Owners of diabetic dogs tend to be very food conscious – to put it mildly. It’s not just that a proper diet is needed to help regulate blood sugar. It’s also that diabetic dogs need to eat, period, so that their insulin can be administered. Without enough food in the system, there’s the danger of…
The First National Dog Party Day
Many of you probably know that today is Take Your Dog to Work Day, introduced in 1999 by Pet Sitters International. It’s not observed in our household, since Frankie gets to supervise my work flow year round. But as I discovered when I tried to make plans to get together in San Diego with my…
Found Animals: Megabucks – and a Mission
What would you do if you had a LOT of money and wanted to do good? If you’re reading this blog, odds are it has something to do with helping animals…maybe something grand like preventing the senseless killing of healthy animals by stemming pet overpopulation. All over the world. That’s what a billionaire surgeon, Dr.…
Pet Travel Planning, Pt. 3: Frankie’s Drug-Free Policy
Frankie and motorized vehicles don’t mix. From the start, he made it clear to me that not every dog eagerly jumps into a car, ready to ride. And nothing I have done in subsequent years has ever changed that. To wit: Taken him to places that he doesn’t hate in the car. Check. We go…
Pet Travel Planning, Pt. 2: The SturdiJet Carrier
As I mentioned in my last post, my pet travel guru is Mary-Alice Pomputius of DogJaunt.com. No one blogs with greater, more useful detail about traveling with a small dog, especially by plane, than Mary-Alice.* And if there is a higher title than guru — perhaps the Guru Queen? — that’s Mary-Alice on the subject…
Pet Travel Planning, Pt.1: Booking a Flight
As I mentioned in an earlier post, Frankie and I are flying to San Diego next week. You might think that, as a former full-time travel writer, I would take air travel in my stride. Have the right luggage, the perfect nonwrinkle outfits. Be able to go anywhere with just a vest, like Peter Shankman.…
Vet School Helps Pet Paralyzed in Joplin Tornado
No question, we need feel good stories. And fast. I just got one, via press release, about a wonderful thing the University of Missouri Veterinary Teaching Hospital did. So I’ll share it, post haste,* without spending hours trying to blog about it. MU Veterinary Team Helps Dog Paralyzed in Tornado Walk Again from MU News…
Wordless Wednesday: 6/15/2011
These Parisian pups Spanish Pulis *came to my attention via a rather circuitous route. My friend Vera Marie Badertscher, blogger at A Traveler’s Library and author of the wonderful new Quincy Tahoma: The Life and Legacy of a Navajo Artist (I’m sending you to the blog, where you’ll find two surprising dog-related reviews), sent me…
Austin Humane’s Awesome Ad Campaign
As regulars to this blog know, I run two series of pet-related public service announcements, one called Spay & Neuter with a Smile, the other Pet Adoption Videos That Don’t Make Me Want to Kill Myself. Both are inspired by my feeling that serious messages are often best conveyed with humor. Not everyone agrees and…
The Petties: Nominate Frankie the Funny
When I saw that it was time for Dogtime’s second annual pet blogger awards, I was planning to pretend that I wasn’t the slightest bit interested. The competition is so daunting that I couldn’t imagine being chosen “best” in any category. But then I saw there was a new category this year, funniest blog or…