A Dorothy Update

My sister, Martha, and I like to quote to each other from the movie Persuasion.  And one of our favorite lines is when Mary says petulantly, “Why does everyone say I don’t care for a long walk?  I love a long walk!”  Or something to that extent.  Well now that quotation seems to apply to Miss Dorothy, since after a year and a half of, shall we say, eschewing a walk and lying flat on the city sidewalk in protest, Dorothy has discovered that she does indeed love a long walk.  And walks beautifully when she gets to go on one.

Because of the heat we haven’t been walking her daily, but when given the chance, she is more than happy to join her pack when it’s on the move.  And in case you are wondering, she still likes to find a stick and carry it about:

We’ve been giving Dorothy a daily zyrtec for her skin allergies, and it has done wonders so far on keeping her body hotspot free, and in keeping the UTI’s at bay.  She still has a rash on her head that you can see under the white fur.  I’m not sure what causes it or how to get rid of it (the only thing that has made it go away previously is antibiotics).  It doesn’t seem to bother her very much—she doesn’t scratch at it or anything.  You can just see that she has what look like bug bites up close.  And maybe they are mosquito bites?  It is possible.

The other issue she has at the moment is that her nose is all light brown and scabby.  When we googled it we found that it could be an allergic sun reaction?  I don’t know if that is right or not.  At any rate we got some Snout Soother and have tried to apply it, but Sean has to do it stealthily via “drive by” application, otherwise she freaks out if she sees it coming.  Has anyone else has similar issues with bulldogges?

Dorothy is also a somewhat picky eater.  We feed her Natural Balance venison, but she doesn’t love it.  We put a little of the wet food on top and she will eat that, but she often will leave the kibble in her bowl.  Frequently she isn’t eating her kibble because she ate grass in the yard and her stomach is upset, but I have no idea how to prevent that from happening, other than by not letting her go in the yard, which seems severe.  We keep hoping that she’ll learn to associate the grass eating with the upset stomach, but I’m afraid that is but a pipe dream.  So anyway, Dorothy is a little skinny at the moment (the only member of the family with that particular problem, ahem).  She’s about fifty pounds, but is a little bit ribsy-looking.  I think we need to fatten her up a bit.

Dorothy thinking, I’ll eat anything off the barbie.