Fleas, Doggy Allergies, and Dried Beans

Okay, so it's been a while.  I've been off on a new project :P  Jeremy says I'm obsessive compulsive when I latch onto something.  I don't know what he's talking about.  We have a little problem.  Okay, it's grown into a big problem.  And it's all my fault.  You see, once it gets cold, there aren't any fleas around.  Since there aren't any fleas, I forget to put flea meds on the animals, and, in fact, don't buy anymore.  Now it's warmed up, and we've got fleas, 1 itchy dog, 2 itchy cats, and 1 very, very itchy dog who I think is allergic to either the flea bites or something else.  Poor Audrey can't stop itching, which means we are having a lot of trouble sleeping at night, which means somebody in the house is getting very grumpy and blaming me for the flea problem (I won't say any names, but he's the only other person besides me who can speak English in the house).

In my defense, I did put them back on flea meds this spring, and when I took Audrey into the vet in May, she didn't have any fleas, but she had started itching.  I figured the flea meds that I had purchased at Wal-Mart were working fine, and the vet just suggested giving her a couple Claratin and fish oil pills a day because it was probably an allergy.  That seemed to improve her itching--for a little while.  Then, this month, things went, well, umm, bad (that might be an understatement).  Fleas everywhere, itching everywhere, not happy husband everywhere. . .   So I decided to get proactive.

Step 1: New Flea Meds and Homemade Dog Food
I bought new flea meds for all the animals.  I bought flea spray for the home to spray on fabric.  I gave the dogs a bath with flea shampoo, put the new flea meds on, and sprayed every cloth surface in the house.  All the animals seemed a lot better.  Problem fixed.  Or not.  Within a few days, Audrey is itching again.  I decide it must just be allergies.  So I do research on dog allergies and decide I should start making my own dog food, since many dog allergies are food related.  I found a recipe that was really easy, I went to Wal-Mart and stock up on dried beans, long grain rice, eggs, and other doggy food supplies.  I am positive I've got the problem "licked" now.

Then I make my first batch of dog food in my crock pot and realize, measuring it out, that each batch is only going to last about 2 days.  Great, I'll be soaking beans and cooking dog food every other day.  Jeremy and I will be eating frozen pizza all the time because I'm too busy making dog food (okay, so it's not that complicated or time consuming, and I'm just looking for an excuse not to cook anything).  A couple days later, all the animals start itching again, and Jeremy is picking fleas off the cat's head, holding them up to me to demonstrate how effective my first round battle was.

Step 2: Wal-Mart and New New Flea Meds
Back to Wal-Mart.  I hate Wal-Mart.  It takes me 15 mintues to get everything I need, then 25 minutes to actually get out of the store. Only 2 lines out of like 20 are open, and both are overflowing. None of the express check out lines are open, so I sigh and head to the self-check out, which is also overflowing, but I figure it will be quicker.  Or not.  The stupid self-check out kept having fits--either it claimed I didn't put an item in the bag in that stupid, female, electronic voice, or it suddenly wanted a supervisor's override code, or . . . Pretty much every checkout was having its own set of fits (maybe female electronic woman was having pms?), so every time I needed the supervisor, she was busy trying to fix someone else's checkout.  I tried to amuse myself for the first 5 minutes, but in the self-check out, there's not a whole lot to do.  Basically, I stared into space, tried to remember song lyrics to stupid songs, calculated Pi. . .Then I got bored and just started punching random numbers into the supervisor code.  None of them worked; I didn't expect them to, but at least I was doing something.

Finally, after about an hour in Wal-Mart, I head home.  I'm armed with 2 different types of spray on flea meds, a flea powder (by this time I've exhausted every brand of flea drops at Wal-Mart), and a hydrocortisone spray for Audrey (in addition to all my beans and rice), who, by this point, has a lovely, furless hot spot near her butt.  Animals are all sprayed, which makes them very happy, and the itching calms down.  For a couple days.  Then the fleas are back, happy as can be, doing little acrobatic acts through the animals' fur, and everyone else in the house is miserable again.

