"Is that an electric RAZOR?"

What does the inside of a dog look like? It’s dark. Very, very dark. And by the looks of Olive’s abdominal ultrasound, like a snowy picture on a TV set. Really, it looks like what a blind person might see feeling their way around a dark room. It sure is clear why you have to be trained to read these things. Do you think that these are the same people who scour the beaches with metal detectors looking to find precious items? I guess ultrasounds are easier to read when there are no apparent serious issues, which thankfully is what Olive’s recent ultrasound revealed. There were no foreign objects although if you look very, very closely at one of the pictures, I think you might see the outline of a pheasant (just kidding.) Inflamed intestines, but nothing more. Not that that’s great, but it’s way better than many of the alternatives. I waited impatiently while my dog was being scanned like a bar code at the supermarket. I sat on the hard, cold, germ-resistant plastic chair waiting for my sweet little taupe pooch to re-appear. About two hours later, Olive is led back into the waiting area, straining on her temporary in-patient leash to get to me. The veterinary assistant hands her over to me and removes the communal leash as I place Olive’s collar around her neck and attach her worn leather training leash. Olive heads straight for the exit. “OH, C’MON OLIVE. IT COULDN’T HAVE BEEN THAT BAD. AT LEAST IT WAS AN EXTERIOR ULTRASOUND.” She turns her head and looks back at me as if to say, “OH YEAH? YOU WEREN’T EVEN THERE. THEY SHAVED ME!” Oh the indignity (or is that indognity) of it all. I actually didn’t even notice this until much later that evening when Olive was laying on her side snoring peacefully, safely away from the electric razor. They didn’t shave much. They didn’t have to. The undersides of a weim might be characterized as miles of bright pink skin. It is almost exactly the color of the Eberhard Faber Pink Pearl erasers that kids in the early 60s used to have in school. It looks like they mowed the lawn on a high setting on one side of her abdomen. Now home, Olive, completely exhausted from today’s ordeal, gobbles down her new bland dinner of boiled pasta, chicken and cottage cheese. After licking the bottom and sides of the bowl, she turns to me, oblivious to the fact that tiny white boulders of cottage cheese sit perched atop her Mt. Rushmore-like brown nose. My heart grows about four times bigger when I see this. “OLIVE. COME OVER HERE SO I CAN KISS YOU UNTIL YOUR HEAD FLIES OFF.”