The Uninvited Guest
A few weeks ago both of our dogs became violently ill from both ends and because we live in a home with no yard it was impossible for me to predict when these bursts of bodily upheaval would occur. So even though I was taking both of them out every twenty minutes or so, sometimes I would still miss an accident. ( DEAR GOD PLEASE DON'T LET MY LANDLORD READ THIS) Because of this unfortunate circumstance, in the end they were relegated to the deck that has small gaps in between the boards. OH THE HUMANITY! This meant that in between taking their sick asses outside I was washing the deck with bleach water and trying not to murder them both in the name of disease control.
After three days of this I started to get worried about them and then a light bulb went off in Jeremy's and my head collectively (because together we ARE one giant superhuman brain). Perhaps it wasn't a virus but the dog food! So we switched foods and within a day both of them were well again. Guess where this food is made Dear Readers? Stuck? Need a hint? It's made where all the poisonous things are made. CHI to the EFFIN NA. But I'm not even going to get started on my thoughts about that. Cough* They're trying to kill us and our four legged friends! Cough* Cough*
We put the tainted dog food bag in the garage with the intention of returning it to the store. The weeks wore on and it was forgotten about. Not long after that I was outside getting the mail when I spotted a RAT running across the parking lot. As gross as it was I didn't think much of it and attributed it to the fact that we live right by a strip mall with several restaurants that have large garbage bins outside. And then a few days after that we found that same rat dying in front of our door step. He looked pitiful and as much as I realize that rats carry many diseases and were responsible for the spreading of the black plague, I still don't like to see any living thing suffer. So I was about to get Jeremy to do the 'Ol "Off wif is head" just as a purely compassionate act of course when he gave up his little ratty ghost. He was disposed of and forgotten and I assumed that someone had poisoned him.
Last night we were giving the garage a much needed cleaning and reorganization. In the process of moving boxes that had been stacked against the garage wall Jeremy would find piles, large piles, of dog food with scattered rat crap. And I don't mean crap as in little rat hairbrushes or little rat shoes, I mean rat POOP! We were collectively astonished that the rat had managed to carry so much dog food to these hiding places. I was just waiting for us to discover the nest of tiny, hairless rat babies which I would have been unable to dispose of and would have had to raise to be civilized rat folk. Thank the Lord that never happened. But in the process of cleaning this food and poop up, guess what conclusion I came to? Still stuck? THE POISONOUS DOG FOOD ALSO KILLED THE RAT! And boy was I glad that I had quit giving it to my dogs when I did. The remainder of the bag went away with the garbage truck today to kill more rats or homeless people that may be rifling through the dump in search of edible things. Do I feel bad? Yes, but I also feel like pointing a finger, one finger in particular, at the country who keeps sending us tainted goods. Why, they're even killing their own people now.
My solution? Buy local; buy locally organic if possible. Eat food as unprocessed as possible, believe me it tastes better. If you have a baby, don't let it chew on toys from China, give it a stick from a tree or a chicken leg. In all seriousness though, let's be conscious consumers because when it all boils down, I'm just not ready to die, or get food poisoning.
Oh and the dog food? It was the Iams in the green bag.