October 15, 2012

White Dog and the rest of the White Dog Army greeted Steve at the door and sniffed him suspiciously. It was 11pm and he was returning from his late night at school and was amazingly still walking relatively upright. "See, I am perfectly fine," he said with a false bravado that the WDA saw through immediately. That he had overdone it was obvious when he sloooowly eased himself down to pet heads and that "perfectly fine" really meant "I am in pain and am VERY glad to be home!"

We were ready for him, though. The White Ones herded him right into the bedroom where the blankets were already turned down. They pushed him back on the bed and helped me get his shoes off. Amid his continued protests that "it does not hurt too badly," the nursing staff ordered an immediate hot massage to be applied followed by a liberal slathering of tiger balm.

After, we tucked a pillow at the small of his back and wrapped the comforter around tightly to keep him warm. WD and Oso sat on either side to anchor the blanket so he could not move. Quinn lay along the side of the bed as a bumper so Steve could not put his feet down to get out of bed even if he wanted to. Puff, YoYoMa and Nuka joined me in the kitchen to warm his dinner of Thai peanut sauce rice and vegetables. I was about to carry the tray in when Nuka remembered that he should be drinking LOTS of water...so we filled a pitcher and grabbed a glass. Dessert was ibuprofen.

WD laughed at Steve when he struggled to get up so that he could take the WDA for bedtime walks. "You are not going anywhere more tonight, dad. See that door?" she said nodding toward the dog door just beyond the foot of the bed. "We all know how to use that and Michael already took Quinn out so we are all good. Just relax and get over this, I don't know how much longer we can be patient about you being out of commission. You just are not much fun like this!" With that she nested into his side and the others nosed his hand before finding spots all around the bed to snuggle in for the night.