KnobNotes: A Curious Blend of the Humorous and Helpful

The Demise of the Purebred Dog? An Editorial Rant

2011-12-12T17:38:00.000-08:00

Earlier today, I read that in a Canadian Kennel Club member referendum in which less than 20% of its members voted, the majority voted to remove the word "purebred" from all Canadian Kennel Club by-laws, information and mission statement.

There were additional amendments which can be seen here, including one which stipulates that no one will be allowed to breed dogs that do not conform to their breed standard. For now, I’m commenting on the removal of the word “purebred.” And my reaction is this:

I am flat out astonished. Flabbergasted, really.

I was hopeful that the forum in which I first read the ruling – a show dog e-mail list – would be flooded with expressions of disgust from equally outraged fanciers. As of now, there’ve been few remarks. And this concerns me as much as the ruling itself. The fancy as we know it is doomed if the people most active in it can't muster an expression of disgust.

In response to the referendum, I wrote: “Allow me to share some views that came as a rude awakening to me. They were learned after I got more seriously involved in writing a blog and attended a few media and blogging events. There are Shelter and Rescue people out there, really good people - most of them, who think the Animal Rights people are nuts. And that's great. They also think that breeders, all breeders, are evil. Not so great. In their world, the only good purebred dog is a rescue purebred dog. With several media and blogging events now under my belt, I've come to decide that the word "rescue" is said so often in front of a breed name that it's becoming a breed unto itself. Rescue Beagle. Rescue Shepherd. Rescue Shar-Pei.

     If we in the fancy thought our sport was in trouble before, what the Canadians have done is a forecast of things to come here. Think I'm wrong? Did you ever think you'd see the day when mixed breeds were accepted by the AKC in performance events? Has anyone noticed that on its web site, the AKC now says, "We are more than champion dogs. We are the dog's champion." The word "purebred" which USED to appear there quietly slipped away. What Canada has done is a clarion call for more of us to get off our butts and become more active in whatever way is do-able for each of us or we won't be referring to our breeds when posting a question here - we won't be ALLOWED to. Control the language and you control thought.

     Since getting into the blog thing, I've noticed how few purebred dog bloggers who are active in the fancy there really are. I know why this is. We're busy. We're working with our dogs, we're breeding them, showing them, training them, doing therapy and rescue and field work with them. I suspect our reasoning is that someone else will do the heavy lifting while we do our part by being responsible fanciers.

     It's not enough anymore.

     Not everyone has the time to attend meetings, show up at auctions, do breed rescue, write a blog. But we can become more vocal in our opposition to what's happening to us. Introduce yourself to your local shelter and put a face to the term, "purebred fancier or responsible breeder." Go on Twitter and Facebook, denounce the movement underfoot. Opposing purebreds is the new racism. If you're already doing it, awesome. If not, what would it take?

     You bet I'm worked up.

A response to my post soon followed, and the writer was spot on when she suggested that evidently only 20% of Canadian members felt the issue important enough to elicit their vote, and that if the remaining 80% are angry about the results, they have only themselves to blame for not having voted at all.

That, too, concerns me. Isn’t this apathy exactly what’s happening in our own country right now?

The tables have turned. A purebred dog, once a status symbol for one’s station and affluence in life, is now an indictment of elitism and suggests a lack of sensitivity on the part of the owner to the every-man. Tacit in the ownership of a mixed (or rescue) breed is the understanding that they are somehow nobler than the purebred dog owner. They care more. They’re more egalitarian. They didn’t shop. They adopted.

This is a new kind of elitism.

Not all mixed breed owenrs are like this of course, but it's a pervasive sentiment in many circles, and it's growing.

Relegating “mutts” to the masses while the pedigreed dog enjoyed social status are two ends of a social spectrum separated by about 100 years. And it took about that long to flip the equation. Neither extreme suits me. In a country so concerned about choice, isn’t owning a purebred dog bought from an actual responsible breeder also a choice? The reality is that it is, but one that is increasingly becoming frowned upon. And this means that there’s no choice at all if one wants to be regarded on equal footing as the person who chooses an equally loveable mutt. Why can’t we each have what we want without it meaning anything more than that we love dogs? Some of us need or want predictability in the puppies we get. We like knowing what that puppy will look like as an adult. How big will she get? What kind of temperament can we expect to have? Is the dog going to be too active, or not active enough?

What is especially maddening to me is that this “change in fortunes” regarding mixed vs. purebred dogs isn’t being done TO us. As a fancy, we’re imploding from within. It was Canadian members who voted to remove the term “purebred” from their language. It was the AKC which voted in mixed breeds to participate in performance events. The Canadians explained their action this way:

Explanation for Amendment: As set out in the Explanation for Proposed Amendment #3 in which it is proposed that the word “purebred” be removed from the definition of dog, this amendment broadens the Club’s mandate to speak for all dogs in terms of the work we are doing in areas such as legislation and canine health, and even the transportation industry which impacts all dogs. This amendment also opens the opportunity for the Club to set-up a separate division to deal with non-purebred dogs in which these dogs would be allowed to participate in performance events (i.e.non-conformation events).

In the back of my mind, I can’t help but wonder if it’s possible that the Canadian Kennel Club and the AKC are really the visionaries here. They’ve seen the proverbial writing on the wall which suggests that the day is coming when it‘s not purebreds versus mixed breeds, it’ll be about dog owners versus everyone. If I’m right, it would seem that the Animal Rights people are on track to fulfill their goal of obliterating dog ownership altogether.

And we’ve helped.

My next blogs will be coming from Florida where I'll be attending the AKC Eukanuba National Dog Show. I'll see you on the other side.

From Milanos to Mukluks: One Woman's Journey to the Eukanuba Dog Show

2011-12-10T19:45:00.000-08:00

Ada Blackjack

In 1921, a 25 year old Eskimo woman named Ada Blackjack was in search of a husband and an income. Seeing an opportunity, she agreed to be the cook and seamstress for a secret Arctic expedition to colonize the desolate Wrangel Island for Great Britain. Instead of finding a marriageable man or money, she became the sole survivor of a harrowing adventure in which none of her male companions survived. After two years utterly alone, she was finally rescued. It’s a remarkable story of an unlikely city girl finding herself in a polar world surviving only by her wits.

I read Ada’s story a few years ago and was reminded of her when I heard about Zoya DeNure and that she would be at Eukanuba.

Iditarod racer, Zoya DeNure

Zoya, an Iditarod “musher,” (her first Iditarod was in 2008) lives in Alaska with her husband, John, and their three year old daughter, Jona, They take in unwanted Alaskan Huskies – shelter and rescue dogs, many of them, and rehabilitate them with a positive training program. Most have been turned into racing dogs who are part of her team or are placed with an appropriate musher where they can do what they love to do: run. It is an unlikely life for someone who not that long ago was an international fashion runway model and record label representative.

Zoya says, "I’m racing to make a difference in the sport, to improve dog care on the trail and in the yard using positive race training that works for every sled dog, young or old. I’d like to get more families and kids involved in our sled dog rescue efforts and interactive programs year-round.”

On the cover of
Mushing Magazine

But how does a girl from Wisconsin find herself in Alaska just off the Denali Highway by way of high fashion houses of Europe? I hope to find out next week when I attend the AKC Eukanuba National Dog Show in Orlando where Zoya will be visiting the Eukanuba Breeder Booth. If you have any questions for to me pose to Zoya, you know where to find me: KnobNots@KnobNots.com. Remember that Eukanuba won’t be televised until February 4, 2012, so check in on my blog often, become a fan on Facebook, or follow me on Twitter (@KnobNots) to get group results as they happen.

Loading Straw for the Huskies

One of Zoya's Cover Shots

Now Zoya models with her dogs

Mushing in Alaska

Loading Eukanuba Dog Food for her dogs

Zoya from her modeling days

A "shoot" with one of her dogs

Hang Nails with Hang Time? A Product Review that Might Help

2011-12-08T13:08:00.000-08:00

Yu-Be Moisturizing Skin Cream

I know very few people whose hands don’t tell a story. Age, stress levels, diet, grooming – it’s all there as every aspect of our hands reveals something about us. That said, a universally nagging problem whether we neglect our hands or pamper them is dry hands and hangnails.

Back in the day, I had (I thought) attractive hands and long, stylish nails, but even then I battled dry cuticles. Washing dogs, schlepping crates at dog shows, and living and playing in the dry Rocky Mountain climate made it seem inevitable. Then I took up road cycling; There is no good way to change a flat tire and emerge with nice hands, so I bid the long nails good-bye and welcomed even WORSE hang nails. They looked bad and hurt worse - and nothing I tried helped.

Today, I’m reviewing a cream that came recommended to me a few weeks ago. It wasn’t sent to me, I paid for it. And because it’s been the first thing to actually improve my own dry hands and hang nails, I’m passing it along. Like me, many of you are dog people and we are notoriously hard on our hands. Groomers and exhibitors, take special note, but know that as with any product, your results may vary and you should read the ingredients (coming further down) to ensure that you’re not allergic to any of them.

Yoshikiyo Nowatari

“Yu-Be” Moisturizing Skin Cream is made in Japan, the invention of a young pharmacist named Yoshikiyo Nowatari who formulated it back in 1957. He chose to sell it as a "medicated" cream so families would know it was for tough, dry skin and not a "beauty", "wrinkle" or "anti-aging" treatment. Yu-Be has since become the #1 selling skin cream in Japan and was even used by Sumiyo Tsuzuki on her face as she became the first Japanese woman to ever summit Mt. Everest from the more difficult "Northern Ridge" (the China/Tibet side) AND the first Japanese woman to ever ski to the lowest point on Earth, the South Pole in Antarctica.

Sumiyo Tsuzuki with a tube of Yu-BE
hanging off her neck from a shoe lace

The cream contains Glycerin, Water, Isopropyl Myristate, Stearic Acid, Glyceryl Stearate SE, Triethanolamine, Tocopheryl Acetate (Vitamin E), Glycyrrhetinic Acid, Camphor, Riboflavin (Vitamin B2), Hydrogenated coco-glycerides, Stearyl Alcohol, Polysorbate 80, EDTA, Methylparaben – and note that it does NOT contain sun block or any SPF protection

Yu Be is the first skin product I’ve used to contain camphor, so perhaps it's the camphor that has made the difference. There is a slight camphor odor when the cream is first applied, but it quickly disappears. The cream is Glycerin-based and is also enriched with Vitamin E and Vitamin B2.

The stuff is not inexpensive. My 1.25 ounce tube was $16 at Sephora but I’ve seen it for less on Amazon.com and Ebay. It comes in a jar as well as a tube, and there is an assortment of other products at Yu-Be’s web site. You can also request a free sample there, but you’ll have to pay a $4.95 shipping and handling fee.

The cream is an all-purpose product and can be used on all areas of your body, including your face and lips.

I give "Yu-Be" a hang-nail-free “thumbs up.’

How Anthropologie Led Me to a Criminal Life

2011-12-06T19:24:00.000-08:00

This is the dress I bought from Anthropologie.

I'd been admiring it for a long time, especially because of the detailed lacing on the back. There's something so............oh, I don't know..........so "Tom Jones" about it. Saucy barmaids in British period movies wear lace up bustiers and they always have more fun than the other female characters combined. They're bawdy and mouthy, and secretly, I always thought I'd make a good one. With this dress, I could tap into my inner wench. And yeah, so the laces are on the back. And it has long sleeves. And there's no cleavage. My dress. My fantasy.My blog.

But do you see something wrong with it?

This is the dress I bought from Anthropologie that almost became the dress I was wearing in my mug shot following my first criminal arrest. I didn't steal the dress, though what I paid for it on sale felt like robbery.

Do you see it yet - the "thing" that's wrong?

This dress I bought from Anthropologie is a "girly girl" kind of dress. With its flouncy skirt, I would be able to put my hands in its pockets and swish and sway and twirl and flutter about. Only I would be a wench, and wenches don't flutter. They have raucous repartee with dashing men in shirts open to their first rib who only want one thing and I wouldn't care because I was a wench.

And if you haven't seen "it" by now, here's a close up.

It's a store security tag, known in the "biz" as an EAS or check point 'UFO" tag, and it was left on the dress after I bought it and walked out the door.

Sure, an alarm went off as I left the store. I figured it was for the customer entering the store with a return, probably with its security tag attached. "Putz," I snorted to myself. I thought nothing of it and went home to gloat over my shopping acumen.

As it happens, I wore the dress the next day. I attended a brunch, and after the brunch, I ran errands. And that's where my troubles began.

See, an EAS tag contains a miniature circuit with a diode that will burn out when a store clerk passes the tag through a demagnetizing device. If it is not swiped, the tag will emit radio waves in response to the transmitter at the door where a receiver opposite it will detect it and sound an alarm. Basically, these tags communicate using Radio Frequency and a lot of stores use them. Including most of the stores I visited after the brunch. And yes, I looked all this up.

"Target" thought nothing of the beeps I set off as I entered the store. Security at Target listens for beeps when someone is LEAVING the store, as I did 20 minutes later. But as I carried no purse, no bags, and wasn't wearing a coat, security virtually ignored me.

Then it was on to the mall. As I left one store and entered the next, I left a series of beeps and alarms in my wake. I was oblivious. I felt pretty good in my new dress - saucy, even, when a plain clothed security guard stopped me at the door of a high end clothing store. "You're going to have to come with me," he said.

"That's it? That's your best pick up line?" I shot back. Remember now. I was a wench. I gave as good as I got.

He wasn't amused and took my elbow. Now I wasn't amused. Wench or no wench, this was the year 2011 and there are certain protocols in place for hitting on women. I was, you see, a MODERN wench.

And I still didn't "get it."

By now we were joined by store clerks looking for a distraction to break their boredom. "She's been lurking around the designer clothes," said one catty eyed lady. "She was in the plus size area, too," added the other. Ouch. This was so not true.

In my defense, I pointed out that it's how I shop. I look at things, I walk around, and then I look at some more things.

The security guard listened carefully. "You set off the alarm," he said. "You must be wearing something with a security tag on it." I invited the store clerks to look at what I was wearing and tell the man that nothing I was wearing was from their store. "Then it must be under your dress," he said with the levity of a heart attack.

In the 1963 movie, "Tom Jones," there are lots of tankards of beer, a lot of turkey legs, several wagons containing loose straw and a ton of winking. I'm certain there wasn't one strip search conducted by security personnel in a dingy room with the police waiting on the other side of the door. Where was Albert Finney when I needed him?

When I felt tugging at my dress, I thought to myself, "OhmyGod, they're not even going let me undress in private." To my relief, however, I saw that it was a third store clerk who held up a corner of my dress in her hand and said to the others, "She's still got the UFO tag on her dress. THAT'S what set off the alarm."

Putting a good face on it: Removing the tag

Disappointed that there would be no arrests being made that day, my small entourage evaporated back into racks of clothing. As I left the mall, I wrapped my girly skirt around my legs and waddled as far away from store entrances as possible. The next day, I returned the dress to Anthropologie and explained what had happened.

The store manager was mortified. And apologetic. And mortified some more. She didn't offer to give me the dress for free, but she did mollify me by allowing me to take a picture of her removing the tag. "See," I told her, "people never believe that this stuff happens to me. I need proof."

And now you have it.

My shopping weakness

The Road to Eukanuba: Meet the Future of the Dog Fancy

2011-12-05T08:50:00.000-08:00

In a couple of weeks, I'll be heading to the AKC/Eukanuba dog show in Orlando where I intend to check in on the future of my sport.

I won't be visiting a high tech booth demonstrating robotic handlers capable of performing a flawless triangle;

I won't be consulting with geneticists on track to construct the perfect dog;

And I won't be learning about a microchip that, once implanted in the brain stem of a judge, renders that judge incapable of error;

I'll be watching kids.

Jackie Kennedy and her dog,
"Hootchie" at the East Hampton Show,
her first dog show

For those of you already in the sport, skip ahead, you already know this next part. But for the benefit of you newer to the dog fancy, I want to you meet the junior handler.

He or she is a kid between the ages of nine and eighteen. They, or someone in their family, owns the dog they show (they have to). To qualify at Eukanuba, they'll have had to have maintained a 3.0 grade average for two semesters before entries closed and earned five first place wins in an Open class.

And when they're in the show ring, it's not their dog that's being judged, it's them.

