The Things We Do For Love

We came home from our Mississippi Adventure, picked up our pups, and then Brett scampered out to the garage to greet his tools. I noticed that Pippa had a chunk missing from her face and one of her ears had a creepy, raw circle of doom in the center. I called Mom.

"Hey Ma, what happened to Pippa's face?"
"What do you mean?" she said in that sweet, innocent yet defensive tone of hers.
"There's a chunk missing."
"What?"
"A chunk! And what's with her ear?"
"Her ear?"
"Her ear, Ma!"
"Well I don't know. She was fine when she left here. It must have happened at your house."
"We've been home 20 minutes."
"Well I didn't see anything and I looked at her this morning."
"You had one job, Ma!"

I took Pip to the vet who said it may or may not be ringworm in her ear and the origins of the missing chunk will remain a mystery but don't let that get infected.
Pip is delightfully oblivious to each of her ailments and only wants to eat the assorted ointments she's been prescribed. The Vet also told me to go to a drug store and buy "jock itch ointment." The medication they prescribe to kill yeast on pups has the same ingredients as human jock itch cream, which doesn't cost as much.
"If her ear isn't ringworm, it's yeast the cream will take care of."

So I went to CVS and I wandered around the more embarrassing medical aisles looking for jock itch cream but I could only find it in an aerosol can. Pip would not take well to being sprayed in the ear. I searched and I toiled and I read ingredient lists I can't pronounce and finally took the can to the pharmacist and quietly asked if they "have this in a cream?"
"Let see, what is that?" and she rolled the can around in her hands. "Jock Itch."
I stoically held a pleasant, neutral expression, a fifty yard stare enveloping my eyes.
"Yeah. I've seen this in a cream." and she came out from behind her towering bunker and walked back to where I had found it.
She quietly surveyed the display of ointments, picking up tubes for an assortment of different rashes.
"Are you looking for itch relief or something to treat it?"
"No no. It's for my dog." I said earnestly. As I said this, I realized how absurd it sounded and I accepted the fact that the pharmacist would think I was pretending the jock itch cream wasn't for me. Then I wondered if girls can have jock itch, and then I wondered if she was going to focus on the 'dog' aspect of that statement and report me for sadistic animal experiments.

Instead she straightened up and shouted, "Hey Sandy," everyone waiting to have a prescription filled turned to look, "Do we have jock itch in a cream?"
Shut up. Shut Up!
"I thought so." Sandy said from behind the pharmacy counter. "What do you have?"
"Just jock itch in a spray can."
"Oh!" Sandy shouted, "The cream version is over with the yeast infection medication!"
Stop it! Stop! Shut...Up! People glanced at me and then looked away.
"Go check the Women's Health aisle!"
"It's for my dog." I said out loud, to no one in particular.

I followed the pharmacist to the women's Health Aisle where she offered me a selection of yeast infection relief including a suppository and we both hesitated.
"No." I said quietly.
She nodded and put it back and then we smiled politely at each other.
"My dog's ear has this..." I started, "I'll just spray it." and I took the can from the pharmacist's hand, thanked her, and disappeared to the front of the store to check out.

For the last week I've been spraying that cold moist power onto my fingers and massaging it into Pips creepy rash while the missing face chunk-scab stares up at me waiting for a fresh glob of ointment.

She's lucky she's cute.