I don't know what gross thing Dizzy ate from under the snow.

Sorry today's post is so late; it's a hectic day in a hectic week, and blogging is apt to be haphazard between now and Saturday. Bell, Book & Candle opens on Friday, I've got two manuscripts that must go back to their authors this week, and all the usual odds and ends for various clients.

And my alarm clock's broken; that is to say, Dizzy, who gets up at sunrise and generally wakes me up as well, although he's learned that I don't necessarily get up when he does any more. Nine years of having a morning dog has turned me into a morning person, more or less, and I rarely set an alarm any more, because Dizzy's so reliable.

This morning's sunrise came and went without any reporting from Dizzy. He was lying across my bedroom doorway when I woke up a little after 8:00 a.m., paws in the air, looking listless. He let me pet him, but did not follow me into the kitchen, even when I cracked open a couple of eggs.

Dizzy loves eggs, and gets to lick the bowl after I've scrambled them. He came when I called him, but only gave the bowl a token swipe, and then gave me a look as if I were trying to poison him. He wouldn't eat his breakfast; he took a cookie, and dropped it on the floor.

Bad, bad, scary stuff. Off to the vet we went.

They checked him, drew blood, got him to eat, made sure he was peeing, gave him some fluids. He seems okay; the vet's best theory is that he ate something nasty, which is now working its way through his system. Based on the noxious fumes coming from Dizzy's rear end all afternoon, I would say that is a safe bet.

We've had a lot of snow melt over the past several days, and Dizzy's been very interested in what's gotten left behind. The other morning I had to yank him away from something that looked like a flattened, dehydrated, salt-cured frog -- or possibly toad, I can't tell the difference -- but I don't think he managed to eat any of it before I pulled him off it. He might have. He's been burrowing in the softened snowbanks, and there's no telling what he's found.

I'm about to feed him dinner, and I hope he eats it. This is too worrying.