That’s right, we have another canine birthday in the house! Ralphie, our first-born dog-kid, turned 12 years old today. That’s 69 in dachshund years, he’ll have you know.

He doesn’t look a day over 55, I tell you what.

Normally, I would have spent the day outside with the old boy, letting him walk me ’round the neighborhood, or watching on as he digs for buried treasure (read: carcasses) and whatnot, but he’s on house arrest for the time being. The vet hacked him up good on Thursday, removing a bunch of lymphomas lipomas (!*) (floating fatty deposits, so fun to poke and prod and play with!), cysts, and miscellaneous gross body growths. This is all old hat for him – he’s already had a few (two? three? four? I lose track.) lymphomas lipomas removed previously, but they just keep springing up in the same spot – serendipitously located in his right “armpit,” right where his harness runs under his leg. Once they grow to the size of a large grape, it’s time for another round of slicing and dicing and teeth cleaning.

Even so, this was by far the most growths he’s had removed at once, and I wasn’t at all prepared for the Frankendog who returned home after a day at the veterinarian’s:

It’s hard to make out in these photos (or any one photo, for that matter – so extensive are his injuries!), but Ralphie’s got sutures on his head, under one ear, and on the side of his neck, in addition to the several obvious cuts on his (Buddha) belly. He’s taken it all in stride, though he’s a bit miffed that we won’t let him go outside and dig in the mud. Damn fascists!

In a transparent attempt to buy his love with treats, I made a birthday batch of Hummus Muffins, recipe courtesy of Molly @ It’s A Vegan Dog’s Life. Instead of chickpeas, I added some Kalamata olives to the batter, and “frosted” the mini-muffins with some leftover Kalamata olive hummus.

This was a little thinner than the frosting I used for Kaylee and Jayne’s birthday treats, so rather than frost ‘em all at once, I dipped the muffin tops in a bowl of hummus right before serving.

Probably this goes without saying, but the muffins were a huge hit. The birthday boy had a field day licking the dishes:

Not quite as fun as tunneling for moles, but it’ll hafta do.

Continuing with my birthday dog meme, here are three shiny things I love about my Ralphie bear.

* When the dogs chase a squirrel up a tree – or just happen to spot one scampering through the branches – everyone will gather at the base of the tree, barking up a storm; heads tilted upward, ears flopping back, paws planted firmly on tree trunk, straining at the long-gone squirrel.

Being, shall we say, vertically challenged, Ralphie takes a different approach: When in pursuit of an arboreous squirrel, Ralphie pursues his prey by digging furiously at the base of the tree.

Like, huh?

* Even though they’re all spayed and neutered, Ralphie, Peedee, O-Ren and Kaylee all enjoy humping one another, to differing degrees (ranging from on occasion – Peedee and Kaylee – to a dozen times a day – O-Ren). Again, being vertically challenged and the shortest and longest of the bunch, Ralphie is massive FAIL in this arena.

Rennie is the shortest of the terriers, so when Ralphie is feeling amorous, she’s usually his default partner. She’s also the horniest, so more often than not, what starts out as Ralphie trying to hump Rennie

quickly turns into Rennie humping Ralphie.

It’s all so awkward and hilarious to watch. Poor guy.

(The prize for oddest coupling has got to be when we visited my parents in NY a few years back, and Ralphie took a shining to Copper, their 60-pound bear of a dog-kid. Total awesomeness!)

* Ralphie snores almost as loudly as my husband. Whereas I yell at my husband to turn the fuck over! when gets a zzzzz-ing, I love to hear Ralphie snore. He’s just got this slow, lazy, contented cadence to it – it’s quite calming and reassuring.

Love it! (My husband, not so much. I think he’s jealous.)

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* Duh, me!

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Tagged: vegan veganism food food blogging carnival october veganmofo vegan mofo vegan month of food Isa Chandra Moskowitz PPK Post-Punk Kitchen animals animal rights animal welfare herbivore meat-free dairy-free cruelty-free animal lovers blog swarm ralphie dahshund weiner dog my furkids hummus muffins hummus muffins dog treats recipe flickr photos dog animal companion canine

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This entry was posted on Saturday, October 10th, 2009 at 8:24 pm and is filed under Carnivals, Food & Recipes, Dog, My Furkids, Photo Blogging, VeganMoFo. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.