January 2009 Archives

Hey everyone! Just posting here to let you know that the Valley of the Dogs blog has moved. Come on over HERE to read all about the animals, laugh at funny animal-related videos and keep up on the latest in animal products, news and much much more. The blog isn't completely up to speed just yet but I'm getting there.

See you at another place in cyberspace!

Simone

This is just a brief farewell until we meet again somewhere else in cyberspace. Unfortunately today is my last day working at the Daily News. Through it all I have met and worked with some of the most amazing people. And I can't express just how much I loved doing this blog. Through this blog I got to meet and help out so many people and animals. In fact I just heard that Lucky got adopted!

I have learned so much in these past seven years and I will definitely take that experience wherever I go.

And just so you know...I have every intention to continue blogging about pets. I'm not sure what the blog will be called or when it will start. It may still be called Valley of the Dogs or I may call it something else. Who really knows! All I know is this blogging thing is extremely fun and rewarding at the same time.

If you'd like to keep in touch please email me HERE!

Lucky! The Golden Retriever!

Here's another email forwarded to me about yet another dog that needs a home. Take a look at it. I realize that this dog is in Orange County, but if you're looking for a Golden then here's your chance.

Hello All,

Susan

India, the first cat died this weekend.

Okay I know the Bush presidency ends in two weeks (no comment on how I feel about that) but this is very sad:

First Cat Runs Out of Lives

"The President, Mrs Bush, Barbara and Jenna are deeply saddened by the passing of their cat, India," Laura Bush's press secretary, Sally McDonough, said.

Wow! Was she ever beautiful! And what a great long life!!

It's already Jan. 6, 2009 and chances are you may have broken a resolution or you may have not started them up yet (like me with my plan to go back to weight watchers and to continue training for that marathon in March). Why not make goals instead of resolutions?! And what better way than to learn lifetime goals from your dog.

"Dogs have a lot to teach us about reaching our goals," says New York Times best-selling author Peggy McColl. Her book Be a Dog with a Bone (Hay House; January 2009) is out this month. Here are the Top Ten Suggestions for reaching those resolutions as suggested by our four-legged friends:

1. What is your bone--what is your goal? A dog knows a good bone when he sees one and goes for it. As you consider each of your New Year's resolutions, chomp on your goal, chewing it over, then grab hold and ignore that little voice that says you can't. Be a dog with a bone!

2. Be a little dog with a big dog attitude. Don't think small. Dream big! Be excited about your goal, feel entitled to achieving it, and experience the feelings you'd feel if you'd already reached it. Confidence, knowing that you can feel like a winner, will help you achieve your goal. Think about how those little lap dogs are so quick to bark at a big German shepherd!

3. Get out of the doghouse. Be courageous and believe in yourself. See challenging times as a terrific opportunity to leave behind the security of what you once knew and look again at what you might create for yourself. Dogs like to have their own, cozy doghouse, but they also are willing to explore new places and new things, and sniff around!

Got this email from my friend Connie from dream dogs.

Hi Everyone,

Herman the English Bulldog is sitting in the South LA shelter just waiting for a new home. His ID number is: A1001103. Visit LA Animal Services for more information (Click on the south central shelter). PLEASE CONTACT THE SHELTER FOR INFO ON HIM. CALL FIRST BEFORE GOING DOWN TO SEE IF HE'S STILL AVAILABLE.

His email plea was forwarded to me so I know nothing about Herman other than he needs a whole lot of love in his life right now and a fabulous forever home. So, go and do the right thing....adopt him if your able and give him the loving, caring home he needs or please pass this email on to all you know with the hope that someone out there is looking for a dog like Herman.

Here's his information from the website:

HERMAN - ID#A1001103
My name is Herman and I am a neutered male, brown and white English Bulldog mix.
The shelter thinks I am about 6 years old.
I have been at the shelter since Dec 11, 2008.

Got this email from someone at Dream Dogs LA. If you know someone who would like to adopt a beautiful Weimaraner then look no further!