Walk by a junior showmanship ring and you'll see a ring filled with different breeds handled by youngsters or teenagers. The procedure they must follow is the same as it is in conformation competition. The ring patterns are the same, the individual examination of each dog is the same.

What a judge sees, however, is the quality of a junior's presentation of their dog. Are they showing their dog in a manner appropriate for that breed? Is the dog groomed and presented well? Do they show "a hand" for the dog when presenting it, or are they over or under handling it. Does does the junior handler address the judge with respect, eye contact and a pleasing posture that showcases their dog? Does the junior know their breed, know ring procedure, know ring etiquette or what to do if there's a gaffe in the ring? (a dog relieving himself, for example).

While a judge DOES watch the dog, it's only to further assess the dog's handler: Is the dog responsive to its handler? Do dog and handler work as a team? Is the dog being moved to the best of its ability? Does the handler know not to put himself between the judge and his dog? Is the handler adroitly accentuating the dog's strengths while minimizing its faults? And how is the junior handler dealing with the other dogs and handlers in the ring?

It's a lot to remember for anyone, let alone a kid.

Harder to see are the intangibles: Lessons learned about sportsmanship, winning and losing, developing a work ethic while learning to balance homework, sports, chores and family with dog shows and the preparation that goes into it.

Another intangible: Children learning how to navigate in the world of adults. If it's true that showing dog is the only sport in which amateurs compete with professionals. then it's also the only sport in which children can compete against adults. Undertand that Junior Showmanship is competition among juniors, but these same kids often compete in regular breed classes against the grown ups.

I won't go into the times I've been bested by a ten year old in the group ring. Nope. let's not go there.

Junior handling is no less competitive than adult competition. Junior handlers are terrific kids and by and large, are good sports. The few that aren't have either been influenced by a pushy adult, or they've lost sight of what's important. Sometimes, witnessing a competitor's loss and subsequent tears is enough to bring them around. Sometimes, being sensitive to a tragedy in the life of a competitor or in a community trumps grandiose dreams of winning. Back in my daughter's own junior handling days, a couple of her fellow competitors were students at Columbine High School when the shootings occurred. We adults were humbled by what we saw in and outside the junior handling ring at the first dog show following that horrible day. There were tears, there were hugs, and the supportive bond between former arch rivals gives me goosebumps to this day. Now in their late 20s,these kids still stay in touch.

8 year old Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy with
her Great Dane, 'King Phar,' during
the 35th annual dog show at the Long Island Kennel Club,
Seawane Club, Hewlett Harbor, New York.
(Photo by Morgan Collection/Getty Images)

Statistically, I don't know how many junior handlers will stick with the sport into adulthood, but the lessons they learn will serve them into their adult lives. For some, a spectacular future may await: Last year's Best in Show winning Scottish Deerhound at Westminster was handled by Angela Lloyd, the first Best Junior Handler at Westminster (1998) to go Best in Show there. Others who stay in the fancy will most assuredly be the future of the sport, if not the breeds with which they're associated. They'll grow up to be breeders, professional handlers (many juniors apprentice under professional handlers), show judges, AKC reps, club officers or simply continue to show their dogs. Those that leave the sport will still be touched by what they learned as they become parents,legislators, business people, or even First Lady of the United States.

I've been following a few junior handlers over the last few months who have qualified to show at Eukanuba, and I'll report on how they do at the show. I start at one end of the spectrum with a handler who is about to "age out" of the sport and finish with a handler who's been in it a short time. I'd like you to meet them.

Ryan and "Kate"

Ryan, 18, qualified for Eukanuba in the Bred-By class and by getting a Grand Championship on his Whippet puppy. When I first corresponded with Ryan, he was juggling AP classes, the SAT/ACTs and college applications. He'd just returned from Purdue University for a college visit and was about to visit Case Western, Carnegie Mellon,and Princeton with an eye on their engineering programs. He plays soccer, lacrosse, golf or whatever the "challenge of the day" is, and has been a varsity football and baseball player (though Ryan was nursing a surgical repair on a shoulder football injury when we e-chatted). His favorite author is Ayn Rand (Fountainhead, his favorite of her books so far) and is working his way through her other writings. He's also an Eagle Scout.

Ryan will be showing his two and a half year old Whippet bitch, "Kate" (GCh. Wildbriar's Whimsical of Longlesson) of whom he is the breeder/owner/handler. Should "Kate" come into season during Eukanuba (it's forbidden to show a bitch in season in Junior Showmanship), he'll show her father, "Briar" (GCh. Longlesson Run for the Roses). Ryan says, "I see it [Eukanuba] as a last shot at glory, so to speak. After making the finals last year, I definitely want to take the extra step and win, especially as it will most likely be my last time in the Juniors ring. Either way, Eukanuba is so much fun as a celebration of dogs, breeders, handlers and juniors that just being at the show is exciting."

Hagen and "Paisley"

When twelve year old "Hagen' wanted a different kind of dog, she scoured the Internet for some ideas and decided upon a Boykin Spaniel. After initial enthusiasm, the Boykin breeder they approached for a dog felt some trepidation; The "little brown dog," as the Boykin is sometimes known, is a rare and very energetic breed still somewhat new to the AKC. As a junior handler's dog, a Boykin would be a challenge. Undaunted, Hagen, knew this was the breed for her.

She was right.

Hagen and "Paisley"qualified for Eukanuba both in Breed and in Juniors and they've already won three more shows to qualify for next year's Eukanuba. Not only will Hagen become the first Junior Handler to show a Boykin Spaniel at Eukanuba, it will be the first time in Boykin Spaniel history for a junior to go to Eukanuba. "Paisley" will go into the show ranked as the #16 Boykin Spaniel with approximately twenty Best of Breed wins, and very recently, Hagen and "Dogwood's Inspired Journey" (Paisley's show name) were invited to participate at "Meet the Breed" at the large Denver dog shows in February. Showing an unusual dog hasn't always been easy when, along the way, one or two judges not entirely familiar with the breed haven't understood the appropriate way to exhibit it. Still, as Hagen says, "Having a rare breed makes it harder, but not impossible." She credits the help of some highly respected handlers who see something in her and have encouraged her on.

Lindsey and "Mia"

Lindsey is handling one of the more daunting breeds to groom, a Bedlington Terrier. Inspired to show dogs by her mother when Lindsey was nine years old, she's now eleven and will be handling "Jack," also known as Ch. Stoney Lake Jack of All Trades. Lindsey's mother does much of the blade work and scissoring for now, but Lindsey is learning the ropes of grooming a Bedlington. Like Hagen, Lindsey finds it challenging when a judge may know less about her breed than she does. "I find that sometimes judges don't know how the Bedlington is stacked, that their front feet are together at the bottom, or even that a Bedlington goes on the table. One of the judges who thought a Bedlington went on the ground was a Scottie breeder who should have known better."

Karissa, the last junior I'm following, had her very first show in the fall of 2010 where she won Best of Variety over a two day weekend, a first place in Novice Juniors and a Group 2 in the Hound group. Three months later, she completed Novice Junior. By the summer of 2011, Karissa was ranked by "Today's Best Junior" as the #6 Junior Handler showing a Dachshund, the #30 handler (all hounds) among the entire United States, and her dog, a Miniature Wirehaired Dachshund named "Sherman," was ranked by Canine Chronicle as #18 in breed and #16 all breed under her handling.

Karissa is ten years old.

Karissa and "Sherman"

Introduced to the sport by her grandmother, Marlene, Karissa says, ""Junior Showmanship helps me be more comfortable and confident. It has helped me speak and communicate better with adults." Her big goal was to qualify for Eukanuba which she ultimately did by earning eight first place wins in her class (only five are needed). She'd eventually like to show her grandmother's Bloodhounds but recognizes that she has a wee bit of growing to do first. Until then, she enjoys gymnastics, dance classes - and of course, the dog shows. Karissa thinks about becoming a professional handler some day, and already has gotten the attention of a few well known handlers who have taken her aside to offer encouragement and the odd tip. Karissa will be showing GCH CH Tievoli Rumor's I Am M4 (or, as she affectionately calls him, "Shwerm") at Eukanuba.

Sadly, a judge's unfamiliarity with a breed can work against a Junior who is, after all, a child, and knows that it's not only ill advised to instruct a judge otherwise, but may be disrespectful. Surely we've all found ourselves in similar sitations with a boss. Like I said. Life lessons.

More than 200 Juniors Handlers will be competing at Eukanuba (this includes conformation, obedience and Agility), and after having chatted with these kids and their parents, I not only feel pretty good about the future of my sport, I like these kids' chances at Eukanuba.

I hope you'll check back to see how they did.

The Hill's Brand & Science Diet Media Tour: What'd I think?

2011-12-02T10:42:00.000-08:00

Transparency,” a buzz word in political campaigns, has been finding its way into the competitive arena of pet food manufacturing. The concept has become not only a marketing strategy, but a public relations necessity as the Internet shrinks the world and human nature remains, well, human nature; Word of mouth, anecdotal evidence, and good old fashion rumor and misinformation still influence the opinions we form and decisions we make - only now we’re using a keyboard instead of chatting over a fence.

Dog Food companies are catching on. They know we have more pets than ever before. We’re going more places and doing more things with them than ever before. For some of us, our cats and dogs are our only companions; For most of us, they’re our best companions. We’d no more throw them a kitchen scrap for dinner than we would a human member of the family. We’re savvier than we used to be about what we feed our pets, and dare I say it, few more so than the dog fancier who not only loves her dog, but competes with him.

I’m about to make a few Hill’s executives gasp, but if you’re a dog fancier, you and I both know that Hills and Science Diet have not been the first foods of choice for our show dogs. I know this from my own 30 years in the sport, and I know YOU know it from the comments you made after I announced my invitation to tour their Pet Nutrition Center in Topeka. I suspect the Hills people knew it too when they brought in a dozen writers and bloggers, some of them veterinarians, not only in the interest of dispelling myths that hurt the entire industry, but to provide accurate information about their own program. In other words, transparency.

When it comes to dog food, ultimately, you’re going to believe what you want to believe. You may choose to believe your breeder, you may give greater credibility to “accepted wisdom” passed along at dog shows, or you can follow the advice of a store clerk when you’re looking for a new brand of dog food and the Hills or Science Diet comes up.

I’m asking you to believe me as I report on what I heard and saw.

Personally, I don’t feed either of those foods– though I did use Science Diet’s k/d formula on a dog in kidney distress a few years ago and he did well on it. The more salient point here is this one: After having toured the Hills facility and talked with their nutritionists and veterinarians, would I feed their food to my dogs now?

I’ll answer that a little bit later.

As I get into my report, I’m not going to rehash the mission statement or Hill’s history because you can read it for yourself at their web site. Nor am I going to discuss the basics of nutrition because the subject is simply too vast. I am, however, including some charts you might find interesting. I’m only going to write about what I thought was interesting or noteworthy (my blog, you know) and I’m going to answer the questions you suggested I ask the Hill’s folks.

A few points before moving on to those questions:

The labeling on a package of pet food is a legal document, interesting to me because the definitions some ingredients as defined by AAFCO’s 2” thick manual (Association of American Feed Control Officials) are somewhat vague. “Meat” for example, is defined as “the clean flesh of a slaughtered mammal.” Hill’s assured me that euthanized puppies, diseased cattle and hyenas are not used in their food. Less vague are the rules for categorizing a pet food. Check out the definition for “holistic” in the chart below and remember it when shopping for dog food.

Be suspicious when you’re considering a commercial food that says it’s “human grade.” For a dog food to legally call its ingredients “human grade,” the meat or poultry HAS to have come from a human grade slaughter house, the recipe has to have been made in a human grade manufacturing plant, and all of it has to have been packaged in a human packaging plant. There’s only one pet food currently being sold that meets that standards and it’s “Honest Kitchen.”

Also note that when a diet says it is “formulated,” it was made to appeal to a dog and is presumed to do so, but it was never actually tested on anything with a mouth. This doesn’t imply that it’s a bad food, it just means it was never tested on a dog. Yours would be the first.

When Dr. Bill Schoenherr, Hill’s principal nutritionist got up to speak to our group, he cut to the chase by addressing some of the ingredients that are problematic for many show fanciers, such as corn.

Hill’s recognizes that some consumers have issues with corn, but they stand by the ingredient because their tests and data indicate that from a nutritional standpoint, corn is a digestible carbohydrate.

Another controversial ingredient is chicken by-product, or chicken by-product meal. Critics point out that by-products are undesirable parts of a chicken left after prime pieces have been removed. In Hill’s view, however, dogs love organs (heart, liver, etc), while chicken feet and beaks are high in flavor and nutrition. By-product chicken meal, once it’s been finely ground, is a highly absorbed nutrient that differs from fresh chicken only in water content. It was also pointed out that chicken by-product is the “greenest” of ingredients because it uses the whole chicken with nothing gone to waste.

Some of you also wondered about “meat by-products,” an unfortunate ingredient name. Meat by-products are a good thing as they contain nearly 300% more protein that fresh chicken.

One of you asked that I inquire about the source of fat in Hill’s foods; It’s pork and some chicken fat.

Several of you asked about wheat gluten, and Hill’s says they do use it in some, but not all diets because it’s another high quality protein.

What about soybean meal? Hill’s told me – and the “foodies” I consulted on-line seem to agree - that soybean is a useful ingredient in dog food for its protein contribution.

Just about everyone wanted to know about the source of the ingredients Hill’s uses. Their lamb is from New Zealand and their beef is from the United States. Other ingredients are from countries where Hill “audits the quality control.”

Dr. Waynne Carter and friend

A before and after "heat map."

Our next speaker, Dr. Wayne Carter, spoke on a topic new to me, and it’s totally fascinating, if not the way of the future of nutrition for both man and beast. “Nutrigenomics” is the study of the effects of food and food components on gene expression. We were shown slides of “heat maps” (a way to visually represent numbers) where each column represents an individual animal, and each row, an individual gene. “Before” and “after” heat maps showed us what happened when altering, amending or enhancing a diet could “turn up” or “turn down” a gene expression, say, metabolism. You can see for yourself the dramatic results. The ramifications of this science are heady; Nutrigenomics has been associated with the concept of personalized nutrition based on genotype and some day, perhaps, it’ll lead to personalized dietary advice based our own (or our dogs’) genes.

Reading a Heap Map

As a purebred fancier, I wondered to myself if breed specific diets were around the corner – and voila! Dr. Carter produced the results of research on six different breeds (Cocker, Labrador, Beagle, Dachshund, Golden Retriever – and I’ve drawn a blank on the 6th) that suggest that there is no data to support the benefits of tailoring a diet to a specific breed. That’s not to say that certain conditions known to affect certain breeds (i.e., Bedlingtons and Copper Toxicosis) wouldn’t be impacted by “turning on” or “turning down” nutritional components to impact that gene expression, but again, the science is very new – and, to my mind, thrilling.

Dave Baloga explained to us the “science of taste” and how a Hill’s panel of “smell experts” works to create dog foods that are palatable and attractive smelling to cats and dogs. An entertaining portion of his talk was our own “smell test” in which each writer was asked to identify the scents in plain white bottles marked only by numbers. The bottle with the “fresh grass smell” was a smell dogs love, while the smell of “dirt” does nothing for them. The wonderful aroma of fresh oatmeal cookies was popular among the bloggers, but research shows that dogs aren’t interested it at all – a memo my own dogs missed when I’ve made Snickerdoodles at home.

Bark Park

I don’t mean to dismiss the other speakers, Dr. Dennis Jewell and Dr. Dan Aja who spoke on Nutrition and Nutrional Assessment, respectively, but as I mentioned before, the subject is too vast to tackle in a blog and much of the information can be found on the Internet.

After our lunch break, it was time to visit the cats and dogs whose job it is to test Hill’s food. There are around 400 cats, and 402 dogs – virtually all of them Beagles – who live in a series of modern buildings surrounding a pastoral green known as “Bark Park.” The dogs are all pair-housed, twenty dogs to a “pod.” Their building is modern, airy and light filled, and is constructed with noise-reduction materials. Each dog has a name which has been etched into a dog-shaped name plate over their own crate-sized “room” which adjoins a larger space. If they so choose, they can sleep on a Karumba bed. Rubber chew bones are strewn everywhere. The dogs come and go as they please through dog doors and hang out with whomever they please, but groups of dogs are rotated so that while one group enjoys “down time” napping, the other group is playing.

