Battle of the fleas

Ew, this morning when cuddling with Jake noticed not one, not two but *four* fleas on him! Then worse, we noticed a turd on the floor. He had not been out for his customary walk the night before. I couldn't walk him because I was by myself with Lauren, then I fell asleep before Ryan got home so I couldn't tell Ryan he needed to go out. Usually Jake will make this clear himself by whining and scratching and jumping in little circles, but he'd also fallen asleep. So I had a little pile to clean up this morning, luckily, without getting graphic on you guys, let's just say it could have been much worse and it didn't leave any stains.

Anyway, so this morning after the flea and turd discovery, Ryan took him over to the dog park and then to the groomer (we always reward him first with dog park for suffering through the grooming, plus we figure it's a great chance for him to get really sweaty and dirty first before his bath). On the way to the groomer, he threw up in Ryan's car. Meanwhile I was at home washing all of the bedding down to the matress pad in hot water, vacuuming, washing his dog bed and all of the blankets & towels in his kennel, etc. I had to clean that up when Ryan got home, and Jake ended up having to go in his kennel at home for several hours because the groomers could not take him until afternoon and we did not want the fleas to migrate to the freshly de-fleaed parts of the house. He got his flea bath and Ryan bought Advantage or Frontline (I haven't looked in the bag yet) and the whole bill cost $100. Ouch!

I am getting itchy thinking about fleas and of course it's psychosematic-he's probably had them for awhile and only now that I know of their existance I'm imagining little bites. But I betcha *you* are getting itchy just reading this!