Sausage breakfast for Pogo?

The master at playing dead

Pogo on the stairs. There’s a ball in that cavernous mouth somewhere.

The home phone call last week, while on holiday, wasn’t entirely unexpected. Situations, minor or otherwise, rarely go unreported. Today it was Pogo’s turn. Not so minor. He couldn’t or wouldn’t get up. The only good news, if you can say that — we were due back the next day.

This had happened before. I was in the US last time, also on holiday, when the disturbing news came through that Pogo’s walk had abruptly ended, he could no longer walk at all. He’d been chasing a ball with all the mad, sinew straining vigour, he always put into a chase, before flipping over in the long, summer, straw-like grass. A small dip in the field, unnoticed at speed, had been enough for balance to temporarily desert him . He’d done it many times before, as dogs do. This time was different. His head did not bob-up, shaking the dust and straw off his back, this time, there was no movement at all.

Poor Pogo

A week’s stay at the vet hospital on a catheter revealed that he’d twisted himself badly enough to damage some of the nerve-endings in his back. Once home, we spent the next 6 weeks carrying his lifeless backend around in a sling.