Foozle me, Mom!

Jib here.

Sailor is better. I like it when he’s better. He chases me. He rolls me in the dirt. He barks at the mailman and tells me to bark at the gardeners. He makes me happy.

Mom is making sure Sailor stays better. She gives him neck messages. She buries her hands in his ruff and her fingers talk to his neck. He loves it. He leans his head into her chest like Zoe does when Mom rubs her behind her ears. He sighs. He closes his eyes.

Mom is making sure Sailor stays better in his hind end, too. First, she foozles his butt fluff. Sailor’s feet jump around and his tail wags and wags. He laughs into her face. He loves being foozled. Then Mom messages his back and butt. She says the foozling makes Sailor relax so she can talk to his muscles without having him move around too much.

Sailor says that until today, his back hurt a little when Mom messaged him. He says the foozling was great, though, and didn’t hurt. And his back felt better after Mom’s fingers talked to it. She also talked to his legs, and Sailor says that felt great.

Yesterday, Mom petted sunscreen over her arms and watered our tomatoes. Then she foozled Zoe’s butt fluff. She laughed and said a naughty word and Zoe ran across the lawn and Mom went inside and washed the fur off of her arms. She had to use soap. I’m glad she didn’t foozle ME. Bad words make me nervous even when Mom is laughing. The worst word she says is "bath.” That word makes me really nervous and she said it yesterday after she foozled Zoe.

Sailor thinks “bath” is the worst word, too. And he puts his ears down and mutters when Mom says “teethies.” I don’t. I jump up on the cheese table. I like having my teethies brushed. The toothpaste tastes great and so does the cheese. Sailor likes the cheese table, too, and will jump up even though Mom is holding his toothbrush. Mom tied a white metal board to the cheese table and sprays spray cheese all over the whiteboard and we lick it off. Sometimes we get a free lick. Sometimes we get a toenail grind. And sometimes we get our teethies brushed after the cheese is gone. Mom says this is a good way to keep us occupied when she grooms us.

Zoe doesn’t like the cheese table. She says it means something is going to happen to her that wasn’t her idea, and that is not her idea of fun. She won’t come for supper even when she’s hungry unless it’s her idea and not Mom’s. She WILL run to the front door for walkies, though. Walkies is her favorite thing. It doesn’t matter whose idea it is. And Zoe likes being foozled if she doesn’t have anything better to do like nap or watch the street or mark the edge of the brick patio.

Here comes Mom. I think I will smile at her and turn around and coax her into foozling MY butt fluff.