Do you hate when people anthropomorphize their pets?

It’s friggin cold. We went and got the dogs’ hair cut on Sunday. PROPERLY this time, by a groomer who actually knew what she was doing and ACTUALLY CUT BOTH DOGS’ HAIR. Wait. Let me start this again.

Last groomer:
Both dogs got a bath.
Doozer got some half-assed haircut where he had all these little bits of long fur that she missed sticking out everywhere and I had to go over him again and snip off those little pieces and she didn’t get the fur out of his eyes at all.
Sprocket got his “mustache” and topknot hacked at. And that’s all. Well. Look here. Although he was supposed to get an all-over haircut, she just said “Oh I couldn’t, he has such beautiful long fur!”. Yeah, he had long fur. And it was nice. But it was also matting underneath from being in the snow and if she had cut it then it would have been manageable.
Did she cut either of their nails? No, she did not.
Did she even cut the hair on Sprocket’s butt so that his poops wouldn’t stick to it? NO SHE DID NOT.
Did the dogs leave there traumatized and acting as though they’d been beaten with a barcode scanner? Yes they did. And when I picked them up, did she give me a long list of things that were wrong with my dogs (they’re too wiggly! Doozer barked! Sprocket whined when I was trimming his face!) to make up for the absolutely terrible job she did on their grooming? Oh, yes. Yes she did.

Did I pay her $100 because I was a n00b and can’t handle confrontation? Oh, what do you think? Yeah, you know I did.

It got to the point that no matter how much we brushed him, Sprocket was getting totally knotted on his belly and under his legs, and I’m sure it was becoming painful for him. We definitely didn’t want to take them back to the same person, for obvious reasons. I noticed that their breeder had become a Facebook fan of a certain groomer, so I went over and checked out her website. It turns out that she’d just started her own business, although she’d been grooming her own special-needs dogs for years, and was accepting new clients. I took a look at some of her before and after pictures and they looked good, so Rob went ahead and made an appointment.
The first thing the dogs did when we got there was pee on her floor (Doozer later had an unfortunate pooping incident which he does not wish for me to detail here) and she was fine with it (the other lady tsk’ed at me) saying that it was because of the smell of other dogs, not because they were badly trained.

It took her about 4 hours to finish up both dogs, because she takes her time and lets them have “breaks” to make sure they’re not getting fed up or overstimulated. She had to completely shave down Sprocket (his belly was *really* badly matted) and only did a little trimming on Doozer (face and butt and feet) because that’s what we asked her to do. They both got their nails cut and their uh, “sanitary area” clipped (again, Doozer wishes for no details to be given on this, but Sprocket says “Dude, it’s the truth – when you shave it it does look bigger!”), their ears cleaned, as well as a bath and a blueberry facial (yeah I don’t even know). And for both dogs, even *with* Sprocket’s extra shaving needs, it cost $25 less than the other lady ($30 for Doozer and $45 for Sprocket). Which is really, really good. And they weren’t traumatized when they left. And the lady gave them each a report card (apparently they were “very well behaved little angels”) and some free cookies.

So, all in all this was a very positive experience compared to the last time. Of course now we have wind chill warnings in effect and Sprocket is not happy going outside because he’s totally nude. I put two sweaters on him and he tries to deal but he is always very glad to get back in the house.

Oh, and Doozer? He wants you to know that he’s 100% brave of the coldness, unlike his “wussy” brother. His words, not mine.