“Bark Park,” as you can see from the photographs, contains play equipment on real grass, though astroturf is the surface on which they tread most often. Once a day, the dogs “go to work” by eating. Each dog chooses its own “station” where most typically, s/he gets a split meal, meaning that the dog chooses which of two bowls from which to eat. The dog are acquired from “purpose-bred breeders” and live out their entire lives here. They get people time at the Bark Park or in the hallways.

Kitty Food Testers

Cats have similar housing but, of course, geared to cats. They seemed to me to have it made. After a certain age, they go into retirement where they sleep in the sun and look at birds at a feed station. I saw cats being brushed, cats being petted and played with.

One of the few non-Beagle
food testers

The dogs were bright eyed, alert and each appeared really healthy. I’ll concede that perhaps it was just poor timing that we appeared when we did in their daily schedule, but I would liked to have seen more dog/person interaction, or know that adoption is an option in their future. That being said, each dog looked happy to me. Tails were wagging, the dogs were busy and, being social Beagles, enjoyed the company of the other dogs.

Our day wrapped up with some closing remarks, including the company’s vision to add the question, “what do you feed your pet? to the list of routine checks made by a vet that currently include listening to a pet’s heart, checking her temperature and looking at his eyes.

I was able to ask CEO, Neil Thompson, candidly if it was true that in exchange for underwriting a vet’s education, vets reciprocate by selling Hill’s brand and Science Diet brand foods in their practice, or that for every bag or can of Hill’s brand food sold, the vet gets a portion of the sale. A weary smile appeared on Mr. Thompson’s face (I think he’d heard this before) and he answered.

“No,” he assured me. The arrangement between a veterinarian and Hill’s Products is a business one; The vet buys the food from Hill’s and sells it to his or her clients. No kickbacks, no “under the table” exchange of money. It’s a commercial relationship, pure and simple. Hill’s does not underwrite anyone’s education, however……………

A few years back, Dr. Elizabeth Stone of Ontario’s Veterinary College in Guelph, Ontario, approached Hill’s with the suggestion that more needed to be done to shore up a vet’s knowledge of nutrition. Hill’s provided the funding for a building in which veterinary students get 300 hours of nutritional training, and not the current six hours that most get elsewhere. The instruction is not given by Hill’s employees, and the education is about nutrition in general, not nutrition as Hill’s sees it.

Some of my best conversations were with Mr. Thompson, and yes, maybe his British accent did make for easy listening. But his approach to his company’s product lines reminded me a great deal of my own attitude when entering the show ring for group judging. If the judge likes my breed, well by golly, I’ve got a nice example of the breed to show him. If they don’t like my breed, they won’t like my dog. Mr. Thompson’s attitude is equally philosophical. If one recipe of Hill’s dog food causes a gastric upset in a dog, there are other recipes that may be a better option for the dog. And if, at the end of the day, a dog (or his owner) simply dislikes all the food, there’s a 100% money back guarantee. The Hill’s people are proud of the quality of their food, proud of the data that supports the wisdom of using the ingredients they use, and convinced that if you remove one ingredient only to appease critics, you alter the balance of what’s left behind.

So would I feed Hill’s brand dog foods to my dogs now?

Coming from the school of thought that “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” my answer is no, but only because my Pulik are currently on diets that work for them. I saw no evidence that Hill’s makes a bad food, and the healthy coats and bright eyes I saw on the food testing cats and dogs bear that out. I know that some of you who HAVE tried the food reported greasy, unhealthy feeling coats - and for you, I have no answer beyond what Mr. Thompson maintains: try a different recipe, and if at the end of the day the brand doesn’t work for you, it’s simply not a good fit. I’m not persuaded that Hill’s is bad food. I am more inclined to believe that some foods work better on some dogs than others.

If my fellow bloggers have already written about the same tour I was on, I’ve made it a point not to read their blogs as I wanted to stay focused on my own impressions. I would encourage you, however, to visit those blogs for a more expanded view of the tour, and now that I’m done writing, I’m heading over to them, myself.

My fellow bloggers:

Pawcurious.com

todogwithlove.com/

DogTipper.com
Gooddogz.org
yourdailycute
AskaVetQuestion

Hills Pet Nutrition Media & Blogging Tour. Are there Mimosas here?

2011-11-29T16:26:00.000-08:00

The invitation from Hill’s Pet Nutrition to attend their Media and Blogger tour in Topeka tomorrow came as a surprise to me and honestly, I wasn’t sure about coming. There are a lot of opinions within the dog fancy about Science Diet - and Hills Pet foods, in general. That alone made my decision easy. Why wouldn’t I want to learn for myself what the company and their food is about?

It’s early yet. I’ve only just checked into my hotel room after a 90 minute drive from the Kansas City airport where, if I may so opine, the baggage areas are very confusing.

At some point very soon, I’ll need to do more than just stare at my computer and the header on my blog site. I’ll want to write a fair assessment of what I hear tomorrow. The Hills Pet Nutrition people have brought together an assortment of bloggers, writers & pet health professionals. We come from different backgrounds, but having met some of these people before, I feel sure that ultimately, we'll strive for facts. On Facebook, I asked for suggestions on what questions to ask and got some good ones from fellow owners/breeders and handlers.

In a short while, we’re heading to the Kansas History Museum for dinner and will be meeting the Hill’s representatives for the first time. I can’t decide whether to start out with a giant Mimosa or pace myself and ease into it.

Best to make a game day decision on that one.

Can you Tebow?

2011-11-28T21:24:00.000-08:00

Tebowing Dog

Tim Tebow won another game yesterday. He didn't do it alone, of course, and like his other recent wins, it wasn't pretty - but it was a thing of beauty.

Huh?

For the uninitiated, Tim Tebow is the quarterback for the Denver Broncos. Since starting for the team this season, he's has a 5-1 record, but he's still the subject of debate. Does he have what it takes to be an NFL quarterback?

But I'm getting ahead of myself. You need to know a few things about him first.

Tebow became the first college football player to both rush and pass for 20 or more touchdowns in a single season and the first college sophomore to win the Heisman Trophy. He won the coveted Heisman Trophy, and his 2007 performance earned him the Maxwell Award as the nation's top football player, the Davey O'Brien Award as the nation's best quarterback and the James E. Sullivan Award as the nation's most outstanding amateur athlete in any sport. In 2008, Tebow led Florida to its second national championship in three years. He was named the offensive MVP of the national championship game.

The moment that started it all

A good pedigree, don't you think? And for those of you who are thinking, "Ho hum, one more pampered jock," keep reading.

Tebow was born in the Philippines, the son of Christian Baptist missionaries. While pregnant, his mother suffered a life-threatening infection with a pathogenic amoeba. Because of the drugs used to rouse her from a coma and to treat her dysentery, the fetus experienced a severe placental abruption. Doctors expected a stillbirth and recommended an abortion to protect her life, but Tim's mother refused. If you're a football fan, you may be aware of all this already, but if the only game you ever watch all year is the Super Bowl, perhaps you remember the fuss surrounding an ad funded by Focus on the Family that was broadcast during Super Bowl XLIV. The two 30-second commercials included Tebow's personal story from a pro-life stance.

It was not his first brush with controversy.

“Tebowing" with Nascar Champion
Jimmy Johnson,at Hendrick’s Motorsports in
Concord, Notth Carolina

In 2010, a new rule for the next NCAA football season came into effect dubbed "The Tebow Rule" by the media. It banned messages on eye paint (those black stripes under a football player's eyes) and was so named because during his college football career, Tebow frequently wore biblical verses on his eye black. In the 2009 BCS Championship Game, he wore John 3:16 on his eye paint, and as a result, 92 million people searched "John 3:16" on Google during or shortly after the game.

As far as I can tell, controversy has surrounded this guy all his life. He has a polarizing effect on people, which, as a Denver resident and Bronco fan, I see first hand every day. He's the subject of talk radio almost daily, and his passing abilities (or lack of) are the stuff of sports column fodder. And yet no one can deny one simple fact.

The guy is a winner. He has heart and he inspires people.

“Tebowing on top of a mountain in Afghanistan”

To make a dog show analogy, think back to when "Carly," the German Short haired Pointed, won Westminster's Best in Show. She was a gorgeous dog, but every dog in Westminster's Best in Show ring is a gorgeous dog. It takes more to win that coveted trophy and Carly had, as it was later called, "the stack heard around the world." Simply put, she would not be denied. She did everything it took to win that Best in Show, and like Carly, Tim Tebow has been doing whatever it takes to win football games.

I'm not writing to argue about the finer points of Tebow's game, though if pressed, I will say that I like him. Tebow is a much needed change from the Michael Vicks of professional sports. I've watched what he does after a game. I've listened to his interviews and to what he's been saying; Right after he gives thanks to "His Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ," he gives credit to his teammates and his coaches. This willingness to share credit, and especially to thank the man above makes a lot of people uncomfortable.

Scuba diver "tebowing"

I find this interesting.

Dennis Rodman cross-dressed, Tiger Woods' had an obvious sexual addiction issue, Michael Vicks hung dogs by the neck, and Barry Bonds did steroids. Comparatively speaking, there seems to be more discomfort with Tebow's faith than with any of the aforementioned behaviors. Why is that, I wonder.

Still, Tebow does have his admirers, including a chap from New York City who noticed that after the game with New Orleans, Tebow quietly did something on the field that has become a phenomenon. He got down on a knee and starting praying when everyone else around him was celebrating. The guy from New York City coined it "Tebowing," and he started a web site inviting people to submit pictures of themselves "tebowing."

Tim Tebow thanking the man upstair
with John Elway looking on

It's gone viral in a big way. From scuba divers to professional hockey players, from soldiers in Afghanistan to tourists at the Parthenon, everyone is tebowing.

I love the creativity and sheer fun of people "tebowing" in different locations, and to that end, I'm inviting you to submit your own pictures of you AND YOUR DOG "tebowing." The first five people to submit pictures of themselves "tebowing" with their dog (or the dog "tebowing" alone) receive a beautiful glossy 2012 Canine Companions Calendar.

Even Pulik can get in the act of Tebowing

Guest of the Day Has its Perks

2011-11-26T15:14:00.000-08:00

Catching her breath after a dazzling
triple flying front tuck position

What is it about a hotel that inspires some dogs to be at their naughtiest? As I write from my bed in a hotel room in Bozeman,“Katie,” our 10 month old Puli, has spent the last ten minutes jumping between two queen sized beds while making chimpanzee sounds. This is a minor improvement over what came before when TWO dogs were jumping from one bed to another before one tired of the game. I felt as if I was sitting in a small dinghy on a roiling lake. And before that, the dogs ran relays from one room to the next, one pretending to be a sheep, the other typecast as a sheepdog in hot pursuit. I have a strong suspicion that the first dog to jump on the bed and bump into me signaled the completion of one lap before they started over again. I just now ran a spell check, and that last sentence read “I havr a stong supicony tgay nif\\##4on.” Just saying.

Katie repositions the pillows in preparation for
a daring attempt at a triple sow cow
normally seen only in ice skating competition

When we checked into this hotel, my husband learned that he was Day’s Inn “Guest of The Day.” For this honor, he was given a 12 ounce bottle of water and a packet of orange colored peanut butter crackers shrink wrapped in blue plastic. His name appeared in white plastic letters pinned on a black display board in the lobby for all to see, AND he got a free upgrade to a two room suite which is how my dogs came to be running laps in it.

We try to be good dog-owning guests, but it’s not easy with a breed that tends to bark. We’re on the third floor and use the stairs to enter and exit the building, but the dogs have discovered the magnificence of their voices in a stairwell that echoes. The faster I try to get the dogs out of the stairwell before they bark, the more they think I want to play. “Katie” grabs my pant leg and tugs at it with the ferocity of a Wolverine, the other dog tries to race me to the bottom. Irritated that I’m not chasing him, the corded dog circles around me to chastise Katie who’s still hanging off my leg. And he has as much luck of getting her to release me as he has of discovering a side of Kobe beef in his crate. I’m not sure why I haven’t broken my neck yet, but more than once I’ve been found at the bottom of the stairs so entangled in two leashes and the cords of a dog that it’s taken two other people to figure out how to free me once they’ve stopped laughing.

This cup is long past being able to hold a Mimosa

Stupidly, I forgot dog toys when leaving for the trip- a crisis for Katie. Unlike home where our floor is a mine field of chewies, plush toys and balls, the barren landscape of our hotel floor must have been a dismal sight for a baby. Eventually, we realized our mistake when the cups, Kleenex and toilet paper vanished and were later found in pieces. The mistake was remedied immediately, but dogs are funny about toys and don’t always take a liking to the ones you think they will. For this reason, two toys were bought so that Miss Katie would have a choice.

This toy failed to pass muster. Other Puli

owners will recognize the tell-tale tilt of

the head which can only mean one thing:

"Mother, you fool. This toy is inadequate."

This toy cow has a face and makes sounds
like a small mammal being flayed. She likes it.

If it’s been strange for us to stay in a hotel over Thanksgiving, it’s been even stranger for the dogs. They’re accustomed to spending hours in a car en route to a destination and staying at a hotel for a few days once we get there, but there’s always been a dog show somewhere in those few days, and always, great pains are taken to keep their coats clean and tidy. On this trip, we’ve been stopping at parks frequently during the days where the Pulik can run, play and be silly in the leaves and snow – something that doesn’t usually happen at a dog show until after the last day of judging. Being a dog comes naturally to Puli,of course, but I swear, a show dog seems to know that when they’ve been washed and carefully groomed, they’re supposed to stay that way until the shows are over. The first time I let the dogs out of their crates and encouraged them to run after me through the wet leaves (wet ones are easily pulled out of a corded coat), the dog in the show coat looked at me skeptically from inside his crate before jumping out. I felt as if I was prompting a little boy to jump though mud puddles while wearing his Sunday best.

Today is our last day in Bozeman and I know I’ll have a couple of really dirty dogs to wash when we get home. As I rinse them in the tub or groom them on the table, I’ll reflect on what it was like to be a Thanksgiving orphan at someone else’s house after having had the holiday in our own home for the last 25 years. I’m already pretty sure that it was more work staying in a hotel than it would have been to stay home and cook a turkey and some pies. It’s tiring, staying with dogs in a hotel for nearly a week. Or it should be if you’re doing it right. You can’t just roll out of bed and let the dogs out. You have to get up and out of bed, put on leashes, keep the dogs quiet all the way out of the hotel, and then walk them until they’re inspired to produce results. You have to collect and bag the evidence, find a trash can in which to dispense the bagged evidence, and then figure out how to get back to the hotel room without being seen because you’ve suddenly realized that you forgot to get dressed.

Next year, I’m doing the turkey.

Show and Tell: A Slab Fracture and Bloat

2011-11-21T11:58:00.000-08:00

If you're squeamish, you may want to come back another time. If you're a caring pet owner AND you're squeamish, read on, but avoid the pictures, a few are graphic.

Not my dog's tooth, but a nice
detail of a slab fracture

While scaling my dog, Maci's, teeth last week (that's pronounced "mutt-tsee), I removed a bit of tartar off a premolar and wiped it off on a cloth. As I removed the remaining bit of tartar off the tooth, part of the enamel peeled away but remained attached under the gum line. In an instant, I realized my dog had a slab fracture, the most common type of tooth break in a dog. It typically occurs when the dog bites down on a hard object at just the right angle to flake off a piece of the tooth. This injury wasn't there when I looked in his mouth a couple of weeks before - and to add insult to injury, I could also see what looked like pulp exposure which meant that the tooth had to be hurting Maci. I was sick.

I immediately scheduled an appointment to see Dr. Kenny Lee, one of my vets who specializes in dentistry. Kenny has studied along side Pete Emily, an old friend and THE preeminent trailblazer in canine dentistry. Kenny will be testing for board certification soon and when he passes, he'll join only 105 other veterinarians in the world who are Board Certified in canine dentistry.

Maci is a show dog and I was keen to repair the tooth, but after an examination and x-rays, the prognosis was grim. The tooth was too damaged and necrotic for a root canal to be anything more than a temporary fix; Worse, infection could spread to the other teeth. "Yank it," I said. The tooth was on his non-show side and I would rely on experienced show judges not to be obsessively concerned about broken or missing teeth due to injury in a working breed.

As you follow the pictorial essay of the procedure to remove Maci's tooth, ask yourself what it was that could have so damaged this dog's tooth. I'll make it easy for you with multiple choice options: Was it: 1) A marrow bone or cow hoof; 2) a Greenie dog treat; 3) Chewing rocks; 4) Biting a fence or crate door. The answer will come later.

