Fall is here

Summer seems to be over. The days are getting shorter, a cool breeze is in the air, and Bea shows flashes of puppyhood as she tears around the yard, thinking she can run faster than me.  Of course, her long legs make it look like she's faster, but I always catch her. More and more visitors come to the clinic every day too.  Some are stocking up on kibbles for the winter, while others heard about Big Mike and want to do whatever they can to keep their pets from getting sick .  I like to think that I am responsible for getting the bark out on that one.

Mother's helper are acting different too.  Today, they just would not stop laughing.  It started with Taco the poodle.  Taco is one of our regulars and on mothers favorite list on account of the basic fact that he's a poodle.  He came in for the take-a-nap-get-clean-teeth routine, but was supposed to give mother some of the yellow marking liquid before he went to sleep.  Turns out, he only puts his yellow marking liquid on top of his sister's yellow marking liquid, and nowhere else.  Of course, Alice didn't come to the clinic today.  So mother decided to get the yellow marking liquid from Taco while he was taking his nap. The laughter started when mother asked Sweet Sally to hold Taco's boy parts so she could put a tube in to take the liquid out. It only got worse when Dancing Debbie was unpacking some boxes during the procedure and Vocal Vonnie asked, "Hey, what's that?"  Smirking, Sweet Sally replied "Gee, Vonnie you can see what I'm holding, do you really have to ask?"  Mother finished her work quickly, and said "Sorry, Taco, if you'd just have peed in a cup like we asked, we wouldn't have had to do this the hard way".  Which, for some reason, made Vonnie and Sally both break out in laughter again. 
The strange human barking continued into the afternoon.  Taco and another girl dog, Dizzie, were getting picked up by their parents - something mother refers to as 'discharging' them.  Taco had just left and Dizzie's parents were on their way in.  Vonnie didn't realize that Dizzie hadn't left yet and asked mother, "Aren't you done for the day? Are you going to head out?"  "No, I can't leave yet" mother replied "I have a discharge".  At the same time, Sweet Sally and Vocal Vonnie's eyes grew big and they laughed "Thanks for sharing Dr. Smith, but it's ok to keep some things to yourself!"  Mother grew red in the face and walked off, I can honestly say I've never seen my mother speechless before.  And just as I turned in disbelief, I heard her grumble "....children.." under her breath.  I think all the laughing is what the humans do instead of having tails to wag. 
So far, as much as I miss the warm days of summer, fall is turning out to be pretty interesting!