Humiliations and General Grossness (Part 3)

I went back in the house and was greeted by our dogs, who were very interested in getting outside to potty and explore and see what smells these strangers had left behind. Oh, you'll smell some smells, I thought. I opened the back door and out they ran.

After several minutes, I began to wonder why the dogs had not returned to the back door. They're usually only good for a couple of squirts in the yard and then they're back wanting to be let in. Oh, they're probably around front checking out the smelly hole in the ground, I reasoned. So I stepped out onto the front porch where I could see them over by the hole. I clapped my hands to call them and they came running. Moose trotted up the steps first, happy to see his pa as always. Then Sadie rounded the edge of the porch, a huge smile on her doggy face, and I was afforded a horrifying sight nearly as bad as the gates of hell earlier. Sadie's neck and shoulders were coated in something black. To the untrained eye, it might have appeared to be very black mud. But to my trained eye and nose, I knew it to be raw sewage.

Where did she... ? How did she...? What the f...?!

And even as I watched, she gave me my answer by dashing back to the poo tank pit where I witnessed her bend over and roll gleefully onto the sewage-coated piece of broken pipe that was still laying in the grass above the pit.

"LEAVE IT!!!!" I screamed. "YOU! LEAVE! IT!!!"

Sadie looked up through a haze of filth and flashed a big ol' grin of satisfaction. This was by far the greatest and best stinky thing she'd ever found to roll in and she was in doggy heaven.

Cursing, I threw open the front door and yelled at Moose to get in the house. I then marched back to the bathroom to prepare to give that damn dog the queen mother of all baths.

But which bathroom to use? Normally we bath the dogs in the big tub in the master bathroom. But we'd not yet sealed the new grout in the master bath tub surround. I could bath her in the hall bathtub, but did I really want to chance this dog shaking wet sewage all over the freshly painted walls? Onto the good towels? I finally opted for the bathroom with the most room and the most tile and went with the master. First things first, though, I snatched up my phone and texted "YOUR DAUGHTER JUST ROLLED IN SEWAGE!!!" to my wife. Then I started the tub and turned it to hot before undressing and putting on my ratty painting shorts and a T-shirt I wouldn't mind throwing out. Sadie could not, after all, be willing to come to the tub on her own, so I would have to capture her in my arms and carry her. This would mean time spent in physical contact with sewage.


Sadie was on the back deck when I went to look for her, but she caught a glimpse of what I was wearing and went into red alert. I tried to coax her over, but she dropped her front down to the deck and woofed. Any move I made toward her sent her skittering away. She knew I was out to get her and bathe her. I opened the back door and ordered her into the house, determined to get her into closed quarters where her running range was limited. I then cornered her in the kitchen where I was able to reason with her until she let her guard down enough for me to slip my arms under her chest and lift her up.

I held my breath as I carried Sadie back toward our bedroom, but half way there I had to take a breath. Oh, it was awful. I felt my throat tighten, suppressing a gag. You never consider when you use the bathroom that you'll ever see, let alone touch that waste ever again, but here I was carrying a dog coated in it.

I lowered Sadie into the tub and set about spraying her off with the shower hose. I avoided her head, though, because that's usually the trigger that makes her shake and the longer we could avoid that the better for the surrounding room. Pulling the shower curtain as far closed as I could, I then sprayed it off too then growled loudly at her when she did shake. Dots of dark water struck the shower surround and dripped down. Ewww.

Unfortunately, in my haste to get things ready I neglected to actually bring doggie shampoo into the bathroom. What I had brought was doggie conditioner. I couldn't leave her there to go look for any shampoo, either, or she'd be out of the tub and dripping diluted sewage around the house for sure. So I grabbed the next best thing, a bottle of Head & Shoulders, and started pouring it on her. I gave the bath extra attention to detail and spent a lot of time scrubbing her face, neck and shoulders. Then I rinsed her off and, since I'd brought it in, poured on some conditioner. Finally, I took a sniff of her neck to see if the sewage was gone. It took my nose a few seconds to process it, but it seemed like the smell was gone. I gave her some extra rinsing to make sure, then toweled her off with three different towels--all of which were popped into a hot washing machine before the dog could finish her triumphant post-shower victory prance around the house.

This accomplished, I cleaned up the bathroom, washed all the sewage drops away and then had a shower myself using the same H&S technique as with Sadie. After I too was dry, I grabbed one of our industrial strength contractor's trash bags and went outside to deal with the poo pipe. I managed to get it into the bag without actually touching it, then sealed it inside the trash can.

It took a few hours before I risked letting Sadie out again and even then I watched her every move and called her back every time she tried to head around to the front of the house. I had dispatched the pipe, but who knew what sort of drippings she could sniff out and roll in. I only hoped the following day's adventure would prove fruitful and far less disgusting.

(TO BE CONTINUED...)