Maci & I wait for his procedure to begin. And yes,

I'm sitting with him in his pen. I had a book and

my dog. All I was missing was a Mimosa.

"Maci" is given his anesthesia. Dental technicians always love

to joke with me at this point that they'll have to shave

the dog down to find a vein. I laugh along. And I never,

ever leave them alone with the dog if there's a blade in the house.

We wait for the anesthesia to take effect.

Down he goes. He hears me speaking to him gently but

I avoid mentioning that while he's under, I'll be trimming

his toenails. No amount of anesthesia would reduce the

battle we typically have over toenail trimming. His coat,

by the way, is tied up in elastic bands.

Maci is attached to monitors which will

follow his breathing, heart rate and pulse.

Once again, I'm told we may have to shave

the dog. Polite grin.

All hairy dog jokes aside, we need to get Maci's cords
out of the way and hair clips do the trick.

And here is Maci's slab fracture. The black dots are

exposed pulp - ouch! I take some consolation

after being told that slab fractures on this particular

tooth are really hard to see, let alone catch in time.

I really like these boots from J. Crew. I wonder,

am I too old to wear them? And oh, this is

your last chance to look away. Pictures get

bloody after this point.

The gum is cut to get closer to severing
the roots and digging out the tooth.

A scale picture to show the tooth in relation to the drill.

The roots of a dog's premolar are quite deep

Surgery comes to a stop. A surgical tool is missing.
It's not on the tray table. It's not in Dr. Lee's hand.
None of the techs have it. I know I don't have it.
Ultimately, it's found in Maci's coat. No kidding.

Kenny is normally a chatty fellow, but he asks that we

not talk to him for a few minutes as he's at a delicate

juncture. A premolar is situated close enough to a dog's

sinuses to merit careful attention. I hold my breath.

And the tooth is gone. From there...................

................to here.

A "flap' of skin is created to cover the excision site.
You'd never know that a tooth was once there.

Warming blankets covered Maci during surgery and continue

to keep him comfortable as he comes out of anesthesia.

While Maci was being given anesthesia before surgery,

the table at the far side held a cat being treated for feline

dental absorption, something that effects 50% of domestic

cats - as well as some of the big cats. The teeth become

functionally destroyed as a result of tooth (dental) resorption

Maci's tooth x-ray taken before surgery indicate

that removing the tooth was a good call.

His x-ray after the extraction.

A few hours later, Maci is home.He was

given Rimadyl for pain relief and now, three

days later, he's playing and back to his old self.

Have you guessed what it was that broke Maci's tooth? The reality is that all of the multiple choice answers (marrow bones, cow hoofs, Greenies, chewing on rock or a crate door or a metal gate) can cause a slab fracture; In Maci's case, we believe he broke it trying to remove a metal gate keeping him from the rest of the house. Or maybe he just wanted to get at the liquor.

A while back, I wrote an article on caring for pet teeth, "Dog and Cat Teeth 101." I've learned that there've been some changes about a few things since that article was written, including how best to clean a pet's teeth. To wit: Veterinary dentists don't recommend using tooth scalers anymore. They've found that scalers - and even the ultrasonic cleaners that they themselves use during a cleaning - create microscopic fissures in the enamel of a tooth, and those fissures attract bacteria. The current thinking is that there's nothing better than a daily tooth brushing FOLLOWED BY a wipe of the pet's teeth with a finger wrapped in rough gauze. Displacing the bacteria with that gauze results in a huge increase in good oral hygiene. And to really go the extra mile, ask any dentist for some polish - the same pumice-type polish used when a hygienist cleans your teeth. The polish smooths out any rough spots on the teeth that can also attract germs. For really good information on cat and dog dental care including the best types of chewies and toys for them, visit the American Veterinary Dental College web site.

And now I'm going to end with something totally unrelated to dentistry. I recently became aware of this video and you need to see it as well so you can recognize the signs of a killer.

Although my own breed isn't prone to bloat, I have friends whose dogs are. Everyone should be able to spot bloat when they see it because time is critical in saving an afflicted dog's life. This video is of an Akita in the middle stages of bloat. Before clicking on the link, you need to know that the dog is OKAY. The new owners of the dog were in their backyard videotaping when they realized that their dog was in distress. Unaware and uneducated about what bloat looked like, they filmed the dog until they realized he was in serious trouble and rushed him to a vet. I commend the owners for sharing their video so that others can learn from it. Click here see the video.

In addition, download and print this chart that details the stages of bloat. Share it with friends, pin it to the bulletin board of your local shelter and pass it along. Bloat is a killer and only immediate medical care will save a dog from it.

Abject panic: When Does It Happen -and More Curiously, Why?

2011-11-14T13:59:00.000-08:00

"No," my big sister said. "You're not doing it right. You count in increments until you get to the amount of money you were given."

If you saw how these are made,
you might not eat one again

I tried again, pretending that I'd just been given a five dollar bill to pay for a box of donuts. I was sixteen, had just been hired for my very first job at Duncan Donuts, and I felt as if my working life was over before it ever began. I couldn't make change. I was hopeless with numbers, even worse with mental calculations on my feet, and it would be another 20 years before cash registers would calculate how much change was due a customer. I was in melt down, the first of only a few times in my life I would feel total, I-want-to-pass-out panic.

In a charitable mood, my older sister patiently taught me how to make change, this prior to ratting me out to my parents for some infraction I no longer remember. Okay. So maybe I did borrow her sweater without asking. I would have gotten away with it had its belt not slipped off of me in the driveway where she later found it, a vivid black tire tread mark running down its length. But I digress. I ultimately did learn to make change, a skill I rely on to this day. My job at Duncan Donuts, however, had a much shorter run. Between my very creepy boss and seeing how jelly donuts were made, I quit at the end of my first day.

That deer-in-headlights look

Though I would feel abject panic only a couple of times more in my life, the intensity of the panic grew in proportion to the situation. Years after Duncan Donuts, I got a career-move job working for the local PBS affiliate. Each year, the station held a televised fund-raising auction and my job was to write scripts in-studio for the television personality. On one occasion, the auction item was a piece of art, and the "talent" was my boss' boss, a last minute substitution. In the seconds before the camera's light went "green," she called me over, pulled me to her side and sternly whispered that she'd not gotten a script. I was aware of the floor manager counting down: "Three....Two....." and as I saw him mouth the number "one," the fullness of the horror of my situation came to me: The only way I could have seen his lips form the number was if I was IN FRONT of the camera. I was on live television. And in that same moment of realization, my boss turned to me and sweetly asked, "And what can you tell us about our next item up for bid, Susi?"

I cringed. She'd seen my face. She knew my name. She could identify me later if I made a run for it.

Fighting off nausea, I reviewed my options. I could clutch my chest, yell that I was having the "big one," and slump out of the camera shot; I could reply to my boss, "Well, Trudy, not much. What do YOU think about this painting?" I could vomit and vividly illustrate that I wasn't well; I could start blubbering and hope that the audience felt I was moved to tears by the art, or I could craft an answer with a deer-in-headlights expression and hope that it didn't make my boss look bad. All of the aforementioned remedies would, or course, result in my immediate firing. "You'll never work in this town again," I could hear her say.

I was struck speechless with panic. How on earth was I going to get out of this? My cheeks were on fire but my blood ran cold. My knees got weak. My palms were sweaty, and I could see hairline fractures start to form through my boss' make up as her eyes pierced my skull. "Please God, take me now, "I prayed.

In what clearly was an act of God, I was suddenly struck with the impulse to actually glance at the painting in question. I looked at it and realized, "I know this piece."

"Well, Trudy," I muttered slowly, "it's a painting."

The look on Trudy's face read, "Moron. After I kill you, I'm going to fire you. And then I'm going to fire the imbecile who hired you."

"It's a painting by a painter," I went on. "And, as you can see, it's a rectangle." I was cheering up a little. I was on a roll. "It's a rectangular painting by a painter using paint." Trudy looked around, I suspected for a weapon.

I warmed to my subject. "What makes this painting special is the use of lighting reminiscent of Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio." "Chiaroscuro, I added, "is an Italian term which literally means 'light-dark," and it's not usually seen in modern depictions such as this painting. During the Renaissance, it had its origins in drawings on colored paper using white gouache."

Where had THAT come from, I wondered. I'd been an art critic and had a degree in Fine Arts and Art History. But I'd actually RETAINED something useful to me in a moment of distress?

I was saved. When the camera went dark, Trudy peered at me over her reading glasses, then turned and walked away. It took two cameramen and the floor manager to remove me from my spot. And all I knew what that I never wanted to feel panic like that ever again.

So when a friend asked me years later to show his dog at Westminster, I wanted to say no. I'd never shown the dog. Heck, I'd never MET his dog. I'd never shown a terrier, I'd never shown at Westminster, and I certainly had never shown while videotaped by a camera. In the end, I was persuaded only because my friend was in a pickle. I would be helping him out since he was showing another dog. I wanted to be a good friend, didn't I???

I met the dog. We took a handling class. We flew to New York. We entered Madison Square Garden. We set up in the grooming area. I went to the bathroom twenty minutes before breed judging and I waited. I waited for the panic and nausea to wash over me, but it didn't come, at least, not in the ladies' room. Swell, I thought. It would hit me as soon as I hit the famous green carpet.

Westminster.
And I was calmness itself

But it didn't then, either. As I entered the ring, I looked at the other dogs and their handlers and realized, "These aren't my people. This isn't my breed. This isn't my dog." And to this day, I doubt I've handled another dog feeling as relaxed as I did when I handled that one. The dog, a lovely bitch, was given Best of Opposite Sex. And as pleased as I was, the whole experience was also a bit maddening to me. Why couldn't I do this for myself when it was MY dog? Why couldn't I settle down when a moment was important to ME?

I have no explanation of why panic washes over any of us at some times and not others, but I suspect it has to do with how invested we are in the moment. I've shown my dogs with no expectations of winning and felt at peace. Other times when my hopes where higher, I fumbled with worry. An ardent desire to avoid looking foolish is also a reliable way to invite terror - and terror was what I felt when I found myself on camera. And finally, the ultimate fear factor may be the feeling that we are utterly out of control over the things that happen to us.

As far as I can tell, if I live my life with low expectations, little regard for the future AND I don't mind looking stupid, I'll enjoy a stress free existence. Such a life also avoids ambition and the feeling of accomplishment that comes with a well played risk. It's not wise to ask me if I'd sacrifice achievement to avoid a feeling of panic. If you've ever known the kind of panic I described on those two occasions, you know what I mean.

Have you felt it? Did you deal with it? And how?

One Face of the One Percent

2011-11-10T18:21:00.000-08:00

Meet Joe. That's him standing at the right.

I like to say that it was my Puli that first introduced us to each other over 25 years ago. I was doing yard work on my front lawn, my dog at my feet, when a car driving by slowed to a stop. The window rolled down, a man leaned across the passenger seat and asked one word, "Puli?"

I knew a Hungarian accent when I heard it, and in return, I asked, "Magyar?" (Hungarian?). And thus began a friendship that continues to this day. We had both recently moved to the neighborhood, though Joe did me one better by having recently moved to America. He was an ethnic Hungarian who'd been living in Romania, a machinist by trade who came in search of a better life for himself, his wife and their daughter. Joe had found employment by working for a machinist he'd known in Romania, a man he admired for his industry and obvious success as demonstrated by his ability to hire people. Someday, Joe told me, he hoped to achieve similar success.

Joe's wife was a waitress at a downtown hotel, and between them, I never knew two people who worked so hard. Joe was on this side of exhaustion every time I saw him, and his wife worked as much overtime as she could get. When they weren't working, they kept their house tidy, their lawn well maintained, and their daughter nurtured.

One day, Joe paid me the highest compliment by asking me to help him fill out his citizenship application. His English was poor and he wanted to make sure his papers were in order because above all else, he wanted to become an American. This was pretty personal stuff, but Joe trusted me. It remains one of the high points of my litmus test of personal character.

Time passed, and on the seventh anniversary of his arrival in America, Joe celebrated with a rare day off. He dressed up in his only suit, bought roses for his wife, and drove to the hotel where she worked to collect her when her shift was over. A fancy meal was planned, but Joe didn't even get as far as the hotel. He'd been mugged and beaten so severely that several teeth had been knocked out, the rest broken. Recovery would have come sooner had he not contracted hepatitis while in the hospital. It was a dark time for Joe.

Eventually, Joe healed and went back to working hard. One day, he invited me to his house to show me something, a smile so wide on his face that he lacked the geography to hold it all in. As he lead me to his garage, the buttons on his shirt nearly popped, he was so proud of what I thought was going to be a new car. It wasn't. It was a lathe that took up an entire half of his garage. Now, when he wasn't working for someone else, he was making machine parts in his garage. I didn't understand lathes or machine parts back then, and I don't now, I just know that I wondered when he slept.

More time passed and the day came when Joe was able to add another piece of equipment to his garage. When he could afford a third, it was time for him to consider renting a warehouse. He quit his job and hired some people of his own, some from his old shop, some looking for work. Now when Joe got up in the morning, he went to work for himself. He'd been able to give other people jobs, some of them immigrants like himself.

But Joe wasn't done.

When Joe wasn't making machine parts, he was designing them. Joe's English never really improved, so I was astonished to learn that he'd been marketing the parts, as well. Evidently, they were so innovative, they spoke for themselves. One part caught the eye of a major multinational aerospace and defense corporation whose name you would know. They bought the part. Heck, they bought the design, and Joe and his wife never had to work again.

The next invitation I got from Joe was to a housewarming. Joe had built a house. A big house. An amazing house. A house that cost a sum I could only imagine. The same Joe who had lead me to his garage to show me a lathe was now leading me into his media room. And the buttons on his shirt were close to bursting.

As a rule, I don't get into politics on my blog. It is, after all, "dog-centric." But the Occupy Wall Street protestors in Denver yesterday elected a Border Collie named "Shelby" to represent them in talks with the mayor and governor. According to "Occupy Denver," Shelby's election was inspired by GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney's response to a heckler this summer that, “Corporations are people, my friend.”

I've been listening to the protestors, and it seems to me that their complaints, originally leveled at corporations, have morphed into resentment against the wealthiest 1% of Americans who are richer than the remaining 99 %. For whatever else I think about the Occupy Wall Street crowd, I'm pretty sure that most of them have never met Joe, or maybe not even anyone like him.

For whatever else I think, I wanted you to see the face of a person who is part of that one percent and how he got there. I wanted you to know his story.

I wanted you to meet Joe.

Top Ten Signs that Political Correctness has Gone Too far in Our Sport

2011-11-09T08:52:00.000-08:00

Somewhere around here is an article I've been working on. I've been looking for it for hours and I know how this will go; I'll spend the entire rest of the day searching for something that will be found only when I no longer need it.

This time, I'm going to trick the "gods of lost things" and pretend I don't want the damn thing anymore. "WHO NEEDS IT," I'll shout out loud to no one in particular, "I have this piece right here that I'm going to use, and then I'll get on with the rest of my day. I have a puppy who needs a bath."

I'll publish the article and then the lost article will appear seemingly out of thin air. I'm on to these blokes.

Meanwhile, the dogs will have gathered all around me at the first suggestion that I've lost something (all but the puppy who's now under the bed). Lost items are of great interest to dogs. Maybe it's a side of beef that I've lost. Maybe it's the chewie I removed from the puppy's mouth because it'd gotten too small to be safe. Maybe it's Elvis. They've always liked Elvis.

If I'm to fool the "gods of lost things," I need to follow through and print something. So here, now, is an "oldie but a goodie" written over ten years ago. I'm re-publishing the piece to show, with a heavy heart, actually, that what seemed ludicrous in the year 2000 is no longer as outlandish in concept. In fact, the piece is begging for an update. Look for that one in the near future.