Step 3: New New New Flea Meds and A Gigantic Slow Cooker
Luckily, I still had flea powder and another flea spray, so I give those a shot.  I pretty much have given up and decided none of these products are actually going to work.  I wash all the animal bedding, I wash all our bedding, and I hop online to PetSmart.  Time to give up and just order the expensive stuff.  Then I head to Overstock.  If I'm going to be making dog food, I definitely need a bigger crockpot (Okay, not really, but I can't resist new kitchen toys).  Maybe  I went a little overboard, but the thing is awesome.  It holds like 18 quarts, has settings for slow cooking, for roasting, for steaming.  It's gigantic!  Just think of all the dog food I can make at once!  I wonder if I can fit a whole turkey in there!   Jeremy says it looks like I'm preparing for a church dinner or something. (He's just lucky--I also saw a soft serve ice cream maker and a buffet style server that looked cool!)  In the meantime, I have to sit back and wait for all my new stuffs to come, which is not making the dogs itch any less. So, on to . .

Step 4: Apple Cider Vinegar, Essential Oils, and Nematodes
More research.  Lots and lots of research.  I started with home remedies for fleas.  I came across some that seemed pretty simple. Today I have to go to the store, buy some lemons, peel them, steep them in boiling water, then let them sit in the water overnight.  This is supposed to make a spray that, when sprayed on the animals, will repel the fleas.  Will it work? Probably not, but for the price of a couple of lemons, at least they will smell better.  Then there was mixing certain essential oils with water to make a spray (which, cannot be sprayed on cats, nor can you give cats unpasteurized apple cider vinegar, or garlic, all of which are supposed to work).

This led to further research: if you can make a spray for dogs with fleas, what about a human insect repellent.  Yep, you can do that to with another combination of essential oils.  Armed with my "recipes," a list of other items (the apple cider vinegar, brewers yeast with garlic), I hit VitaSource.com.  For about $25, I picked up the essential oils and the brewers yeast.  I figure, again, it wasn't too big of an investment, so if I mix up all the oils in a spray, the best case scenario will be that everyone in the house will be free of fleas, lice, ticks, and mosquitoes.  The worst case scenario is that everyone in the house smells like a combination of cintronella, cinnamon, eucalyptis, orange, and lavender.  I did refrain from purchasing the electric flea traps, just because each one was $17 and also required that you buy the "flea pads" to put on them.  I also refrained from purchasing the live nematodes that you simply water into the ground and then let eat the fleas--although, I was very tempted (Jeremy just groaned at me when I sent him that link.  He groans at me a lot).  I should have been set, right?  But no, I could stop there. . .

Step 5: Dog Food Recipes
What if the dogs weren't getting adequate nutrition from the dog food I was making?  This led to hours and hours of research.  Research on how much to feed the dogs.  According to the first site I hit, I was malnourishing the dogs, which sent me into a panic.  It also claimed that I should be feeding Jack like 7 or 8 cups of food per day.  Even with my new slow cooker, I'd still be preparing dog food every other day!  So, adequately panicked that I was starving and depriving our dogs, the next 4 hours were spent on homemade dog food research, dog nutrition, dog food recipes. . . I couldn't stop! I now have a lovely, 50 page collection of dog food recipes and a list of the best ingredients for homemade dog food, along with a handy list of how much of their dog food needs to be meat, starch, and vegetable.

