I love this story and cannot stop laughing as I picture Rufus full of King Cake and ready for the Mardi Gras party. Rufus and Sarah are the winners of the year supply of OptaGest and the Only Natural Pet Store/In Clover I Can't Believe I Ate the Whole Thing Contest.
Rufus by Sarah K.
It was Mardi Gras and we decided to have a party to celebrate. To follow tradition we planned to serve Hurricanes, Cajun food, and king cakes. We found everything we needed for the drinks, food, and cake...except for the plastic baby that was supposed to go into the cakes to determine who will provide next year's king cake and party. It seemed that all of the party shops around town were out of babies. They did, however, have little plastic cowboys and American Indians, complete with a tipi! We bought two packages just to be cheeky…now everyone would get a prize in their piece of king cake.
Not having much previous baking experience, I followed the recipe exactly. My 110-lb. Flat-Coated Retriever Rufus followed me around the kitchen, just hoping that I would drop something. No such luck! I baked two cakes because we were expecting a crowd. I carefully inserted the cowboys and American Indians (and the grand prize - the tipi!) strategically into the cakes and used the colorful icing to hide the small holes. My king cakes were beautiful! I placed them on decorative plates and put them in the middle of the island in my kitchen so they could continue to cool. I had about one hour to get ready so I went upstairs to shower.
After a short time I came back downstairs to marvel at my wonderful baked creations. As I walked into the kitchen, I did a double-take. There was only one wonderful baked creation on the island. I swore I put both of them on there, so I looked around to figure out where I put the other one. Then I saw it. The decorative plate that had previously held my gorgeous king cake was lying on the kitchen floor. And Rufus had purple icing on his eyebrow and green icing on his cheek. As things began to fall into place, I started searching everywhere for what was left of the king cake - I had 30 people arriving in 30 minutes and thought I could salvage part of it. Rufus thought this was great fun and chased me around the house until I realized there was no remaining king cake to be found. HE ATE THE WHOLE THING. I stopped dead in my tracks. AND HE ATE THE COWBOYS AND AMERICAN INDIANS. I didn't feel very cheeky now. I felt awful.
A call to the vet did little to help the situation. His advice? Let nature do its job. Rufus spent most of the party begging for food and doing tricks - obviously he wasn’t suffering from any ill effects from eating an entire king cake and multiple plastic figures. For the next week my family and I followed Rufus around the backyard checking for cowboys and American Indians. The pieces passed just like the vet said they would, and Rufus continued to be his usual miscreant self. He must really have wanted to win the prize because we never did find that tipi.