Top Ten Signs that Political Correctness has gone too far in our sport:

1) The AKC dispenses with dog and bitch classes for being gender biased. Gender-neutral classes will make up the bulk of competition, which will also no longer include Veteran's Class, Puppy Class or 12-18 month classes as they smack of age discrimination;

2) First through fourth placements will no longer be offered since anything less than a first place may potentially damage self esteem. The judge will, instead, distribute amber colored ribbons to all exhibitors, pat them on the back and tell them they all did a good job;

3) Free baiting in the show ring will be strongly discouraged as it indicates an unfair economic advantage over dogs from socio-economically disadvantaged backgrounds where extra food may be at a premium;

4) Owners of dogs will no longer be referred to as "owners," since this suggests oppression of one species over another. Henceforth, 'owners' (sic) will come to be known as 'sapien partners;'

5) Professional Handling will be considered bourgeoise as society comes to consider the blatant exchange of money for services to be tasteless and anti-global; Handlers will offer their abilities free of charge for 'the good of the sport' and henceforth will no longer be called "handlers, " but "ring pattern facilitators;"

6) Cross-breeding between breeds will be encouraged as society comes to value "dog-ness" over breed specificity. Afterall, who is anyone to determine that a poodle is preferrable to a Irish Setter?

7) Since no one person is better than another, the concept of 'trained and/or qualified" judges will be obliterated. Anyone who likes dogs will be qualified to stand in a ring under the auspices of the AKC. The result is that dog shows can be held anytime, anywhere, since virtually anyone can distribute amber colored ribbons;

8) Litter registrations, breeding records, etc. will no longer be monitered or considered public record; afterall, what a 'sapien partner' and their dog does with his or her personal life is none on anyone's business as long as they continue to do their job;

9) Obedience competition has been overhauled since the idea of one species taking orders from another is abhorrent. Instead, sapien partners and their dogs will enter the ring and their exercise might sound something like this: "Precious, let's sit, shall we? We'll do it together. Precious, how do you feel about that jump? Not today? Ok. Let's both go pick up that dumbbell."

10) Agility courses will be revamped to allow the inclusion of physically challenged dogs. Buggies and dollys will be provided to those participants unable to complete the course on foot.

Winter Poop Part II

2011-11-08T11:01:00.000-08:00

Not my family. A recreation of
someone else's family of smokers

A few years ago, I wrote about a Thanksgiving tradition in my family: I always cooked the turkey, and my relatives - all smokers - would come to my house and complain about not being able to "light up" in the house. I don't smoke, and on cue, I would invite them to pursue their habit outside on my deck where I always made sure there was comfortable seating around a centrally located ashtray. If the weather was poor and it was, say, 25 degrees below zero, a cozy fire awaited them in a fire pit. And, as further expression of my hospitality, I always make sure that the graveled dog run near their seating area was freshly poop-scooped. Nothing was too good for my guests.

Perhaps here would be a good place to admit that I'm a bit "anal" about poop-scooping on a gravel surface (please note my restraint in not laughing at my own pun: Anal. Poop scooping. Get it?). I think Freud might have had something to say about a person so possessed with not scooping up one more piece of gravel than is absolutely necessary. I say, "Screw Freud," (yet another pun if you're a Freudian). I've analyzed myself and believe that my desire to collect poop with the delicacy of a neuro-surgeon is rooted in one of three explanations: 1) I'm frugal and would rather spend money at Anthropologie than at a landscape company replenishing pea gravel; 2) The older I get, the harder it is to hoist a trash bag of doggie-doo when 150 lbs. of pea gravel is stuck to it, and 3) (my personal favorite): Poop scooping to meet self imposed criteria has become a challenge.

It's important that as we age, we keep our mind stimulated. By having achieved a high skill level of poop scooping, I delay decrepitude. My children should thank me.

But I've digressed. We're back to Thanksgiving. There I was, scooping the dog run in the hour before my guests were to arrive. and damn if there wasn't a small piece that kept eluding me. If the "nugget" didn't slip between the tines of my rake, it rolled beyond my reach. If I flicked it too hard, it ricocheted off the shovel and flew behind me. I was spending entirely too much time on one piece of poop that seemingly had a mind of its own.

I surveyed the dog run. Except for this one recalcitrant piece of poop, it was pristine. Leaving the piece and attending to something else, say, the Thanksgiving turkey, wasn't an option. I put it to you this way; Have you ever shared a meal with a companion who was unaware of a glob of ketchup on his chin? The longer you looked at him, the more you noticed the ketchup, and pretty soon, the spot became larger than life and was the only thing you saw when you looked at his face? You had to wipe it off as surely as you needed to scratch an itch. This was like that. Leaving the poop to mar the gravel landscape couldn't be tolerated.

Dooby-dooby-doo

The poop and I faced each other. It was going to take more than clever rake skills to maneuver this piece of poop onto my shovel, it was going to take psychology. I needed to be one with the doo doo, to think like the doo doo, to BE the doo doo. (A bit of trivia here. Little known is that Frank Sinatra got the idea for his famous "dooby dooby doo" in "Strangers in the Night" from this very story).

More trivia. That last part? I lied. Sorry.

In hindsight, I might have had less trouble with the poop had it not been a perfect sphere. Or small. Or have the texture of a Tootsy Pop (a chewy nougat center with a hard outer shell - and sorry if you're eating right now). If it wasn't slipping between the tines of my rake, it was rolling away from me. If it wasn't rolling away, it bounced. Capturing this piece was no longer just a challenge, there was a principle involved. I WAS going to be smarter than a piece of shit. And so, with head down, scooper in hand and chin jutting out in determination, I walked, and scooped. Walked and scooped. Chased, corralled, lost it - and chased again. I never looked up, I kept my eye on the prize, and I kept after it.

Not my burning turkey. A recreation
of someone else's burning turkey

Which was how I came to be three miles away from my house on Thanksgiving while my dinner guests languished over an ash tray, wondering if someone should do something about the smoke billowing out of the oven.

I had chased the damn thing into traffic, and in the end, a yellow Ryder rental truck did what I could not. It conquered the poop by flattening it.

By now you're probably asking yourself few things. Why hadn't I simply bent over and collected the poop with a plastic bag covered hand? Why hadn't I used a sifter to separate the poop from the gravel? And (you ask yourself): Why am I still reading this blog about poop? In short order, the answers are that using my hand would have defeated the challenge of the contest; Owning a sifter with the expressed purpose of separating poop from gravel is too anal even for me, and you're still reading this because you recognize great literature when you see it?

Flex Rakes.
The Poop Scoopers
of Champions

Grip & Grab Poop Scooper

I finish with one more observation; I think my gender makes a difference in this story. Applied Animal Behavior Science Journal is set to release the results of a study that found that dogs walked on leashes by men are four times more likely to threaten and bite other dogs during the walk. Could gender make a difference when choosing our poop scooping tools? I use Flex Rakes. The rake/shovel system requires delicacy, wrist action and patience. It allows me finesse and it gives me options. I can use the corner of the rake, or I can raise it over my head and pound the daylights out of the poop as I turn the air blue with expletives. I notice that many men in my neighborhood, however, prefer "Grip and Grab" type scoops. Now I ask you: does a Grip and Grab look like it offers any kind of control? I think men like this sort of scoop because it resembles a piece of heavy construction equipment called a clam shell scoop. Men love monster trucks, chain saws and heavy equipment. Why use a plain old rake when you can make truck sounds while poop scooping? Why pick up a pile of poop when you can grab the earth underneath it, and possibly every worm, insect and mole in the earth as well?

Thanksgiving is soon upon us. We're breaking with tradition this year and leaving town, us and the dogs. There is no pea gravel dog run where we're going. There are no smokers. I feel sure, however, that there will be poop.

Clam shell scoop close up

A honking BIG clam shell scoop

Winter Poop. It Can Kill You.

2011-11-03T20:46:00.000-07:00

I hate the word "poop." I hate hearing the word "poop," I hate saying the word "poop" and because I hate writing the word "poop," I use it as infrequently as I can. "Poop" lacks dignity, and I find it especially vulgar when it's part of a verbal exchange between a parent and toddler while I'm waiting for a food order at a restaurant. That said, it's sometimes the only word that will do, especially for those of us who feel that words have nuance. "Poop" in my view, is not interchangeable with feces, waste, scat, dung, crap, turd or dog logs, all perfectly wonderful words, but not for this article. So, poop it is.

I write to warn you of the very real danger of dog poop in cold weather. If you pick up your dog's poop - and you know you should - be forewarned. A friend of mine suffered a painful eye injury this week when she was chipping away at a pile of frozen dog poop in her yard. Because the little brown mound had gone through a couple of freeze/thaw cycles, it had all the pliability of granite, which is to say that it had none at all. When the pile refused to budge, she took a pick axe to it. Gutsy, but not entirely smart. As she tells it, a small piece suddenly broke off the mound, ricocheted off the house and hit her in the eye. When every blink of her eye caused excruciating pain, she was told to see an ophthalmologist; He diagnosed a scratched cornea, but not before inquiring what it was that hit her in the eye. "No shit!" he blurted out when she told him. And then he laughed at his own pun.

As she told me all this over the phone, I thought the doctor's reaction was rather unprofessional. And I would have told her as much had I not been stifling laughter at the other end of the line. Why add insult to injury?

She's been prescribed eye drops. And she's had to wear an eye patch that's evoked curiosity. Being a particularly shy person, she suffers when her explanation has evoked more chuckles than sympathy. I, of course, have risen above all this. I've thanked God it wasn't me. My friends and family EXPECT this kind of thing to happen to me. Every once in awhile, it's nice to break character.

I've been thinking. Is it worse to suffer an injury to one's eye, or, say, be a mouth-breather and endure THAT scenario while poop-scooping? What if it HAD been me, a known mouth-breather. What if I, in pioneer spirit, had taken an axe to a recalcitrant frozen pile of poop. What if a piece flew off in the direction of my mouth at the precise moment that I'd taken in a breath of air. What if I'd started choking on a piece of poop? Surely vomiting be the next logical step upon realizing that one has inhaled dog poop. Can you even vomit while choking? And if you're like me, and I know I am, I'd start laughing at the sheer absurdity of the situation. Can you laugh, vomit and choke at the same time? Would your head explode?

As it happens, I do know of another poop related danger lurking in a yard during the winter. The dreaded "stepping-on-a-poop-scoop-rake-hidden-under-the-snow" injury. Sadly, I was the victim this time. And I can testify to how freaking-hard a frozen handle to a poop scooper can get. If memory serves me, I was wearing Sorrel boots at the time. I trudged into the snow and all of a sudden, something hit me so hard in the stomach that the last thing I saw before doubling over in pain was my husband and all of the dogs ALSO doubled over. Only they were laughing.

As a rule, I think that the only safe poop is soft poop. With Thanksgiving coming up, however, I'm reminded that it ain't necessarily so. And I'll get into that in my next blog.

The Homicidal Season: Dead Leaves & Puli Cords

2011-10-29T18:46:00.000-07:00

I love the autumn for its colors and the crispness in the air, but it's also a time of year that puts me in a homicidal frame of mind. I watch helplessly as dead grass, withered weeds and dessicated leaves blow into the dog yard and embed themselves into the corded coats of my dogs. The dried foliage fractures into microscopic pieces upon contact and I know I'll have hours of tweezer work ahead of me if I want to show the dogs again. The dogs, of course, love this. Fussing over them means more "mom" time, and it's possible that it's for this reason alone that I've caught them standing spread eagle into the wind, inviting any and all manner of foliage to latch on to their bodies. I get angry, of course, but I'm also embarrassed for them; It's unseemly for a stud dog to resemble Kate Winslet in her "I'm Flying" scene from "Titanic."

Body suits work after a fashion, but they don't protect a Puli's feet and those are corded, too. Furthermore, not everything that can get into a dog's feet is organic. One of my fully coated dogs once stepped into a wad of pink chewing gum three days after I'd had knee surgery. The gum had softened, spread out like an amoeba and worked itself deeply between the pads of his foot. At that point, it evidently didn't bother him enough to tap me on the shoulder and say, "Mum, I have some difficulty with my foot. Could you see to it?"

Instead, the dog spent the day strolling over garden debris, a garage floor and lounging about the kitchen. At a time of his choosing, he borrowed my crutch, whacked me on the ankle repeatedly and bellowed, "WOMAN, HELLLLOOOO, ARE YOU BLIND? DOG WITH PAW PROBLEM HERE." Indeed. Deep inside his paw and adhered to the pink bubble gum was pea gravel, flaky onion skins, dust bunnies, a couple of metal washers and a golf tee with a "Top Flight" dimpled ball still perched on it.

When it comes to a dog's paw - a highly sensitive appendage that a dog will lick - one dispenses with the usual remedies to remove gum. The dog wouldn't have tolerated an ice cube held against his foot, I didn't know about peanut butter, and I wasn't inclined to use a chemical solvent to dissolve it. In the end, I cut away as much gooey hair from between the pads as I could. And that's when I found him. A tiny golfer in knickers and argyle socks. Who knows how long he'd been in there.

Meanwhile, the other dogs observed all this with rapt attention. Dogs can be odd when it comes to witnessing another dog's infirmities. The Puli incurred great sympathy and garnered a lot of respect from his house mates when it came to the bubble gum in his foot. "Whoa, dude," they said. "Look at all the crap you've got in that paw!"

Interestingly enough, when a different dog suffered ruptured anal glands the month before the gum incident, it was a source of amusement to all of them. As if it wasn't bad enough for the poor dog be sore *there,* an antibiotic had to be rubbed "on-site" daily. The dogs never missed an opportunity to see ointment smeared on someone else's anus, and indeed, invited every dog in the neighborhood over for brunch on these occasions. I noticed that all of them sat with their own anuses glued to the floor during these applications, never entirely sure that I wouldn't turn on them next.

Perhaps they sensed that a ruptured anal gland would heal in time, and therefore figured that they had only so much time in which to make the most of her humiliation. Maybe this was why they also treated me as if I wasn't nursing a surgically repaired knee. By now I was doing physical therapy on the knee, often doing the exercises on the floor. This was made considerably more difficult when 35 pounds of hair sat on my face because a dog felt like bonding. As I moaned and tried to remind my knee of what it once could do, my grunts were peppered with muffled, "Gbbb 'ff mmmm 'ad" (translation: "Get off my head!"). For my trouble, I got a mouth full of black hair and noted the queue of other dogs waiting their turn. Good times, those.

I'm gazing out the window as I write, watching leaves being blown this way and that by the wind. I know that when I let the dogs out in a few minutes, they'll walk over those leaves and a clean trail will follow behind them. And I'll know exactly where to find those leaves.

Today's Bike Ride Brought to you by the Letter "S"

2011-10-28T20:24:00.000-07:00

Snow still lines the Platte River

I promised myself last winter that as long as the roads were clear and the temperature was over 40 degrees, I'd get on my bike and ride. A quick little blog tonight is brought to you by the letter "S" for things having to do with my ride earlier today.

Snow (left-over from a storm the other day) always elevates a bike ride from riding with caution to riding as if I'm at Def Con 1. Why? Because I'm already the person who can get into trouble on a sunny, dry day cruising at a blistering 7 mph. Why would I tempt fate to ride two days after a snow storm?

Because I'm considering wearing this Anthropologie skirt to Westminster next year and I want it to hang off me as if I were a curtain rod.

It's important that you start out a ride with proper equipment, and I like to wear socks that reflect my mood, or the mood I want to be in. Judging by what I wore today, I must have wanted to be in the Caribbean.

Don't worry, be happy, mon

I hadn't gotten very far in my ride when I noticed shoes hanging off a power line. What's up with this? I've seen shoes hanging off of lines before, and I've never understood it. Is it a signal to aliens? Am I to feel bad about having shoes when third world babies are going without? WHAT DOES IT MEAN?

Sometimes Mother Nature gets ahead of herself here in Colorado. She hasn't finished one season before she begins the next one. The snow storm was preceded by gusty winds that blew the leaves off the trees. Holy cow, where was the bike path here?

Somewhere in this mess was a bike path.
I chose a route and hoped I wasn't riding over
a small mammal. Or another cyclist

I love October. I love Halloween. I love pumpkins. I loved this pumpkin patch.

Ok. So they were pumpkins and not spheres.

I stopped to refill my water bottle at a quickie mart where a young child gaped at my gloves which are called "lobster" gloves for obvious reasons, I reached out to give him a closer look and he freaked out. I have a feeling he thought the gloves conformed to the hands inside. It reminded me of a picture Rich Shelin posted on Dr. V's Facebook page which freaked out everyone who saw it.

Lobster Gloves

At one point, I caught a glimpse of my shadow. Is it true what they say about shadows, that they add an extra ten pounds to your frame?

