random ramblings rambled randomly

Last Saturday was the saddest day in the last few years of my life.  I had to say goodbye to a friend of 10 1/2 years.  Kenshin Himura aka “Fats McGee”, aka “the fat dog”, had to be put to sleep on Saturday.  He had suffered from kidney failure, and while he was still eating, he became anaemic and weak, and eventually, at the last, he could not walk.  He spent his last night on the lawn, unable even to get up to eat dinner.  His dinner was brought to him, when it started to rain on Saturday morning, we had to lift him up and carry him to shelter.  At the time of his death he weighed no more than 60 pounds, shocking when you realise that at his peak he was more than twice that.

Kenshin was born in October 2000 somewhere up in Cascade.  We had just lost out Rott/ridgeback mixed dog, Julio, who suffered a heart attack and died.  I remember going up to the house in Cascade on a Friday evening, he was the biggest puppy there, which made him a natural choice.  He was my dog, as Julio was my dog, so I got to choose and name him, i picked the name of main character of the show which at the time was my favourite, Kenshin Himura aka Batusai the Slasher.
They told us that he was a pure Rott…. he wasn’t. He had some Alsatian markings and a white mark on his chest which the vet called an imperfection.  I considered that he had a birthmark on his chest like his owner, his was white, while mine is black. we didn’t mind that he wasn’t pure or that the owners weren’t completely upfront with us.  He was adorable, and that was all that mattered
Kenshin was an amazing dog, he adapted incredibly quickly to circumstances, even when he hated them at first.  The first time that he got tied, he struggled and fought so much he broke his collar. The second time, he got as far as the chain would allow him to, and he just lay down.  Every 2 or 3 minutes he would raise his head up and upon realising that he was still tied, he would put it down again.  By the 4th time, he would come when he heard the chain clinking.  Although he would growl at the vet when he went, he recognised when he was ill and voluntarily go into the car to go to the vet, because he knew that the vet made him better.  Unfortunately he could not understand why we would take him there if he were well, and would use his considerable weight and strength to make getting him into the car a virtual wrestling match. Up to the very last day, when he realised he was by the vet, he perked up because  he knew the vet would make him better, when I saw this I admit it, I cried, because there was nothing that could be done.
The other memory I have of Kenshin as a puppy was when he got into the house when we were out.  I think that we had left the kitchen door open.  Anyways, we came home and there he was in the tv room chewing on my bartending book.  When he saw us, he looked up at us as if to say “Hey, you’re home, what’s going on?”, and then went back to eating my book. I still have the book, he was only eating the edges.
He was incredibly animal aggressive… he did not like other animals at all.  The only exceptions were our other dogs.  When he came to live with us, we already had a Rott/Doberman mixed dog Tio Mario (Tee-yo Ma-REE-yo) (a combination that results in a truly retarded dog).  The two of them got along like best friends almost from day one.  They would have their scuffles and fights, but you could see the clear love and affection they had for each other.  When Tio died, Kenshin mourned for months.  He was also good with the other dogs we got after Tio, Pierrott (Granade) and Ananci (Story).  By contrast, the dogs opposite and next door were his mortal enemies.  When we carried him to the vet, we had to wait outside with him. The presence of the other dogs irked him too much.

By any measure, Kenshin was a large dog.  He measrued about 2 feet to his shoulder and the largest head I have ever seen on any dog.  Before his kidney failure he tipped the scale at about 140 pounds
Kenshin never wanted to give the impression that he engaged in behaviour of an indecorous nature at all.  When our neighbour replaced the fence between our properties with a 6 foot wall, he built a ramp for his dogs, 2 Alsatians, to look outside. They would look into our yard and bark at our dogs.  Despite his massive size, Kenshin could jump up so that his mouth could reach above the wall. Fortunately there was a grill which prevented them from biting each other, but that is another story.  Kenshin would jump once or twice, then look back at the house to see if we were looking. If he saw any sign of us at all, he would stop as if to say “Me?  nah that wasn’t me.”
As I said, Kenshin was incredibly animal aggressive.  I have lost track of the number of rats he killed, except the last one.  He would not come when we called him for dinner.  A highly unusual state of affairs, so I went to look for him.  As I turned the corner of the house, he emerged from the darkness with a HUGE rat in his mouth.  I swear the thing was bigger than any cat I had ever seen, and he did not want to give it up.  He got into 2 fights with the neighbour’s 2 Alsatians, both of which he won hands down, especially considering that there was 1 of him and 2 of them.  In January 2009, the dogs from across the road raided our yard as I was driving out to go to the gym an early morning… all 5 of them.  He took on 4 of them and had them scampering, before taking on the ringleader.  Pretty soon he had the other dog’s head in his mouth, and refused to let go. I did the foolish thing and attempted to pry his jaw off the other dog with my bare hand.  Despite the fact that he was trying to crush the other dog’s skull, he did not bite me at all… at all.  To this day, I find that incredible.
At the same time Kenshin was incredibly affectionate with us. He would come up to you and nuzzle you with his head.  As you petted him, he would lean on you with his considerable mass and eventually lie down on your foot for you to scratch his belly. Where were you going? He was on your foot, you couldn’t go anywhere!

