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Looks like a Puppy, Smells like a SkunkSeptember 06, 2008 Local weather is being influenced from afar by tropical storm Hanna: there were showers on and off all night. I know because I got up several times; Trav, who sleeps on the deck, wanted to come in during the downpours and go out again during the lulls. This morning, after he'd snarfed his breakfast and I'd brushed my teeth and after the last (so far) downpour, we set out for a walk. Trav went into the scrubby underbrush near the house, I thought to poop and bury a tennis ball, but he emerged a minute or so later smelling like a skunk. I didn't see the skunk or hear any commotion that suggested interspecies interaction, but my nose does not lie: there was a skunk in the underbrush, and Travvy interacted with it. It doesn't seem to have been a direct hit, however, because he didn't smell that bad. We continued on our way. When we got home, I mixed up some skunk stink remedy (one quart peroxide, 1/4 cup baking soda, and a teaspoon of lemon-scented Joy dish detergent) and rubbed Travvy all over with it. He put up with this OK, but the chemical interaction caused the deck to blossom with startlingly white algae-like blooms so I hauled up the hose to rinse it off. I couldn't remember if skunk stink remedy is supposed to be rinsed off the dog, and if so how long you're supposed to wait, but the presence of even a small quantity of soap made me think "Yeah, probably," so when about 15 minutes had passed I let the hose fall back to the ground and escorted Trav down to meet it. He wasn't thrilled about the rinsing but he wasn't bad either. Of course he shook himself vigorously and got me almost as wet as he was. A random multiple-sniff test revealed much improvement: the left hindquarters sniffed weakly positive for skunk but the overall bouquet was faintly lemon with malamute undertones. With his dark gray guard hairs clumped together so the white undercoat gleamed through Trav resembled even more than usual the riding ring at Malabar Farm with its dark gray rubber bits dotting bright white (at least when it's dry) sand. Rhodry's first skunking happened at about the same age, maybe a little younger. Note the wording here: I didn't write "Rhodry first got skunked at about the same age" because that wouldn't be true. Rhodry didn't "get skunked." Rhodry skunked himself. We were walking on a trail through the woods behind the Mai Fane meadow. He bolted into the scrub and started repeatedly and vigorously throwing himself down on the ground. From a few yards away this behavior looked bizarre to the max, but it shortly became olfactorily apparent that Rhodry was rolling in dead skunk. I didn't know the skunk stink remedy then, and I can't remember what I washed him in: tomato juice? milk? shampoo? I do remember that for weeks afterward whenever we passed through skunk stink on the road Rhodry would lean eagerly out the window to get closer to it. Finally it dawned on me that dogs like skunk stink, though they don't care to be sprayed in the face. I dubbed Rhodry "Looks like a Puppy, Smells like a Skunk." I even remember an e-mail correspondence with that as a subject line -- I was on old GEnie back them -- very possibly with Lisa Barnett. When the skunk smell faded, so did the name, but it came back as appropriate, even when Rhodry was no longer a puppy. Rhodry was my puppy till the day he died. He's still my puppy, but I don't think he'd mind lending his old name to the next generation. Hail Travvy: Looks like a Puppy, Smells like a Skunk. Wear your name well, but not too often.
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