Okay it's no longer New Year's Day but that doesn't mean you can't start your New Year's resolutions now. I mean I actually plan to start eating less on Sunday (Jan. 4) because I'm going to a big Birthday Shindig tomorrow night. Can't waste the food...eh? Plus who else is there to finish up the half-jug of eggnog still in our refrigerator. Might as well enjoy it!

Anyway I just read a list of New Year Resolutions for Dogs at our sister blog Southbay Pets and thought...hmmm...there must be one out there for cats. I can just see Hershey and Marcie as they contemplate some of the things on this list (thank God I don't have a hamster or fish). Not sure if they'll keep these though:

Cat's New Year's Resolutions

1. My human will never let me eat her pet hamster, and I am at peace with that.
2. I will not puff my entire body to twice its size for no reason after my human has finished watching a horror movie.
3. I will not slurp fish food from the surface of the aquarium.
4. I must not help myself to Q-tips, and I must certainly not proceed to stuff them down the sink's drain.
5. I will not eat large numbers of assorted bugs, then come home and puke them up so the humans can see that I'm getting plenty of roughage.
6. I will not lean way over to drink out of the tub, fall in, and then pelt right for the box of clumping cat litter. (It took FOREVER to get the stuff out of my fur.)...This never happened to me but my cats have stuck their paws in the drinking water and then used the litter box.
7. I will not stand on the bathroom counter, stare down the hall, and growl at NOTHING after my human has finished watching The X-Files.
8. I will not fish out my human's partial plate from the glass so that the dog can "wear" it and pretend to be my human. (It is somewhat unnerving to wake up, roll over in bed, and see the dog grinning at you with your own teeth.)
9. I will not use the bathtub to store live mice for late-night snacks...Thank God I don't have to worry about this one as my cats are indoor-only.
10. I will not drag dirty socks up from the basement in the middle of the night, deposit them on the bed and yell at the top of my lungs (Burmese LOUD yowling) so that my human can admire my "kill."
11. I will not perch on my human's chest in the middle of the night and stare into her eyes until she wakes up....yes that is a prominent ritual in our house.
12. We will not play Herd of Thundering Wildebeests Stampeding Across the Plains of the Serengeti over any human's bed while they're trying to sleep...Hershey are you listening?
13. Screaming at the can of food will not make it open itself...again Hershey are you listening?
14. I cannot leap through closed windows to catch birds outside. If I forget this and bonk my head on the window and fall behind the couch in my attempt, I will not get up and do the same thing again...Hershey? (she's actually done this with a squirell that was perched on the tree outside our window)
15. I will not assume the patio door is open when I race outside to chase leaves.
16. I will not back up off the front porch and fall into the bushes just as my human is explaining to his girlfriend how graceful I am.
17. I will not complain that my bottom is wet and that I am thirsty after sitting in my water bowl.
18. I will not intrude on my human's candle-lit bubble bath and singe my bottom.
19. I will not stick my paw into any container to see if there is something in it. If I do, I will not hiss and scratch when my human has to shave me to get the rubber cement out of my fur.
20. If I bite the cactus, it will bite back.
21. It is not a good idea to try to lap up the powdered creamer before it dissolves in boiling coffee.
22. When I am chasing my tail and catch my back leg instead, I will not bite down on my foot. This hurts, and my scream scares my human.
23. When it rains, it will be raining on all sides of the house. It is not necessary to check every door.
24. Birds do not come from the bird feeder. I will not knock it down and try to open it up to get the birds out.
25. I will not stuff my rather large self into the rather small bird feeder (with my tail hanging out one side) and expect the birds to just fly in.
26. I will not teach the parrot to meow in a loud and raucous manner.
27. The dog can see me coming when I stalk her. She can see me and will move out of the way when I pounce, letting me smash into floors and walls. That does not mean I should take it as a personal insult when my humans sit there and laugh.
28. Yes, there are still two very large dogs in the backyard. There have been for several years. I don't have to act as if I've just discovered the Demon Horror of the Universe each time one of them appears in my window.
29. I will not play "dead cat on the stairs" while people are trying to bring in groceries or laundry, or else one of these days, it will really come true.
30. When the humans play darts, I will not leap into the air and attempt to catch them.
31. I will not swat my human's head repeatedly when she's on the family room floor trying to do sit ups.
32. When my human is typing at the computer, her forearms are *not* a hammock...Hershey are you listening?
33. Computer and TV screens do not exist to backlight my lovely tail...but how about Hershey's entire self?
34. I am a walking static generator. My human doesn't need my help installing a new board in her computer.
35. I will not bring the city police to the front door by stepping on the speaker phone button and then the automatic 911 dial button.
36. I will not speed dial the overseas numbers.
37. I will not walk on the keyboard when my human is writing important emiognaioerp ga3qi4 taija3tgv aa35 a.
38. Any critter that lives in the house (hamsters), stay in the house and any wild critters (frogs and earthworms) stay outside. I am not allowed to set the hamster free in exchange for finding a frog to put in the fish tank.
39. I will not stalk the deer in the apple orchard next door. They have sharp hooves and could hurt me if they weren't laughing so hard.
40. I will not watch the guinea pig constantly as the guinea pig likes to sleep once in a while.
41. The goldfish likes living in water and should be allowed to remain in its bowl.
42. I will not put a live mole in my food bowl and expect it to stay there until I get hungry.
43. I will not eat spider plants and hallucinate behind the toilet.
44. I will not drag the magnets (and the papers they are holding up) off of the refrigerator and then bat them underneath it so that they adhere to the underside.
45. I will learn to relax at the vet's office so they will start writing things in my records like "Good Kitty" and "Sweet Kitty" instead of the stuff that's there now like "MEAN!!" "BITER!!!" and "GET HELP!!!!!"
46. I will not be miffed at my human all day and then kiss her on the nose at 2:00 a.m. to tell her that she is forgiven and can now pet me.
47. I will not scratch the children of lawyers, no matter how much they chase me or how hard they pull my tail.
48. If I MUST claw my human, I will not do it in such a fashion that the scars resemble a botched suicide attempt.
49. If I must give a present to my human's overnight guests, my toy mouse is much more socially acceptable than a big live cockroach, even if it isn't as tasty.
50. I will not soak my catnip toy in the water bowl to make tea. I will not get high and sit there drinking my tea and kneading the floor afterwards. I will not then get delusions of grandeur and make tea in the toilet bowl or the tub. And I will not try to make tea with used socks, dirty panties or hair scrunches when my humans take the catnip toy away from me....some of the Kitten Rescue cats need to read this! Hah!
A warm pepperoni pizza is not a good place for a nap.

