Virtually family

[originally posted November 26, 2009] People who don’t blog on a topic that’s close to their hearts and who don’t have a Twitter community that provides important information as well as consolation and celebration might not understand this post. Then again, they likely won’t read it. This is for those who do understand, who feel…

Five training tips for traveling with your dog

[originally posted November 19, 2009] I was looking for something clever to title this guest post by Mary-Alice Pomputius and then realized I had one of those gems that doesn’t need a flashy setting. This interesting, informative article does exactly what the title says: gives five great training tips to help you travel successfully with…

Dinner at the Dog Dominance Cafe

Honestly, I was planning to forgo all negativity, to stop writing posts with clever — but hostile — titles about a certain TV personality. I was planning to — and still will, I promise — write about how to find a good dog trainer. Then, yesterday, someone posted a link on Twitter to a dog…

Dog Breeding & Its Discontents, Part 1

The other day I got into a mini-argument on Twitter –well, in 140 characters it’s got to be pretty short — with a dog breeder who extolled the virtues of “hobbyists” as opposed to “professionals.” The tweeter proclaimed that hobbyists breed dogs for love whereas professionals do it for money, making the former preferable to…

Bad to the bone

Frankie was in a funk. Why wasn’t he getting the media attention he deserved, he wondered, after his stellar YouTube debut? I told him I tried again to get him into PeoplePets.com on Twitter, sending them a link of him in full cowboy regalia. I was sure that smug head turn at the end would…

Banning Puppy Mills/Farms: What Can Twitter Do?

This is not a rhetorical question. It came to mind because someone on Twitter this morning suggested linking #woofwednesday with #banpuppyfarming or #banpuppymills campaigns. For those not familiar with these weekly rituals, #woofwednesdays are a way to say hey to others in the dog tweeting community or to recommend them to others (the # indicates…