Trink's been walking funny off and on yesterday and today. There are times when it seems like the right hind joint right at the ankle is "stiff", which makes her gait a little odd... hard to describe, but not as smooth and flowing on that leg as the others, with possibly a bit of a swing out. And there has been a time or two that the leg just suddenly seems to not bear her weight at all, although that's when we are stepping up and down, like getting on/off a curb, into/out of the car, etc. so it's hard to tell if the leg isn't holding or if she just misjudged the footing. (She really seems to have no idea where her back feet are!) Human example would be when you think that you are at the bottom of the steps, but there is one more, so there's no ground where you expect it, and you do that tilt and sink as your foot keeps going.
The real difficulty is that she will be fine for most of the day, and then do this for just long enough for it to be noticeable, and then she's back to being fine. For example, she was fine at daycare today, did this on the way down the steps (did the leg not bearing weight at the very bottom step, and then the stiff footing across the lot) to the car, got home after a 30 minute drive, and then tore around the backyard like nothing ever happened. I don't see anything in her paws, and she doesn't seem to have any discomfort when I manipulate her legs or run my hands down them. She does have corns developing on her pads, which can sometimes make her gait odd, so that might be contributing to this. Or not.
If it was just the stiff foot, I'd probably put it down to just the results of a hard life at the track and the cold weather (we've had our first hard freezes these last two nights), but the leg not bearing weight bothers me. On the other hand, I was just at the vet Monday about an ear problem (we're treating for yeast, because she's been pawing it a lot and there were a few, and the vet says she just might be one of those dogs that is super-sensitive to them), and they did a brief check over, and she was fine then. Of course, the same is true for about 99% of today, too.
So.. thoughts? I'm not adverse to the vet, but it's sort of like the people with seizing dogs... if she is fine when she's there, then I'm not sure if it would be advantageous. I'd like to be able to make it a useful visit, so any advice on things I could do to provide useful information to the vet is appreciated.