I finally realized I might have been doing a little overkill when I started adding up all the different comments people were making across the 1000 sites I hit.  Every single person had a different idea about what dogs need, and some of them were a bit, well, fanatical.  I have no idea why so many people are cooking and pureeing vegetables for their dogs.  The dogs do all have teeth, right?  And why are people feeding their dogs baby food?  I thought that was just supposed to be a celebrity fad diet, but I guess dogs are now in on the benefits too.  Then there's the people who feed their dogs nothing but raw food--I guess they haven't heard that they need to be pureeing the veggies.  I didn't even bother with that one.  I tried to feed the dogs the raw liver and bits from the turkey one year, and they just looked at me like what the hell is this?  I ended up having to cook them.  That and Audrey won't eat any raw vegetables except radishes.  The rest, she just sniffs disdainfully and walks away from.  There also was the site that said dogs need at least 40% of their meal to be meat.  It then  gave a sample recipe that included oats, brown rice, barley, carrots, broccoli, zucchini, and parsley, but no meat.  So pretty much, Jeremy boiled it down to me being obsessive compulsive again.  I spend hours pouring over this stuff, and he sums up my own conclusions without having looked at any of the "data."  I hate it when he does that.

I can tell you, though, that those people feeding their dogs lamb and rice all the time must have a lot of money--if I'm making lamb, it's gonna be for me.  Hmmm, maybe we could raise a sheep in the back yard!  Except I'd probably think it was cute, name it, and then Jeremy would be stuck with a pet sheep to add to our menagerie.  By the time I'm done researching, the new flea meds have finally arrived.  Every animal now gets a new set of flea meds, and I'm keeping my fingers crossed that this actually works!  Armed with my new set of ingredients, my new recipes, and my new "crock pot," which arrived yesterday, I set out make a new batch of dog food.  Depending on which site I go by, it will be enough to feed the dogs either a day or a week.  Finally, I'm done with all the animal stuff, I've done all the research I can--nothing left.  Until Jeremy brought up the fact it might be cheaper to buy dried beans and rice in bulk.  Hmmmm.

Step 6: Bulk Beans
Since we sort of live in the middle of nowhere, I decided it might be easier to order bulk dried beans and rice online.  This morning, I sat down and started researching. I pretty much found two ways of purchasing dried beans, neither of which are economical or practical.  There's the "gourmet/organic" route that wants to charge $8/lb!  What, are they magic beans?  If I plant some of them, can I climb a beanstalk and find treasures?  I'd spend $8/lb for that!  The second option is even better.  Apparently, there are tons of these "survivalist" type sites out there.  On these sites, you basically have to order like a metric ton of beans at once for like $1000.  On the plus side, shipping is free, and you will have your very own semi delivery of beans!  (In case you are wondering, one site is having a sale.  For a reduced price of $900, you can buy all the dried and canned food that you would need to survive for an entire year.  Or, as the site's handy chart breaks down, it's enough food for 2 people for 6 months, for 3 people for 4 months, etc.  I'm very glad they broke that down for me because I never would have figured it out otherwise).  I'm a little scared to think just who out there is ordering metric tons of food, especially considering that 1) they apparently can't be trusted to do basic math, and 2) even though it is dried, it does have a shelf life.  How could even one family go through a metric ton of beans in a year?  Where exactly does one store a metric ton of beans?  What do they do once their metric ton of beans starts rotting?  Could a metric ton of rotting beans release enough gas to start a fire?  (In fact, what type of gas does a metric ton of beans release?)

I contemplated just what one would do with a metric ton of beans.  The best thought I came up with was that if they were all mixed types, I might be able to call it modern art.  Sadly, I realized this would also require a building to cover the beans from the sun, or the beans would lose their colors.  To cover the cost of the beans and the building and the electricity, I would definitely have to charge an admission fee--probably a pretty hefty one.  But that would only last like a year, and then they'd start to rot.  If I came up with a really fancy/smartass title for it, something like "American Economy" or "Housing Bubble Burst," I might still be able to charge admission to my rotting metric ton of beans.  But then again, I am kind of in the middle of nowhere.  I doubt I can pull people a half hour off the interstate with a giant billboard touting (or should that be tooting?) "The World's Biggest Pile of Rotting Beans."  I guess I'll just have to give up that dream.  I think I need to give up any more research for now also!