yeah that's my first attempt at being funny in this new year we call 2009! But in all seriousness here is another pair of dogs that are looking for a forever home. Hopefully 2009 will be a great year for these two cuties!

Here's the email I got:

Jack and Jill are a supersweet puppy pair of terrier mixes who were found as strays and only too happy to jump into their rescuer's car. Jack, the white one, is around four-months-old and very precocious, yet also smart, charming and funny in that terrier way. Jill, the ginger mix, is a more mature one year-old and the shyer, quieter one of the two, but knows how and when to tell Jack to chill! Both Jack and Jill are friendly, frisky, affectionate and playful pups who keep each other company, wrestling on the floor as you relax on the sofa. Jack will amuse himself and you by tossing squeaky toys into the air or staring at the lights and noise of the TV, head tilted curiously. Jill will jump up and curl into your lap, content to enjoy a gentle voice and a scratch behind the ears.

They're still being crate trained and housebroken in their foster home, but we think they'll get the hang of it soon as they learned "come" and "sit" commands pretty quickly. Jack and Jill are also enjoying on-leash walks around the neighborhood, meeting bigger dogs and just checking out the smells, sights and sounds of the big, wide world.

It would be nice to keep the two together, since that's how they were found, but they can also be adopted separately - and may be better off that way, given their different personalities, for the right people.

Jack and Jill are up-to-date on their shots and healthy; however, they'll need to be spayed/neutered prior to or immediately after adoption. Please contact TIna at (323) 573-5172 or email her at Queentina@pacbell.net for more information.