Vet...or not vet?

Okay, this is a bit of a nothing post as we've enjoyed a bit of a nothing week. After the excitement of running Summer camps in Budapest and Pécs, it's been awesome to spend a whole week at home just chillin'.

Unfortunately, while it's been a lazy week for Daniel and I, things have been a bit tougher on Iago. He managed to pick up some ticks while we were in Budapest, and while I spent several hours literally going over him with a fine toothed comb to locate and remove them, we still thought it would be best for a vet to check him out. Ticks can be pretty nasty and in some cases can lead to nausea, lethargy and even paralysis in dogs. For this reason, you're supposed to keep any ticks that you remove from the dog so that the vet can analyse them to see if special treatment is necessary. Unfortunately I just couldn't bring myself to keep such gross things around any longer than I had to, so I drowned them in a small bottle of Unicum (the vilest alcohol in our supply), and tossed them out. 

Luckily, the vet didn't seem bothered by the fact that I had destroyed all evidence of Iago's tick infestation. In fact, the vet didn't seem at all bothered (or even very interested) in Iago at all. He turned up at our house, we introduced him to Iago, then he just kind of stood there while we tried to explain the problem. We pointed out where the ticks had been, and he gave the area a 1-second glance, then shrugged his shoulders. O-kay then. Perhaps he'd be more interested in giving Iago his annual heartworm injection? No, it turns out not. Apparently treating dogs for heartworm is pretty unusual in Hungary. Hmmm. 

After that we all kind of stood around awkwardly for a bit, then we thought we'd ask the vet to take a look at Iago's ears (he often gets infections, especially during Summer when he swims a lot). Watching the vet try to look at Iago's ears was pretty weird. He seemed to have almost no idea what he was doing, almost as if this was the first time he'd ever had contact with a dog before. It was very strange and made me wonder whether he even was a vet, or just some random guy who'd happened to turn up at our house and been too polite to leave when we started asking him to check out our dog.

Anyway, after a bit more confused standing around, the vet left, telling us he'd be back again in the afternoon. Umm, okay. Daniel and I left Iago outside and continued our holiday chillin' inside. Ahhhh, good times.

A few minutes later, we heard children's voices in our front yard calling out to Iago. It seemed that our new neighbours' children had finally arrived! They have three daughters aged about 3, 6 and 9. Ever since their appearance earlier this week, they have been outside playing with Iago every day. Their favourite game seems to be to stand at opposite ends of the garden, then call Iago to run alongside them to the other end, then back again, over and over. It's super cute, especially as their parents seem to have explained that Iago only understands English, so now they call out "Iago, come" before they start running.

Understandably, Iago has been pretty knackered the last few nights. Entertaining three energetic young children all day is a big job for such an old doggus.

- Amanda