Posts Tagged ‘Urban Pooch’

Pug Scrubbing

I hope everyone had a great weekend!

On Sunday morning, I took Sid over to Urban Pooch for some de-skunk-ification. This was his second visit to U.P. and while he was still squirmier than when bathed at home, he seemed more relaxed than the first time we went.

While I was busy scrubbing him, two different pugs came in and had their nails dremeled. Both seemed pretty calm during the process so I thought I’d see how Sid would do. He runs away and hides whenever I get out the nail clippers (hoping to trim his dew claws) and refuses to let me so much as touch his paw so I didn’t have high hopes for the dremel, but I figured I’d at least give it a shot.

After I dried Sid off, the Urban Pooch assistant, Luke,  popped Sid up on a table and started dremeling away. My job was to distract Sid with a constant flow of venison jerky straight to the muzzle. Luke was super quick and gentle with the dremel – I don’t think Sid even really had time to process what was going on until it was already over. Sid actually kept his cool for most of the process, and wasn’t bothered at all by the noise (it was a lot quieter than I expected). He started getting super-squirmy near the end so we conceded to let him get away with two nails un-trimmed.

So it looks like two (nicely trimmed) dew claws up for the dremel!

Squeaky Clean

This past weekend was The Weekend of Spring Cleaning and General Pug Maintenance.

First up – Sid’s three beds. As you have probably seen from recent photos, Sid’s beds were looking downright unruly. The worst of the bunch, his “dirty bed”, is named as such because that’s where I give him Wigzi balls and/or Kongs stuffed with PEANUT BUTTER every day for lunch.

Despite Sid’s best attempts at devouring every morsel, including the remnants of peanut butter that get mashed into the fabric, the bed was looking pretty grimy. The fabric resembled some kind of animal print, only the “spots” were really peanut butter grease stains. I actually think Sid may have preferred the bed stay in this condition – sorry dude.

Once the beds were thoroughly washed and dried at the laundromat down the street, I washed my own bedding. My outer blanket is a light brown color which hides the pug hair insanely well. This plus can also be big minus though because you never realize how much pug hair has built up until you take a very close look – yeah, it needed to be washed too.

And last but not least – the pug.

We tried something new this weekend and it turned out to be a bit of an adventure. Sunday morning I walked Sid over to Urban Pooch, a hybrid pet daycare/groomer/store which provides, among many other nifty services, self-wash stations where one can bathe one’s dog, DIY-style. While waiting for a self-wash station to open up, Sid met another pug named Maxine who was there for a nail trim. I guess technically it was a nail grind because they use a dremel to gradually file down the nails. Maxine’s mom said Maxine preferred the dremel over the clippers. Has anyone ever had their nails DREMELED?! Knowing how much Sid hates to get his dew claws trimmed perhaps dremeling might be a better option.

Anyway, a tub soon opened up and we headed to the washing room in the back. As soon as the door opened, the roaring whoosh of the air dryers overwhelmed us. Sid immediately put his jets on reverse and made a quick dash back towards the front of the store. I actually had to pick him up because he planted himself so flat that he resembled a squashed cockroach.

Once the dryers had stopped, he eased up a smidge but was still freaked out about what the heck was going on in this strange place. I plunked him into the tub, got on my vinyl smock (which came in handy!), and started hosing him down. Unlike the usual zen-like state that baths invoke upon Sid, this crazy new environment prompted a squirmfest. He did manage to finally calm down by the time I applied the conditioner though I did have to squelch numerous attempts at escape.

After I dried most of the water from Sid using the towels provided (another nice element), I thought maybe we’d try the hair dryer out. But a desperate look from Sid made me realize that was probably a bad idea. So we nixed the idea and I just gave him another going over with a towel and popped a clean t-shirt on him for the walk home.

Coconut Fresh!