You know what's REALLY dangerous on a bike ride? It's not cars. It's not other riders. It's not the wind, snow, rain, or space station debris. It's squirrels. Some squirrels are just stupid. Or daring. They dart out in front of a bike cruising at 18 mph and think they can get out of the way in time. And they always do. The cyclist, however, doesn't share the same optimism and either slams on her brakes, makes an unwise course correction, or simply heads into the bushes to avoid a collision. I was lucky to meet this squirrel when I was off my bike adusting a chain. He was a bold little thing, and very irritated that I didn't have a bag of acorns to offer him.

Nothing "squirrely" about this squirrel

It was time to head back to my car. I'd already been thinking about this blog and about what I would write. I thought about the day's ingredients and had decided on the "S" theme. Only one thing was missing and I didn't think I would be lucky enough to encounter it.

And then I did.

Though her owners thought I was daffy when I asked if I could take a picture of their dog, "Asia," (what's a blog, the husband asked his wife), they were very obliging. And that's how I'm ending things. With Asia, the Shiba Inu.

Pure Bred Dogs: a Martha Stewart "good thing."

2011-10-25T18:45:00.000-07:00

As dog owners, we take a lot of things of granted. We take for granted the dog toys strewn all over the floors. We take for granted the water bowl that always needs filling. If we can't move our feet in the middle of the night, we take for granted that there's a dog laying on them and not that we've had a stroke. Dog hair, water bowls, poop scooping, grooming, vet visits - these are all things we take in stride. It's our normal.

For some dog owners, what counts as normal can also be specific to our breed: Some breeds drool. Some "hawk loogies" with the turn of a head. Some breeds, if they're show dogs, wear snoods around the house. Some shed so much that dog hair is a household condiment while others have such vigorous tail action that nothing of value is ever put on a coffee table. I personally would find it startling to sit down and be eye level with my dog, but I'd also have broken my neck long ago if I lived with a toy breed I didn't see in time mid-stride. Big dogs or little, hairy breeds or drooley, it's all "normal" for the person who lives with them.

I guess I hadn't appreciated my own breed's quirks until a guest became trapped in my guest bathroom. It was silly, really. She'd come to our house to hand-deliver some documents we'd been expecting and asked to use my powder room almost immediately after she arrived. No problem, I said. The facility was near the front door and I showed her to it. She smiled apologetically, closed the door, and I left her alone. My dogs, who'd been outside, were let in and I busied myself in the kitchen while waiting to hear the bathroom door open.

A few minutes elapsed, and then five, and I never heard my visitor leave the bathroom. I glanced around a corner and saw that the door was still shut, one of my dogs lying on the floor near it. I continued to prattle around the kitchen, but when five minutes grew into ten, I grew impatient to get my paperwork, escort the stranger out of my house, and get back to my day. I glanced around the corner again. The door was still shut and the dog hadn't moved other than to lift his head and stare at the door.

And then I heard it.

Tap tap tap.

I wasn't sure I'd heard correctly at first, the sound was so feint. And, besides, who expects someone to be knocking on a bathroom door from inside the bathroom?

At this point, I must be fair. There IS another side to this story, and now would be the time to share it.

Imagine. A courier arrives at a home and finds herself in dire need of a restroom. The strikingly beautiful homeowner with dazzling eyes and a body to kill graciously shows her to it and, presumably, attends to other matters until the reason for the visit can be resumed.

The courier is about to open the door when she looks down and see this:

God almighty, it wasn't there before.

She steps back and takes in the bigger picture.

She hadn't imagined it. It's still there.

And then it moves. Whatever "it" is, it moves.

I suppose when looked at the situation from her perspective, knocking on the door was probably a reasonable thing to do. Whatever "those things" under the door were, they were attached to something that was: a) Alive; b) Possibly bigger than she was, and c: Likely venomous with claws and a spiked tail.

We're back to the moment, now. I put my ear to the door, called to my visitor and opened the door. She stepped back - way back - and after she looked at my face, her eyes dropped and took in the dog near my feet. It was worse than she had imagined it. This thing was covered in stringy appendages. It panted, showed TEETH, and it then it brought her a stuffed monkey that squealed. Probably the carcass of an endangered species. Probably a ruse to get her to reveal her tender, fleshy backside.

No amount of paperwork could compel her to stay beyond a signature and hasty retreat. She was soon gone.

In thirty years of Puli ownership, I've seen cords under my bathroom door hundreds of times and have never given it a second thought. But in recreating the scenario by taking pictures of what she saw that day, I can understand how startling it must have been to her.

It made me reflect on the times I've visited or stayed with friends with other breeds.

I've picked Old English Sheepdog hair off of a slice of birthday cake and was the only person at the table who winced. I watched as a Bloodhound launched a loogie a full 15 feet across a room that not only had distance, but velocity since I was able to hear it land with an audible SPLAT. I've sat down on a couch next to a Deerhound already sitting there, and she towered over me.

God help me, but this is one reason I love purebred dogs - it's the diversity they bring to the table. Visiting a home with a different breed is a lot like visiting the Italian, Polish or Armenian section of upstate New York was when I was a kid. I knew I was going to like being there, but I also knew that day would be different.

I would experience someone else's normal.

And it was, as it is now, always a Martha Steward "good thing."

Dog Trivia. Can we ever get enough of it?

2011-10-22T16:44:00.000-07:00

I was asked a thought provoking question on Twitter the other day. What has been the weirdest fact that I've come in the course of posting dog trivia on Twitter.

A black-and-tan Coonhound

from Boulder,Colorado has

the 2012 Guinness World Record

for the "longest ears on a living dog."

Dog trivia. On Twitter? Huh?

A quick explanation: I research, compile and post "factoids" and trivia about dogs as part of the social media work I do for kennel clubs and for my own small business. When I first started, I was concerned that I would run out of interesting information all too quickly. Little did I know. When I did some digging in my records, I found that I've compiled an astonishing 412 pages of trivia thus far (equal to about 19,000 "factoids") and have 756 pages in reserve. I doubt I'll ever truly exhaust all the information that's out there.

Now I realize why the question asked of me on Twitter was so provocative: I couldn't come up with a quick answer. I still can't, and I've been thinking about it since yesterday.

At best, I can break it down into categories: What's the weirdest record held by a dog (among some pretty strange records); What's the strangest dog law (and there are a bunch out there); The weirdest dog? Define weird. Some might think my own breed is pretty strange. The trivia hardly stops at "weird," however. Virtually everything about dogs is fascinating (to me, anyway), from the role of canines in art to their impact on pop culture. Throw in some facts about the breeds we know well to breeds we didn't know existed at all and one can see how easy it is to generate all pages and pages of trivia.

Those who have followed me on Twitter for any length of time have come to know that there are some things I don't do. I won't write ill of any purebred dog, and I don't denigrate mutts. Breeders of "designer dogs" know where I stand on their "breeding program," however, and it's not in their corner; Since my own background is in the fancy, I like to include information that demystifies the dog show world to pet people, but I also like to show the positive impact dog ownership has on the average person. I seek to educate, amuse, enlighten and surprise. And I like to bash PETA and HSUS every chance I get. I make no apologies for trivia that contradicts an earlier bit of information: I present data as I find it - and different sources sometimes have different views on the same subject. Since Twitter limits posts to 140 characters, I don't include sources, either. I'm not writing a doctoral thesis, I'm sharing trivia.

"Hercules" has the world's
thickest neck at 38 inches

It occurred to me that answering my Twitter pal might make for an amusing blog, so what follows is just a fraction of some entertaining categories along with a few of my favorite bits of trivia pertaining to each:

Strangest Dog Records:

Striker, a Border Collie, is the current Guinness World Record holder for the "Fastest Car non-electric window opened by a Dog" at 11.34 seconds;
England currently holds the Guinness World Record for having had the largest dog walk with 10,272-dogs participating;
Six dogs set a world record for the most dogs surfing on one board at the Surf City Surf Dog Weekend in 2011;
The Guinness World Record for the largest dog cake was set in 2011 with a cake made of dog food, shaped like a Corgi & weighing 150.91 pounds;
In 2011,Andy Pelphrey set a record by bouncing a baseball off the side of a building 23 times in 30 seconds while petting a dog;
In 1988, Olive Oyl, a Borzoi,set the world record for most consecutive jump rope jumps by a dog: 63 complete rotations;
Guinness Book of Records once listed the Komondor as having the longest continuously growing coat of any animal

The Iditarod

Each Iditarod sled dog needs at least 100 salmon to make it through the winter months in Alaska;
The first 100 miles of the Iditarod is known as "moose alley" for the many moose which forage for food on the trail;
Iditarod's bib #1 is reserved to honor the individual who has made a significant contribution to sport even if they're not mushers;
A sled dog running in Alaska's Iditarod race burns an average 10,000 calories;
John Suter ran Standard Poodles in four Iditarods from 1988 to 1991 & finished midpack in each race;
The Iditarod entry fee is $1,750;

Helen Keller with her Akita

People can purchase a ride on a sled for the first few miles of the Iditarod; The revenue is used to send home mushers who didn't earn a prize

Famous People & their Breeds:

The first Akita arrived in America in 1937 when Helen Keller returned from Japan with one;
The Chinese Crested Hairless breed gained healthy numbers with help of committed breeders including the stripper, Gypsy Rose Lee;
When his Italian Greyhounds died, Frederick the Great buried them with his own hands on the grounds of his Sans Souci Palace;
President Reagan’s Cavalier King Charles Spaniel was given a dog house designed by the great great grandson of President Rutherford Hayes;
Gary Berghoff, better known as Radar O'Reilly on the TV show M.A.S.H., owned five dachshunds of each coat variety;
Edgar Rice Burroughs named his Airedale Terrier after the character he created, "Tarzan."

Pop culture

The first time a Beagle is mentioned in the cartoon strip, "Peanuts," was in 1960 when Snoopy denied being one;
The original Wizard of Oz script called for "Toto" to be played by a Dachshund, and the one that was nearly used for the part was a dog owned by Margaret Hamilton, the actress who played the Wicked Witch of the West;
The first dog to ever appear on the cover of Sports Illustrated (February 14, 1955) was a Great Dane;
On a 1972 episode of the game show, "The Price is Right," a Lhasa Apso puppy was the first item up for bid (Ed.Note:I find this ironic, given Bob Barker's active role with animal rights groups);
When Lena Horne and Billie Holiday hung out together, they usually talked about Holiday’s dogs which included her beloved Boxer;
The very first dog to walk a tightrope at a circus was an American Eskimo dog;
On the day Rin Tin Tin died in 1932, his owner's neighbor, the actress, Jean Harlow, came over & cradled his head as he passed away

13 dogs jumping the same rope at the
same time set a new world record

Bizarre dog laws:

Illinois,it is illegal to give a dog whiskey;
Police offers in Palding, Ohio are allowed to bite a dog to quiet it;
It's illegal to educate dogs in Hartford, CT;
In Chicago,it’s illegal to take a French Poodle to the opera;
People who make "ugly faces" at dogs in Oklahoma may be fined and/or jailed;

Dog Physiology

The only mammals with prostates are humans and dogs;
There are seven types of blood groups in canines;
Dogs vocal cords are much thicker and less sensitive than ours - so they can bark longer than we can before getting hoarse;
If you unfolded and laid out the delicate membranes from inside a dogs nose, the membranes would be larger than the dog itself;
Blowing into a dog's ear, even innocently, is the equivalent of finger nails on a chalk board is to us, but amplified 100s of times;
A dog’s raspy tongue serves to debride contaminants from a wound when s/he licks it & stimulate circulation;
Approximately 70% of a dog’s immune system is located in her gastro-intestinal tract

It's hard to know when to stop, but this is as good a place as any. If you like this sort of thing, follow me on Twitter where my trivia appears hourly, 17 hours a day. Find me at: http://twitter.com/KnobNots. In the meantime, what's the weirdest dog "factoid" YOU'VE come across?

Bloomingdale R Us

2011-10-20T11:00:00.000-07:00

Bloomindales in New York

Seventy-two hours ago, I was standing in Bloomingdales on Lexington Avenue.

Retail therapy was in order following the utter sadness of the funeral the day before, and I had a few hours to kill before my flight back to Denver. I wanted "one-stop" shopping to consume my afternoon and remembered reading that the "footprint" of Bloomingdales takes up an entire block of New York City real estate. I entered the store through the perfume department, which, by my reckoning, was the size of a football field - and I could have used a right tackle to get me from one end of it to the other. Bloomingdales was the perfect choice.

I took my time as I admired handbags and shoes, belts and dresses, and the "fashion forward" designers I would never see in Denver for the simplest of reasons: We are the Rocky Mountain West: We are more parka than Prada, sheepskin than Shoshanna, Toms over Tory Birch. It's not that high fashion and trends aren't appreciated here, but most women would be stupefied at the thought of spending on one purse what they could put towards a pair of powder skis; Colorado routinely tops the list of states with the highest percentage of women who ski, cycle, run, rock climb, river raft or attend yoga classes at least once a week - and usually, it's all of the above. Denver store buyers know this and buy their clothing lines accordingly.

I wasn't wearing these
(AG Adriano
Cigarette Jeans $210)

I suppose I had it coming, what happened next. I should have known better than to shop in the city while dressed to be comfortable for a long flight; I should have known better than to wear Lee jeans inside the store, and I should have known better than to expose my "no longer twenty-something face," within 50' of a cosmetics counter. I should have known all these things before stepping inside Bloomingdales where it was so glaringly obvious to the untrained eye that I was from out of town. By the time these realizations occurred to me, it was too late. A cosmetics representative dressed entirely in black had me by the elbow and was steering me towards a seat and facial Armageddon. "LOVE your haircut," she gushed. You're going to LOVE what I'm going to do for your face."

I wore these...........

I doubted it. Unless she was prepared to scrub in for a free brow lift performed by a renowned plastic surgeon, I wasn't interested.

....and not these Pradas
($850)

The woman was strong. And she knew her anatomy. With my elbow bent a certain way and cupped in her hand, I stood a better chance of dislocating it than I did of freeing myself from the vice grip of a cosmetic sales woman during a bad economy. I, however, was no slouch, either, and if I could redirect a twelve year old boy from a Nintendo counter, I could deal with this. Ever so subtly, I put my left foot immediately in front of my right foot and "tripped." I might have broken away had my other elbow not been scooped up by her co-worker. Damn. I'd been double-teamed.

My tweed jacket wasn't as
"fashion forward" as this
Theory Myleen tweed at $585

I wasn't fully in a dentist's type chair before these ladies were smearing goop on my face and chatting away. Pat pat pat, "It's always important to use your ring finger when applying product to your face" pat pat pat "so that you don't stretch the skin too much" pat pat pat. Someone's fingers - (I'll call her Helga, Dominatrix #1) began to massage the lines at left of my mouth: "And do you always direct your fingers UP towards your scalp when applying product?" she asked. I answered, "Mwah, schome tram." "That's good," the other one (Dominatrix #2) cooed, "but try to do it every time." I wondered what she would have said had I told her I used 10w 40 motor oil as a night moisturizer.

"We're just working on the left side of your face," they told me, "so you can compare." I noticed that they often caught each other's eye before reminding me of how much I was going to love their product. I wondered if they practiced this at night.

The two of them were effectively blocking any chance I had of leaping out of my chair and making a run for the door. One of them had her knee pointed toward my knee cap while the other held the jar of "product" perilously close to my larynx. Escape now would be painful. My eyes darted around. Others had been captured, I saw, bound to their swivel chairs by an invisible force field. Their eyes bulged in terror. I wanted to comfort them. I wanted to say to one of them, "It's okay, honey. You're at a New York City cosmetics counter. They can't keep you here overnight. It'll soon be over."

My harpies prattled on: "This is cutting edge stuff," said Helga, determined to iron out twenty years of laugh lines in the next thirty seconds with just her finger tips. "It's made from wombat embryonic tissue," the other chimed in. "Have you ever seen an old looking wombat?" she asked? Why no, I thought. I'd never seen a wombat at all.

Two minutes later and the left side of my face was numb. As a mirror was held in front of my face, "Helga" effusively described how much younger the left side of my face looked. Did I see it? Was I not amazed??? I peered at my reflection and noticed that the left side of my lips didn't match up with the right side. My left nostril was a full inch higher up than the right nostril was. My right eyelid drooped. Yes, my laugh lines were nearly gone. So was the capacity to wince, laugh, frown, grin or form the words, "My God. I look like a Picasso."

