Plastic Satellite Reception is Better.

Marley is fine from his procedure.

We can no longer nickname him Lance Ballstrong (he only had one ball drop).

I was afraid the vet make us make him wear one of those clear plastic collars. Every time I see an animal wearing one it makes me so sad--I think I have the strange ability to feel an animal's pain much easier than if I see a wound on a human (on a human, it just makes me gag...especially if it's my husband showing me his latest war wounds from the lawn).

They didn't give us one of those collars. They gave us a nicer one--covered in a nylon fabric.

The vet said he only needs to have it on when we're not watching him to make sure he doesn't lick himself down there (and he was already compelled to lick himself there before his procedure).

We took Marley downstairs and got situated in the car.

"I am so glad we didn't get one of those sad-looking plastic collars," I said as I looked at Marley, who looked like a wet, limp, noodle.

"Yeah, but I'll bet it doesn't get as good of reception," my husband said.

We took him home, took off the collar while he slept and we watched TV (okay, it's Simpsons on DVD because we cancelled cable because we're too poor to be financially raped by Comcast).

Later that night we put the collar back on before bed. And went to sleep.

For like, half an hour.

Do you remember when warm-up pants were in style? Remember the voosh-voosh-voosh noise they would make every time you took a step? Remember how annoying and noisy that was?

Yeah, try listening to that all night.

And try not to get upset because your dog is having mega issues with having something big, noisy, and inhibits his peripheral vision around his neck while he's in pain.

I only got about three hours of sleep, while my husband, the lighter sleeper of the two of us, got maybe 45 minutes.

Around 3am, I was awake enough, so I got out of bed, took Marley's collar off on the couch in the living room, and turned on The Simpsons.

He was asleep in half an hour. And after about an hour, so was I.

I woke up periodically to make sure he wasn't licking his wounds.

The vet called the next day to check on Marley. I told her about our sleepless night and asked her how long we'll need to have the collar on Marley.

"Whenever the wound heals, which should be anywhere from 10-14 days."

Wonderful.

So we made an effort to make Marley really tired that day, and he managed to sleep through the night, nylon satellite and all.