Dear Reader,

When I was a pregnant lady, lo these many years ago, exactly everyone I encountered had some words of wisdom re: childbirth and child rearing, to share. Amazingly, every single one of them, including those Mothers in my own family, neglected to mention the singular most important and unpleasant documentation of my child’s health and well-being, that Rosetta Stone to the interior, the Holy Grail of Evacuation, my child’s poop. My (dare I say) absorption with this came to an abrupt and welcome end when she was old enough to evaluate her own output and graphically let me know if anything was amiss.

Why didn’t I realize I would repeat the process as parent to a four-footed furkid? At first, I ignored the fact my greyhounds would NEVER be able to analyze their own deposits (although they certainly try their best to scrutinize every other dog’s sensory signature) and act or react accordingly. I never took into account the significance their leavings would have for me nor the hours I would invest verbally dissecting dogdoo. I couldn’t foresee the concentration I would put into contemplating crap.

Naturally, in short order, circumstances dictated that I recover my hound’s effluent, seal it in an air-tight baggie, deposit the baggie in an innocuous plain brown paper bag, write “Kelvin Waddell” on the bag in an effort to disguise it as my son’s school lunch (I don’t have a son) and deliver it as quickly as possible to the vet’s office. You are all familiar, I am sure, with the apocryphal story of the brown-bagging husband who, on the way to work, dropped Fido’s specimen on the vet’s doorstep, thus unwittingly contributing to the hilarity of the vet techs who, upon opening the innocuous brown bag, found a ham and cheese sandwich, a banana and a chocolate pudding cup.

The husband's brown bag held, well, you know.

Therefore, I here take it upon myself to fill a niche, a void (oops, there I go again) if you will, in a brief dissertation into one of the more earthy aspects of the being-owned-by-a greyhound-world.

A Rose by Any Other Name
or
Scatology 101

As much as it sounds as though I will be discussing horticultural nomenclature or at the least, expounding on the delightful vocal riffs of Ms Ella Fitzgerald, I will not. This column is dedicated to my hours spent perusing poop, a brief history of a few of the specimens (ouch!) I’ve encountered and my thoughts of the “why” of it all. if I’ve left something unsaid or an area unexplored, please feel free to add your wisdom. I do not pretend to know the ins and outs (ohmigosh, another one) of the greyhound’s alimentary canal, digestive processes or emission schedules. But I have learned to tell which of my four puppers is responsible for which pile. No mean feat in my book.

The Splat, (descriptive of both audible and visual output) is almost always associated with something the dog has eaten. It could be one pig ear too many, a smidgen of wallpaper paste, the remains of a discarded apple or the road kill I couldn’t have pried out of Tess’s mouth had I been Superman. Anxiety or discomfort can cause Splats and Splats are often a normal byproduct of antibiotic treatment. I have been successful controlling the latter by adding a dollop of yogurt (with active cultures) to each meal as long as needed. Normally, gastric disturbances initiated by inappropriate ingestion pass (I did it again) on the long side of 24-48 hours. If that is not the case, the affected pupper and I are off to see the vet.

Leaving the deleterious deposits that result when any of my puppers has the Splats, whether they are in my own yard, on the sidewalk or in the street, was never an option. Removing them, however, was another story. I eventually learned a trick passed down by generations of garroulous elderly married ladies that ensures quick and complete removal of the offending substance. Here’s a hint you’ll never hear from Heloise: Any time any one of my four has the awful offal, I add one to two tablespoonsful of generic brand Metamucil and 1/3 cup of warm water to every meal. The psyllum in the Metamucil (if you are eating, save this part for later) forms a sausage casing-like sheath which allows for both “quick and complete”. All right, enough of this.

The first time I saw a Rainbow Collection specimen (take me out and shoot me!), I didn’t recognize it for what it was. It was October and the backyard was covered with multi-hued leaves, but I knew the vivid colors in one particular area were not created by Mother Nature, no sir. I had to look into this, want to or not. There was a piece of bright blue something adhering to a lump of magenta other thing both peeking out of poop that, without the odd flecks of yellow and neon green, was otherwise “normal.” Aha! That morning, Kelvin had been helping me clean out a closet where still were stored my twofoot’s playgroup materials from several years before. I had consigned the pieces of chalk, dried-out water color cubes, Play Doh chunks and crinkled construction paper to the trash bin. Obviously some part of that pile (yet again) had made it’s way into Kel’s mouth, but what? Considering the alternatives, I decided it didn’t matter and put off further examination. Rather, I called the vet’s office and asked if any of the above were toxic or dangerous if ingested. I was told that chalk would cause increased thirst and loose stools and the other items would pass through the dog, perhaps changing from a solid to a liquid on the way. Judy, the very knowledgeable vet tech, told me to expect some interestingly colored output. Relieved, I thanked her, scooped the Joseph’s Coat poop into the dooley and have not had an instance of Rainbow Collection since.

Number Five is Alive! Perhaps my worst poopmare is when in all innocence, my hand and arm shielded in a newspaper bag picker upper, I reach for the poop and… it moves! The first time it happened, I screamed. Got a lot of attention from the school bus stop, I did. I was sure what I thought had happened hadn’t really happened, so I tried it again. And it moved again. And I screamed again. Little white wiggly things that appeared to be growing before my eyes were helping it move and some were obviously considering leaving the warm but suddenly noisy haven they’d been inhabiting. Ohnoohnoohno – I had no choice but to pick it up (can you say YUCK in thirteen languages?), return home and fling the baggie into the freezer, muttering “Die! Die!” all the while. Of course it was worms, easily identified by the right people and easily rectified (for a while, at least) with the right meds. But every time it happens, the short hairs on my neck stand up, I can taste my amalgam fillings and I experience an inexplicable rage coupled with the URGE TO KILL. A real poopmare, to be sure.

I’m going to end this by telling you one of the things (other than Kelvin, Dasher, Tess, Suzi, Amy and Dick) that can produce in me almost instant euphoria, warm fuzzies and an incredible sense of well-being – Tootsie Roll Poops! Know what I mean?