The ladies beamed, sure they'd made a sale of wombat goo at $250 an ounce. I almost pitied them for not having fully done their homework when tagging me as easy mark. I was not going quietly into the night, $250 poorer.

I pulled up my dignity and opined that I saw no difference in the two sides of my face even as I was rearranging it. Once again, they found each other's eyes. The look that passed between them said it all; They'd been found out.

Had they been taught two fashion "rules of thumb," they would have had the good sense to let me walk by before snaring me. The first, 'Fashion changes, taste remains" has always served me well when agonizing over the wisdom of a garment purchase. The other is that a fabulous haircut, a high quality purse, and well made shoes on your feet reveal more about you than anything else you have on. I have a great haircut. Hanging off my shoulder was a great purse bought on sale. The shoes on my feet...........well, I have a great hair cut (Ed note: Few people can emerge from thirty years of wearing tight ski boots or showing dogs on cement floors and not suffer bad feet). But I digress. The point is that these ladies had zeroed in on all the wrong things when sizing me up as a hapless out-of-towner.

Apre ski wear.
In Hollywood, maybe

Did I feel any less awkward at having been marked as a hick in the big city? No. I felt like a brown pair of shoes being worn with a black suit. I would love to have been a leggy Heidi Klum look-alike and not have been targeted in the first place. But what goes around comes around. One day, these ladies might, say, head west for a fabulous Colorado ski vacation. In anticipation of their big trip, they'll put together a ski outfit that will include hats, gloves and goggles that all match their outfit. They'll stand in a lift line feeling fabulous in their "look" but by the time they get to the front of the line, they'll have noticed something, a niggling suspicion that will amplify as they ride up the gondola and watch the skiers below. If, somehow, they miss the memo during a day on the slopes, the realization will hit home when they enter a restaurant for apre ski drinks while wearing massive, furry boots.

They're not dressed right.

They're dressed like tourists.

They're not being taken seriously.

No one wants to look like a beginner - or an out of towner. Locals and experienced skiers buy quality components to meet changing ski conditions, not a suit and accessories all in the same shade of eggplant.

Few of us emerge out of this life without knowing what it's like to be dressed wrong for an occasion, but the devil is in the details and it's always helpful to know what to look for. Hair, purse, shoes. Leave the wombat goo at home.

Your fashion tip for the week.

What will be in YOUR obituary?

2011-10-10T12:06:00.000-07:00

I like to read obituaries.

As long as I'm not apt to come across my own, it's one of the sections I always go to in a newspaper.

I find obituaries interesting for the same reason that I find driving through a neighborhood at night interesting; When a house is lit up and the curtains are drawn, I get a fleeting glimpse into the lives of strangers. I see what they put on their walls, their taste in furniture, and if the TV set is on, what program they're watching. Sometimes I see the people, themselves. Quite unintentionally, I form Polaroid impressions of people I don't know because for the briefest of moments, I've seen how they live. And then the next house comes along.

Obituaries may be the consummate form of being on the outside of a house and looking in, but with an obituary, we're getting a glimpse of a person's life from start to finish in paragraph form.

Today, I came across this one which I've summarized: Harry, born to German immigrants, died last week at the age of 91. He served in the U.S. Army during WWII, and then in the Air Force. He was in the Normandy invasion, the Battle of the Bulge and the liberation of the Buchenwald concentration camp. He was a Purple Heart recipient After his military service, he worked for the State of Colorado. He was a life-long golfer and a founding member of a local Catholic church.

I was sorry to read that we'd lost yet another member of the "greatest generation. " I don't know if I would have liked Harry, but I feel sure I would have been able to depend on him.

Then there was Henry's obituary: Henry, known as Hank, owned a beauty supply store with his wife, Wilma. They met while dancing at a ballroom in 1942 and eloped one month later. He served in the military, then returned home and earned a law degree. During his entire married life, he and Wilma continued to enjoy ballroom dancing and even won several competitions.

I think I might have liked Hank for his quirky contradictions: He was an Army Air Force officer, but ballroom danced; He eloped with his bride a mere four weeks after meeting her, but put his nose to the grindstone through law school. He was an attorney, but owned a store that sold nail polish, hair spray and Clairol. Hank struck me a practical romantic.

I don't, of course, have the first notion of what these men were truly like beyond what a newspaper obituary writer wrote of them. Surely they had their disappointments and heart aches, joys and triumphs. But would Harry and Hank have felt satisfaction with what their obituaries said of them? Would one of them have preferred to be remembered as having a twinkle in his eye over being a golfer? Would the other have winced that his devotion to animals was never mentioned?

Some years back when attending out-of-town dog shows, I often traveled with a person who showed a different breed. Our dogs got along and we were compatible roommates, but other people who knew her wondered how I did it; They found her acerbic, humorless and blunt to the point of rudeness. Though she was widely respected for her breeding program, the affection of real friends eluded her. Even so, we had a pleasant relationship and our conversations over long stretches of highway increasingly became more personal. During one drive, we got to talking about legacies, and she revealed that her deepest desire upon her death was to be remembered as a classy, likeable lady who had conducted herself with dignity and kindness. How was it possible, I wondered, this disconnect. She was on track to be remembered very differently, and in a way that would have distressed her.

I realized then the importance of living our lives to match the obituary we want written about us. Since this is largely a "dog blog," there are ample questions we fanciers can ask of ourselves in our "checklist of life." Did I always do right by my dog? Did I ever denigrate someone else's dog to promote my own? Did I ever make someone feel guilty for the type of dog they chose to love? Was I good a good sport in competition even when I lost to a bitter rival? Did I ever cozy up to a judge/breeder/handler for self gain? Did I always have the best interest of my breed at heart when engaged in club activity?

The nature of competition doesn't always bring out the best in us, especially if we're inexperienced or insecure. But could the real sin be in not self-correcting a behavior we'd hate in someone else? Conversely, are the very best deeds found in the acts of decency or kindness that no one else sees us do? Put another way, what would we want our obituary to say, and are we living our lives in a way that will earn us that "model obituary?"

Here are some fictituous obituaries. Which people would you like to have known?

"Jane" was preceded in death by her loving parents. She was active in the dog fancy and despite repeated complaints, was notorious for running up on her competition's dogs;

"Joe," a life long Cubs fan, was active in politics both locally and in his dog club where he served on many committees. Joe was always the first person to welcome a newbie and often shared tips with new exhibitors even if their dog was superior his own;

"Mary," dead at the age of 74, was remembered as a fierce competitor who was spotted more than once roughing up her dogs behind an RV if they failed to win or perform;

At a memorial service for "John" last week, fellow shelter workers remembered him as a tireless worker who never failed to chastise irresponsible owners. He especially targeted purebred dog breeders;

It looks different written down, doesn't it? I made these up, but I've persuaded myself that I need to do a better job in my own life because I hate the thought of leaving behind an ugly obituary. Then, too, there's the whole "fear for my mortal soul turning on a spit in the flames of hell" thing.

Update: My blog entry isn't finished, and it won't get finished the way I had intended to because I've just learned that a friend of our family died last night. The young woman who passed away was beautiful and funny, and if there was even a smidgeon of selfishness in her, I never saw it. She worked with "high-risk" high schoolers in an inner city back east, and she made a real difference in the lives of many of them even as their circumstances distressed her personally. She was my daughter's best friend from college and now she's gone.

She was 27.

I'll be away from my blog for a few days to help the family and offer support for my daughter. The irony that I was writing a blog about obituaries when this happened isn't lost on me, and I did consider pulling the piece. But now I think the message that I wanted to impart - that it's important to act in a way you'd be proud of - has an addendum. Life is too short - make every moment count, and treat people (and your dogs) as if it's the last time you'll ever see them. I'll be back in a few days.

Wordless Wednesday's Caption Contest for October 5th

2011-10-05T10:45:00.000-07:00

It's Wordless Wednesday's Caption Contest with another cool prize that comes courtesy of the Scotch Brite people.

Scotch Brite Botanical Disinfecting
Wipes at Purina Farms

To better appreciate part of today's prize, I'm including a brief product review of Scotch Brite's Botanical Disinfecting Wipes.

Now I have a confession to make. I have a love affair with wet wipes that began with my first baby back in 1983. The convenience of having a throw-away, nice smelling wet wipe that could be extracted with one hand while holding a squirming infant with the other was addictive. Though my husband and I euphemistically called them "butt wipes" at the time, I used them for anything that required the services of a disposable wash cloth. I disagreed with an Old English Sheepdog friend who once told me that paper towels were the one modern convenience that she would least want to do without. Not me. I was a wet wipes girl through and through. Wet wipe cleaning products have come along and I have a container of them stationed in just about every room in the house. I use them to spot-clean everything from my bicycle to my computer. In a pinch, and utterly against manufacturer recommendations, I've even used them to clean the end of a Puli cord that had gotten, ummm, soiled during a potty break before a dog show. I was desperate and it got the job done.

Most terrier people I know are religious about wiping off the surface of their grooming table between dogs. They won't go to a dog show without wipes, and these days, neither do I. But did you know that the instructions on wet wipes call for the surface to be wiped down again AFTER after their product has been used? I didn't. This is a particular concern if your dog licks his or her feet after having just stood on a table that's just been wiped down with a chemically infused wet wipe. But wait! If you're like me, and I know I am, my grooming table often doubles as an impromptu picnic table at a dog show. What have I been ingesting all this time?

When the Scotch Brite folks asked me to product test their Botanical Disinfecting Wipes, I knew just where to try it out: The Puli National Specialty at Purina Farms last week. My sample was the "Lemon grass" scent which turned my spot in the grooming area into the best smelling space in the room. When my neighbors asked to borrow the wipes, soon the whole north end of the building smelled good - not a "chemically clean" good, but more of a natural, woodsy herbal fragrance. Not just another pretty smell, these disinfecting wipes are unique in that they're made from botanically pure plant extracts that don't require an additional wiping off. For this reason, Scotch Brite has targeted schools and classrooms populated by kids whom, as we all know, are teeming little germ factories. They'd never considered that their product had appealing applications to dog fanciers. Now they know.

Today's Prize

The wipes retail for 35 wipes/$2.48 or 75 for $4.63 and are available at most Walmarts, but you could win a canister because it's included in a box of 3M products that is today's caption contest prize. In addition, the winner receives a Post-It Notes Cube, A package of Durable Tabs for notebooks & planners, two Flag+ pens (flags at one end, ball point pen at the other) and three Flag+ highlighting/flag pens.

You have until midnight tonight (October 5th) to submit your caption for the photograph below. Tomorrow the submissions will appear in a poll. The top vote getter will be announced on Friday and have their prize shipped directly to them by the Scotch Brite people. Good luck!

Add caption

Stranger in a Strange Land: A Husband Attends a National Specialty

2011-10-04T11:53:00.000-07:00

When my husband said the words, each syllable out of his mouth had actual hang time. Though they didn't have the equivalent impact of his telling me that he was leaving me for, say, a young Howler monkey, they nonetheless stopped me in my tracks.

"Why don't I go to the Puli Specialty with you this year?" he cooed sweetly.

Let's review.

I've attended every Puli National Specialty since 1978 except for two. He didn't attend any of them;
For one of those specialties, I was ten days away from delivering a baby. He didn't go;
Two of those specialties were in our own city. He didn't go;
His name is on every dog I've ever bred and/or owned. Some of those dogs have had some nice wins including Best Puppy in Sweeps. He didn't see any of them;
One of those dogs won five consecutive Awards of Merit. He didn't see us win even one of them.

I never minded. We both tacitly understood that the dogs have always been "my thing." Besides, going to a Specialty when our children were little gave him time with them alone, and I think he understood that it also allowed me much needed "away time." I always returned home grateful to have a supportive husband, and happy to see the same kids who only days before had caused me to consider psychotropic drug use.

Why now? What was different this time?

Had the "empty nest" syndrome suddenly hit my husband, Richard? Did the notion of rattling around in a house devoid of noisy kids, dogs, rabbits, hedgehogs or me not appeal to him anymore? I don't know. But the man I married was now expressing interest in attending his first national specialty. He was studying road maps. He downloaded the Weather Channel application to his smart phone. He was considering the best vehicle to rent for the road trip. I half expected him to start knitting little dice to hang from the rear view mirror.

High school Lit classes called what I was feeling "internal conflict." Like most dog show people, I have my show life and my private life, and the two have rarely mixed. Introducing these worlds to each other was going to be interesting. From the perspective of my Puli friends, there was never any actual proof that I was even married. The name listed next to mine in AKC show catalogs? Fiction. The father of those kids I carried while pregnant? An alien abduction probe gone wrong. Would Richard misinterpret the reaction of friends finally meeting the mystery man? And could Richard actually enjoy a trip to a dog show? I was an outgoing Corresponding Secretary, I had board meetings. I had a Judges Education seminar, a member's education talk, and I was showing two dogs. I was going to be busy. Really busy. How could I effectively do "my thing" without ignoring my husband?

As luck would have it, several people brought their husbands along to this Specialty and in a very short time, the men shared a de facto bond: They were the merry band of long suffering husbands whose wives show dogs. Over the coming days, I sometimes spotted them together over cocktails or sitting ringside, heads inclined towards each other and snorting over some secret joke. "My wife has resoled her lucky shoes six times." "Listen to this: MY wife wore the same "lucky" bra to 53 consecutive shows because her dog always won when she wore it." "Wait, wait, I can top you: MY wife once drove 2 hours to a dog show before realizing that she'd forgotten the dog at home." They'd titter like little girls, then "man up" after realizing they were being watched. Throats cleared with manly gruff, testosterone kicked in and suddenly the topic turned to the day's football scores.

It was nonsense, of course. All of it.

I only wore that bra 15 times in a row.

I needn't have worried. Richard has always been a good sport about my dog activities, even if he didn't understand much of it. Having him at the Specialty helped him see that he wasn't married to a freak. Yes, I keep dog kibble in trash cans and dump poop in empty dog food bags. He met other people who do, too. Yes, I've gotten up at 4 AM to drive eight hours to show a dog for two minutes. He met folks who thought nothing of doing the same thing. He saw other bleary eyed people walking their dogs at all hours. And all the times I agonized over how best to trim my dogs or why it was important to gait the dogs at the right speed now made sense to him now when seen in the context of competition. Richard no longer teased me about using scores of elastic hair bands to tie up a Puli coat. Instead, he asked me one morning during the week, "Do you think you should use more bands? It IS raining outside."

Things that seemed nonsensical before now made sense. Richard was seeing the sport from MY eyes.

It helped enormously that "Katie," our new puppy and the absolute apple of his eye, was in her first big dog show and that her breeders were also ringside, come all the way from England. They and Richard had hit it off immediately and now had a common interest in how "their" dog did. Admittedly, it was hard not to feel some pressure. I so wanted to show her breeders that they'd done right in sending Katie to us.

Things don't always happen the way you'd like them to.

Katie. I'm pretty sure she was considering
how best to rip the skirt off me

This time, they did.

"Katie" won her class. Then she won Best Junior in Sweepstakes. And then she was named Best Puppy. The next day, she won Best Junior Puppy in Sweeps again.

But we weren't done. My Special won an Award of Merit during Best of Breed. Like I said, the perfect storm of favorable tidings.

Where's the beef??

Now here's a no-brainer: It's lovely to win. You haven't cured cancer, but you still get a prize. You get rosettes. Your picture is taken and other people notice. You carry all this loot back to your set up and all the world (in the grooming area, anyway) sees that your dogs are winners at a National Specialty. But nothing can compare to seeing pleasure on the faces of people you care about. The breeders, two of my favorite people on the planet, were pleased, and Richard, who'd gamely come to a dog show, smirked with pride. Little Katie, always enchanted with life's endless possibilities, wanted nothing more than to tug at my skirt and wrestle it to the ground. Funny how less important you feel when you're suddenly standing in nothing but a slip. And my Special, more jaded than the puppy, looked around impatiently for the side of beef I'd promised him if he just did what I asked of him in the show ring.

The "loot"

Though there was still a herding venue left to the Specialty, it was time for us to head home. On our way back to Colorado, we stopped to visit the house where as a child, Richard had spent summers visiting his grandmother. Sometimes it's a mistake to revisit a childhood home that's not as large or wonderful as you remember it, but this house, now a town landmark, had improved. Sold by the family a few years ago, the new owners remodeled the interior while keeping the house's historical integrity. It was a good visit, if not nostalgic.

