanging out on the table. He is smart enough to know that if he used his power to peer on to the table too often, it would mean trouble. He keeps it cute by using his power only when some of his favorite things are in need of rescuing.
Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Looking forward to your captions in the comments.
Monday, September 20, 2010
Over the last year, I have noticed that the top of Henry's nose is very dry and has even started to crack. Concerned that it might be a sign of a more serious issue, I talked to the vet about it during Henry's last checkup. He assured me it was nothing to be worried about and gave us KeraSolv Gel. Our instructions were to apply it to his nose once daily for the first 10 days and then as needed. Today is the one week mark and I am impressed with how quickly the gel seems to be working.

Above is a before and after closeup of Henry's nose. After a few days, the dry bits of Henry's nose actually started to fall off (gross). He isn't 100% back to normal, but a lot of the buildup has started to come off and I'm sure the rest will continue to come off over the next several days.
I'm not sure if you need a prescription for the KeraSolv gel. Ours came from our vet with a prescription sticker on it with application instructions.
Friday, September 17, 2010

After Benny was done being poked and prodded on the exam table it was Henry's turn. Henry got a little fussy when they were drawing his blood, but other than that he did OK.
My main concern with Henry was his eyes. I have noticed that he is missing a lot of treats when we play our treat toss game. I know that he has the beginnings of cataracts in both of his eyes, but it is extremely early in the process.
The vet took a look and said that it looks like the cataracts are getting a bit bigger, but again it is still early. At this point we should just keep monitoring him to see if we can pick up on any type of vision changes.
Not great news, but it certainly could be worse.
The vet also checked Henry's hips and knee to checkup on his arthritis. Henry has had a bit of arthritis in his hips since he was about a year old. The arthritis has been attributed to his hip dysplasia, but we have done a pretty good job managing it. As he gets older, we do our best to keep an eye on it because the problem is certainly not going to get better as Henry ages. The arthritis might be a tad worse than last year, but all in all Henry is doing great in that department. Henry was also down a pound which I was thrilled about. Keeping Henry at a healthy weight is pretty much the only thing we can do to help his hips and arthritis.
Another small item on Henry's list was his dry nose. Henry's nose has gotten to be extremely dry and cracked. I wasn't sure if this was a sign of some other problem, so I jotted it down on my list of things to ask the vet. The vet said that all is well and that a dry nose is just a part of aging. He gave me a gel to put on his nose to help put a little moisture back into his nose and by golly does that stuff work. Henry is almost back to his puppy nose!
Thursday, September 16, 2010

At his checkup last Friday, we found out that Benny has an ear infection in his left ear. Since Benny just started shaking his head a few days before, I was expecting the diagnosis. The infection isn't too serious, so we have to flush and add some drops to his ears for the next 10 days. He is handling his new morning ear routine better than I expected so that is making things a lot easier.
Our other chief concern was his hiatal hernia which makes him have a little coughing episode anywhere from 3 to 6 times a day. We were prescribed a new medicine that works great in some dogs and not at all in others. We are trying it out for the next month to see what kind of effect it has on Benny. The first two days he was on it, he had no coughing episodes, which had me on cloud 9. However, since then he has had at least one coughing episode per day. So, they are less, but not completely gone. But, I'm not sure if we will keep him on the medicine because the main side effect is jitteriness. Benjamin is naturally hyper enough, so once the medicine got into his system he was bouncing off the walls. Although, he seems to have calmed down a bit the last few days.
With the two big items out of the way, Benny got his shots and the rest of his exam. The scar on his chest from his mast cell removal has healed wonderfully. Other than his teeth, he got a good report. His teeth don't need a cleaning now, but probably will in about 6 months. As much as we try to brush his teeth, he still needs to get cleanings. The vet attributes this to the arrangement of his teeth in his mouth. His teeth are packed in there which makes it very hard to get them cleaned. Henry is on the same tooth brushing routine as Benny and he got a stellar report on his teeth.
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