Although we nicknamed Kenshin “the Fat Dog” or “Fats McGee”, the vet made us understand that Kenshin was not fat… you could tell too.  He was pure muscle, and as he weighed about 140-150 pounds, he was a real power house.  When we put in a 5 foot wall around the yard, he could, if sufficiently provoked, could jump high enough to have his chest over the top of the wall.  If he wanted to, he could have scaled the wall… thankfully he did not want to. Once we saw him bite a frog.  When we tried to hold him to put salt in his mouth and wash out the poison, he dragged the 3 of us around the yard.  There was salt and water all around the yard except in Kenshin’s mouth, but he seemed to come through ok.  Another time, he had gotten some hotspots around his neck, which we were afraid had become infected.  We took him to the Vet to check it out.  Given the location where the hotspots were, we could not muzzle him.  The vet said, no problem, we would give him an anaesthetic.
Problems.
The dog tensed up so much that she could not stick him with the needle.  We ended up having to put him in one of the kennels, holding him to the back wall. The vet’s assistant then came with a big BRC barrier, which he used to pin Kenshin to the back wall, which then allowed the vet to come in and give him the jab. He had gotten the largest dose of anaesthesia, but did not go under at all. He got really drowsy and could not react to bite the vet, but he fought the drug to the end, and did not fall asleep at all.
In spite of his immense strength, power and will, Kenshin did have his Kryptonite, and it was loud noises, especially thunder and fireworks.  During a thunder shower he would find his was into the house by the hook or the crook and would not leave voluntarily, unless we bribed him with a crix, which he could not resist.  Up until he was about 7 he would hide under the sink outside.  It did not matter that he was too big for that space from the time he was about 9 1 year.  As it got harder for him to manoeuvre, he would lie down and stick his head behind the drier, or hide next to the washing machine.  My big loveable coward.

Kenshin loved to eat, and if there was one thing he loved eating above all others, it was mangoes.  Up until a month ago, there was never a mango under the tree, he took them all, he took them all and would eat them until there was just dry skin and seed.  My twitter avatar is of him enjoying his mango.  He couldn’t collect his mangoes once walking became difficult. Although he loved to eat, because he wanted us to think that he was Mr Decorum, he would never eat if he saw us watching him.  He would wait till we went inside, then look in the kitchen to make sure that we were not watching him before he started his meal.

Kenshin did not enjoy bathing. When we had a fence he would climb it… literally… to get away from the water.  It is one of the most humorous sights in the world to see a massive 150 pound dog climbing a chain-link fence to get away from some water. When my sister first told the story, I did not believe it, then I saw it for myself when I tried to bathe him.  As with everything, although he always hated the water, he got accustomed to bathing and would tolerate it
It is almost too painful to write about his demise and eventual death.  He started losing weight quickly and dramatically, we couldn’t understand it.  He was eating normally, and seemed to be in good spirits.  At first the vet, an not our normal one, an associate said that he had anaemia, and gave us some blood tonic, that made him a little perkier, but still the weight loss continued.  Then the week before Christmas, the vet who we normally dealt with called: “how was Kenshin going”, “no real improvement” “I don’t know why X didn’t tell you this but he has kidney failure, there is not much you can do.  Just monitor him and soon you may have to make a difficult decision”.
We agreed that while he could move about and was not in any obvious discomfort, he would be fine, but from the time he could not move or started to suffer, then we would not let it continue.  We would sometimes have to help him get up to get his food, but he managed for a few weeks.  His collar which despite being the largest one we could find was too small for him was now far too big. Then Saturday morning, when I was going to tennis, I saw him lying on the lawn.  My heart sank, because I knew that it was the end.  Daddy and I talked at tennis and he told me that he had to feed him on the lawn itself.  We agreed that it was that day. My sister was not home, we had to call her.  We agreed that we would take him when I came home from the gym.  Before I left, we had to move him from the lawn, because the rain was threatening.  It was not appropriate to have him out in the rain on his last day. I went to the gym but I could not finish the class, I was too distracted.  When I got home, my sister had not come as yet, she was in traffic.  When she came home, we made the arrangements, we would all go. We all wanted to say goodbye.
When we got there, because he could not move and it was so hard to manoeuvre, I had to take him out of the car myself.  It was hard.  The tears started flowing as I put him on the ground.  He was still alert, raising his head and looking around.  As I said before, he was happy to be by the vet… the vet always made him better.
It is still difficult to think about it, even harder to write.  I am glad he didn’t suffer, but still I miss him, and I will miss him for a very long time.  I really loved that dog.
Goodbye Kenshin.