Con-Artists

yesterday the boys and i hung out with my parents' at their house and finally headed home about 4:30. after a quick stop at the grocery store where the boys became racecar drivers in the two-seater racecar buggy, we headed home. by the way, it cracks me up how the littlest things like riding in the racecar buggy can make two little boys so happy! and let me tell you, it's work trying to steer those things in the store. it took everything i had not to run into anyone or anything! on the way home, of course, doodlebug dozed off in the car. for those of you who don't know, this child does not nap and has not napped since shortly after turning 2. he's got his mama's genes...i don't nap either. but most of the time if we ride in the car in the late afternoon he'll doze off. this is great until we get home and i have to wake up him to get him out of the car. this never goes well. most of the time he gets mad about being woken up and starts crying...and never stops.

well, this happened yesterday. we get home, i pull him out of the car and go inside and he just lays on the kitchen floor and cries for at least 10 minutes. i keep asking him what's wrong and get no response. i finally pick him up and sit on the couch with him trying to calm him down. when he's finally calm he says, "my throat hurts". i didn't understand him the first 3 times he said it. finally, i figured out what he was saying. so i asked him when it started hurting. was it while at nana's house? no. was it hurting in the car? no. was it hurting at the grocery store? no. well, when did it start hurting? just now. i said, well, it's probably b/c you were laying in the floor screaming for 10 minutes when we got home b/c i woke you up. he just looked at me. he said he was hungry so i offered him spaghetti-o's (yes, i know, not the healthiest meal in the world, but he loves them and so did i as a kid...still do!) and he was game. he wolfed down the entire can of spaghetti-o's in about 10 seconds. it was as if i never fed the child today. when he finished, i asked him if his throat was still hurting? he said, no, i'm fine! i'm thinking, what? two seconds ago you were crying and saying your throat hurt. i never knew spaghetti-o's had such healing power! i think i was conned by my 3-year-old, but i can't prove it. oh well.

then, on top of all this drama with doodle, i notice when we got home that casey, our 11 year old black lab/mix, is hobbling around on 3 legs and holding one up as if injured. my first thought is, great...how much is this going to cost us at the vet? then i just felt sorry for her b/c she really was pitiful hobbling around like that with this sad, sullen, Eeyore kind of look on her face. i kept touching her leg and paw to see if i could figure out what she had done (she was home all day by herself inside, how bad could she really have injured herself, right?). she never yelped or anything when i touched her so i thought, well, we'll just keep an eye on her and see how she is tomorrow. she hobbled around all night and i kept thinking, we're going to end up at the vet, aren't we? of course, with all this hobbling around she was getting lots of attention from us...more than usual (usually we're shooing her off b/c she hangs around the dinner table like a vulture waiting for the boys to drop food in the floor...she drives me nuts!!).

well, lo and behold, i get up this morning and come down to let casey out to potty and she comes racing through the house on all four legs to get to the back door. she was miraculously healed! i think i was conned...again...by my old dog.