Yes, Dad, I am Guilty

A series of emotional bombs exploded in my parents' kitchen the other night when my Dad discovered that I had not been giving his beloved Yorkshire Terrier his Trifexis heart worm/flea/parasite pill.  For six months.

Cherokee, Dad's little bundle of joy

It's a simple problem about which the dog, Cherokee, and I had reached an understanding.  He did not  like taking the pills, and I did not like trying to make him take them.  The only problem with our agreement was that we did not consult an interested third party, my dad.

Ignorance is bliss, right?  Apparently, not.

I mean, it's not like I didn't try.  I wrapped those Trifexis bricks in cheese.  Stuffed them in ground chicken.  Hid them in supposedly irresistibly tasty, special-for-the-purpose pill covers.  I had my son hold Cherokee while I pried his jaws of iron apart and tried to plunge the poison down his gnarly-growly throat.  Not only was I unsuccessful, he bit me.  Yeah, I call that technique the Pry, Try, & Cry.

No lie.

So as I stood guiltily facing my accuser, Dad's face turned white and seemed to expand eerily.  He threw his head back like I had delivered him a fierce blow under his chin.

"YOU JUST WANT MY DOG TO DIE!" he gasped.

The heavy scent of Eau de Drama threatened to choke me.  I briefly considered fainting.

At this point my mother, in her infinite wisdom, decided to resurrect Pee Wee, Dad's dog from his teenage years in the late 1940s.  "You didn't give Pee Wee heart worm pills, did you?" she asked, smiling smugly with her own cleverness.

Dad wasn't falling for that one, though.  He simply answered, "No," and returned his attention to me..."poor, poor pitiful me.  Lord have mercy on me."  (Just a little Linda Ronstadt moment.  It was so perfect, I couldn't pass it up.)

"I can't believe you didn't tell me!" Dad snapped.

At this point, neither could I.  It seemed like a good idea at the time?  I was beginning to feel like a teenager again but not in the good way that we 50-somethings dream about.

At last Dad excused himself to his computer to blow off the rest of his steam on a game of Solitaire.  He didn't talk to me again that night.  I think it was a good thing.  Don't you?

The next day I took Cherokee back to the vet and got him some topically-applied heart worm/flea medicine.  And today I took him and got him groomed.  So I am back in Dad's good graces.

Until my next major goof-up, anyway.

Cherokee, for his part in the trouble, got extra cuddling and a dish of ice cream.