catching up from the weekend

Okay, so haven't posted in a few days. Rich has been away to see his parents, so trying to keep up with 2 sick dogs (baby Waldo has a GI issue) and other household goings-on have been hectic. Melanie came over for the weekend to go kayaking with my friend Kathy and Kathy's friend Rose on Saturday; Sunday afternoon was a PawSox game.

Watson did well over the weekend - no major accidents besides a few piddles here and there. I was away from home more than I have been in a few weeks but I tried to get home every 3-4 hours to let him out. We are down to 1/4 tab of Prednisone, so hopefully the frequent bathroom breaks will subside once he is totally off of it. I do hope, though, that the appetite stays. He's been eating really well throughout the chemo process so far and is even gaining weight. Sunday, I took him for a walk down the street (along his favorite route) and he seemed to have a good time. He did well on the walk although I noticed he was moving much slower than usual. It was almost like a slow shuffle for me to not get too far ahead of him.

On a related note, I was asked by Melanie to post about my "clever" trick for overnight bathroom breaks. I realized that setting an alarm in the middle of the night was totally disrupting my sleep pattern, yet Watson still needs to go out in order not to soak his bed. My solution is to chug at least 12-16 ounces of water before bed so that my bladder wakes me up, usually around 2-2:30am. As Mels pointed out, I probably sleep better since I am not nerved up about the alarm going off and this is a more natural way of waking up anyway. So when I need to get up and go, I wake up the Old Man too.

I've also devised a more natural way to get him out of bed. I bought some really stinky dried salmon strips from Paw Planet and, instead of peeling him out of bed, I wave it in front of his nose and he leaps out of bed for it. No lifting on my part, and he is quite happy to get a treat.

So sorry for posting about my bodily functions too, but Mels insisted on several occasions that it is not fair for me to post about Watson's business and not my own. Fine, I hope you are happy now. =)