Grandmother's House

Our smart phone applications found us places to eat in the middle of nowhere, and surprisingly, the small town eateries where we stopped were culinary gems. We stopped often to walk the dogs and found the humor in people gawking at what was probably their first corded dogs. At a rest stop, a trucker noticing our Colorado license plates asked if Missouri's humidity had affected our dogs' coats. Richard's fingers vice-gripped my arm before I could answer the man - a husband's way of warning me not to have too much fun with the answer. During the hours and hours of driving, we actually talked "dog" and I heard his observations of the Specialty, the musings of a stranger in a strange land.

Now, over a week later, life has settled into a routine again.

Yesterday, Richard asked me, "Where's the Specialty next year?"

Danger,Will Robinson. Velcro ahead.

2011-09-16T11:50:00.000-07:00

As I prepare to leave for our National Specialty next week, I'm lining up all the things I think my dogs might need while we're gone. Bowls and food: check. Towels and blow dryer: check. Toys and grooming supplies: check. As I rummaged through the dog room, I came across a "suit" I'd purchased for my dog a couple of years ago but that he'd never worn. Intended to protect his coat from weeds and dirt, the suit is made of a lightweight nylon and has openings in all the important places, like, say, the dog's head.

At a Puli specialty, one sees the many creative ways in which owners keep their dogs' coats protected. Di rigeur are fabric covered elastic bands used to tie the cords away from danger spots, most notably, a dog's "nature spicket." Then, too, we want to pull the cords up off the ground where a Puli's coat reliably collects small objects: twigs, dried dead foliage, small mammals. I know someone who once pulled a slicker brush off her dog's testicles, something the dog must have walked over at a dog show. I've never forgotten the look of shock on the owner's face. I'm guessing the dog never forgot the moment, either. Extraction took place in private. I'm told it took a while.

When 175 hair bands aren't enough to fully protect a dog's cords, some owners chose to put their dogs into suits, such as the one I have pictured here. So when I came across the suit I'd bought in 2009, I thought: what better time to try it out than at a national specialty when I want my dog squeaky clean. We needed to do a trial run.

"The Suit" before it had to come off

Our first challenge was to figure out what went where since the suit opened up to the shape of a bear skin rug. As per instructions, the dog was to stand over the opened suit and I was to insert his legs into the sleeves. By the time it was all said and done, however, I didn't so much put the suit on the dog as stuff him into it. Just when I thought I'd gotten one leg into a sleeve, cords erupted out of other openings. Was I putting the dog's left leg into the left sleeve? No wait, that was his tail. I spent a good ten minutes jamming what I thought was one of the dog's legs into one sleeve only to realize that two legs were already in it. Sweaty and exhausted, I realized I'd lost my place on the dog.

The dog, meanwhile, was no help at all. I remain suspicious that while I worked at one end, he surreptitiously rearranged his legs and tail at the other end just to mess me up. Every time I looked at his face to see how he was enduring this fiasco, he wore a pleasant smile and gazed absently into the distance. This was unexpected tolerance from a dog for whom patience meant not flaying my ankle as I prepared his meal.

Progress! I got each leg in its own sleeve. The head popped out of where it was supposed to appear. Even the tail seemed in the right spot - opposite the head. One final act remained and that was to close up the suit. I peeled off the paper from what I assumed was a zipper - and that's when I saw it.

Imagine hearing the theme music to the movie, "Jaws." You always knew that something bad was about to happen when you heard its ominous tones; The notes started out slowly, faintly, and wafted into your consciousness. It built momentum and got louder and louder until it thundered to a crescendo. On screen, the crescendo came when the water turned bloody and you saw the swimmer go down for the last time.

I'm pretty sure the Jaws theme was wafting through the room when I spotted an 18" Velcro strip along the back of the suit where I thought a zipper would be. Every corded dog owner knows right about now that this was a game changer. Suddenly, every cord growing out of the dog's body came alive with but one instinct, and that was to attach itself to the Velcro with the same urgency as a sperm swimming upstream to fertilize an egg. Swear to God, but the dog looked at if he was sharing his suit with wriggly, undulating snakes all driven to find that Velcro.

Under these circumstances, getting the dog out of the suit became a nightmare. I got a one body part out, but the hair growing on it latched on to the Velcro with ferocious tenacity. With the Puli's unerring sense of timing, the dog chose this moment to go limp - check out, as it were, and get in a good power nap.

If putting lace-up shoes on a sleeping person is difficult, getting a limp Puli out of a Velcro situation is worse.

Six hours later, I think it was dinner that finally persuaded the dog that he'd had enough. He woke up and surveyed the situation. He took a deep breath, inflated each cord to the extent that it popped off the Velcro, and simply stepped out of the suit and strolled away. "Why are you taking so long to get me my dinner?" he asked me as I held the limp suit in my hands as if it had been someone's skin recently sloughed off.

We're not taking the suit with us.

Are you an idiot, too?

2011-09-13T09:41:00.000-07:00

The winner of the goodie bag donated by Eukanuba is Jinnie Strickland of El Paso, Texas with her caption, "Sucka." Congratulations to Jinnie.

Doing too much?

I'm going to be taking a break from blogging next week as I'll be at the Puli National Specialty at Purina Farms in Missouri. It's been years since I showed a class dog AND a Special, and I'm not quite sure how I'm going to do this without help. I suspect that anyone within 15 feet of me will be at risk of being recruited to do something: "Hold this," or "carry that." I don't want to consider that how I'm going to manage is age related, but I am mindful that there was a time when I thought nothing of packing the car with a dog, an infant and his sister, and driving eight hours to a dog show without help. I have only dim recollections of what I actually did with my children while I was in the ring. Perhaps I crated them. No, that would have looked bad. More likely I put them in an X-pen.

I am joking, of course. Sort of.

Evidently, I still haven't learned the wisdom of trying not to do too much in too short a time; I have two dogs to wash and groom, I'll be a vendor at a 2-day festival, I'll have a car to unpack from that festival and re-pack for the trip, I've got a house to clean, suitcases to pack, mail to stop, cleaning to pick up, packages to mail, and as Corresponding Secretary for the National Club, I have reports to prepare - all in the next five days.

My friend, "Cliff" recently told me I was an idiot. Far from getting personal, he was simply sharing his enthusiasm over a book he was reading, "People Are Idiots and I Can Prove It!: The 10 Ways You Are Sabotaging Yourself and How You Can Overcome Them" by Larry Winget. The more of the book Cliff read, the more he, a busy attorney, came to recognize his own idiocy. The book maintains that each of us has what we have because our actions produced these results. Not our words and certainly not what we want. When we grouse, "I've got so much to do," and instead of doing them we continue to sip our second cup of coffee (or blog), we're being idiots.

This is hardly a novel concept, but my impression is that the style of the book inspires the reader to a "call to action," that THIS TIME, we'll change what isn't working for us.

I've been threatening for a long time to lighten my load, pare down my projects and start saying "no" more when asked to take on new tasks. Perhaps this book is just what I need to actually do it.

Next week when I attend our Specialty, I'll be handing over the reins of my job as Corresponding Secretary to a newly elected person. After two terms, I'm done, "termed out," as they say. Handing over four years worth of material is a great way for me to get my house in order, both figuratively and literally. I'm always wishing my house were tidier, more organized, and that I could see actual surfaces of tables and countertops. My kids joke that my last words will be, "Don't mind the mess." It's not funny anymore.

When I get back from Missouri, I'm buying that book. I'm going to stop being an idiot.

Results Are In: Field Test of Cooling Mats

2011-09-08T15:05:00.000-07:00

There are a few things for which I hold the bragging rights, but I wish I didn't: All my friends and acquaintances concede that I'm the only person they know to have driven into 75 yards of cow manure in a Volvo wagon, the same wagon with which I got a speeding ticket while I was parked in a parking lot. I was the only student of the Singer Sewing School to have sewed three sleeves on a dress - and the pattern called for it to be sleeveless. I remain the only art critic in the history of an unnamed Denver newspaper who was required to have her copy reviewed by an attorney. I could go on, but why.

I claim no credit for one more bragging right, and while some may contest it, I maintain that my breed of dog (the hairiest breed in the world, according to some sources) gets hotter, faster than any other breed. Not only does a fully corded Puli have an immense coat, but many are black and quick to absorb heat.

The truth is that dog owners of any dark or heavily coated dog have long sought ways to keep their dogs cool during warm months, especially dogs active in the show and performance arena. Most of us have muddled through with products that work after a fashion, or devised systems of our own invention that ultimately are messy, inconvenient, time-consuming or require a power source. With the Puli National Specialty coming up this month in muggy St. Louis, Missouri, I was motivated to see if anything new had come along since the last time I looked for a cooling mat. Two products were most often recommended and I decided to "field test" both of them during a recent dog show weekend. If either could keep a Puli comfortable, they would likely keep any dog comfortable.

The "testers" were my own dogs, "Maci," a fully corded five year old black Puli, and "Katie," a 7 month old youngster going to her first dog shows.

"Maci," cool bed tester #1

"Katie," cool bed tester #2

The Cool Pet Pad

The products were K & H's "Cool Bed III," a "cooling, cushioning bed for your dog" that was purchased for $45 from a local Wag n' Wash grooming store that's part of a chain.

The Cool Bed III

The Cool Bed III's water fill

The difference in thickness between
a filled "Cool Bed III and a Cool Pet Pad

TheGreenPetShop's "Cool Pet Pad" (size medium) was bought via telephone for $34.00 from Tybrushe Pet Supply of Canada, the only source in North America that currently carries the pads.

The box containing the blue colored "Cool Pet Pad" read:

Needs no refrigeration;
No water needed;
No electricity needed;
Always ready to use;
Cools for hours, lasts for years;
Automatically recharges itself;
Patented Activated Gel cools on contact;
Cools & sooths;
Good for Pain, Swelling,aches;
Fits in standard beds, crates;
Perfect for Cars;
Wipes clean;
Portable, folds easy;
Non-toxic.

How it works according to the manufacturer: "A patented gel and chambers along the design are activated by weight or pressure offering a bed that's cooler than the surrounding ambient temperature for 3-4 hours of constant use. It will automatically start to recharge by a shift in weight or position. After a period of non-use, the pad is supposed to start to recharge immediately. You can speed up the process by soaking it in ice water or placing it in a refrigerator or freezer. Leaving the pad in direct sun, heat or hot air effects the performance. The pad is cleaned by hand with a clean, damp cloth and should not be machine washed."

The box containing the gray colored "Cool Bed III" read:

Indoor/outdoor;
No electricity;
Just add water;
Non-toxic;
Aids in medical recovery,skin conditions,calloused elbows,arthritis, excessive panting, hip dysplasia;
Tough nylon & vinyl exterior;
Adjustable comfort valve;

How it works according to the manufacturer: "The bed contains a soft, cool gel designed to radiate heat back into the air or floor surface to keep a dog cool. The water saturated Cool Core absorbs the dog's natural body temperature and converts it to room temperature which is normally well below the dogs' body temperature. The difference created between the room temperature and the dog's temperature is how the bed provides a cooler surface. Even if it's 80 degrees in the house, the bed is 22 degrees cooler than the dog's normal body temperature. The bed provides a permanent, natural, "cool" spot for the dog inside or outside in temperatures under 95 degrees without chemicals or electricity. Never use in direct sunshine, an area with good airflow keeps the bed cooler."

The "field test:" The differences were evident as soon as each mat was pulled out of its box. The blue "Cool Pet Pad," was a thick pad that was indeed ready to go.

The gray "Cool Bed III," on the other hand, required that I fill it with water, about 1.85 gallons for the "small" bed. a size that fit nicely inside a #300 Vari-kennel crate; Conversely, I needed two blue medium sized Cool Pet Pads to cover the bottom of the same sized crate. Filling the bed with water was easy, and once it was filled and the filler cap replaced, I was able to make the bed as firm or cushiony as I wanted by releasing air from the valve. For all intents and purposes, it was a water bed.

Each dog took turns with the different products for the two hour drive to the dog shows and home again, and also while in their crates during the shows.

How did I determine if the pads worked? I watched for panting, restlessness and each dog's overall comfort level. But ultimately, I felt each dog's stomach and chest, as well as the mats themselves to see how cool they felt to my hand.

The results? While both products kept my dogs dry, the gray colored "Cool Bed III" did a better job of keeping my dogs cool. My "touch" test revealed that the gray bed was noticeably cooler on my hand than the blue "Cool Pet Pads" were, as were the "underneaths" of my dogs. Both dogs rested more contentedly, and I think they liked the extra cushioning that a "water bed" provided. The "Cool Bed III" would also be my choice for an arthritic or old dog and the extra chore of filling the beds with water was worth the effort.

The "Cool Pet Pads" came highly touted, and perhaps they are effective with a shorter-haired dog, but a Puli carries a few extra pounds of hair that the coolness of the blue pads didn't seem to penetrate. I'll be using the Cool Beds III for our trip to Missouri.

Caption Contest in honor of Surf Dog Surf-a-Thon

2011-09-07T09:58:00.000-07:00

Terrific bag of goodies for the winner!

We have a terrific prize for this week's Wordless Wednesday Caption Contest. Donated by Eukanuba, the "goodie bag" (seen at the right) is in honor of this Sunday's 6th annual Surf Dog Surf-A-Thon competition presented by the Helen Woodward Animal Center.

The photograph for this week's caption contest is a frame lifted from a video of a recent Surf Dog finals competition. YOU MUST WATCH THE VIDEO FIRST to understand the context of the picture of "Abbie," an unassuming dog who has just humiliated her competiton. Click on the link, scroll down to watch the video and at about 1:39 you'll see Abbie's move. Submit your caption to KnobNots@KnobNots.com by midnight, tonight - that's September 7th.

Tomorrow, all captions will be up for a vote and the caption earning the most votes wins. Friday, I'll announce the winner of the Goodie Bag which contains the following prizes:

A nylon backpack;
A softbite floppy disc;
A plush Rhodamine-colored towel;
Eukanuba bandana;
A travel water bowl;
Surfboard shaped Eukanuba sticker;
A hexabumper floatation toy.

Here's the picture (remember, you have to watch the video). Good luck! And remember to take a moment this Sunday to remember those lost in the attacks on 9-11.

Don't Catch it, Don't Fetch it, Don't Buy it

2011-08-31T08:04:00.000-07:00

Over the weekend, I'll be "field-testing" two different cool mats under real dog show conditions: My Pulik will be sitting on the mats inside their respective crates for the two hour drive to a dog show and also while at the show. I know a lot of people with heavily coated dogs who'll be interested in the results since most of us have been unsatisfied with what the market has had to offer thus far. I'm hoping at least one of these mats is a keeper.

Every so often, however, you come across a product that makes you wonder, "What were they thinking?" or in this case, "What were they NOT thinking? I wasn't even half way through this morning's coffee when I came across an ad for the "Poop Hoop" purported to make "Even The Best Dog Pooper Scooper Very Obsolete." I don't think so.

Take a look at this video (don't be eating) and ask yourself as I did: How handy (or discreet) would one of these be at a dog show or dog park? Even more to my way of thinking, however, was how much I would like to have seen them test this thing on a fully corded Puli; A Puli's "business ends" are so obscured by cords that you could be holding the Poop Hoop under the dog for forty minutes before realizing you've been holding it under his chin.

I was especially amused by this product instruction: "Gently slip the Poop Hoop" under the dog without disturbing him." Are they kidding? Had the product inventor ever tried to collect a stool sample from a dog intent on being left alone during nature's call? I've run the equivalent of an agility course with an outstretched hand covered in a plastic baggie chasing such a dog. We've scaled rock walls, hopped branches and run circles around cars - me, trying to get close enough to catch an "untainted" dropping from the dog, and the dog running as if I'm after him with a butcher knife and hunger in my eyes.

Color me suspicious, but I'm thinking the poor dog in this product video was stuffed with meatballs for three days before being allowed out of the house to relieve himself. By then, you could have driven a 16 horsepower 5" PTO powered wood chipper under the dog's rectum, he wouldn't have cared.

I give credit where it's due, however. The Poop Hoop is a catchy product name and I even admire the tag line, "Catch it, don't fetch it." Sadly, those are the best parts of this product. My conclusion? Don't catch it, don't fetch it, don't even buy it.

When it's right, the rain won't matter

2011-08-29T13:45:00.000-07:00

How someone gets to my age without ever having attended a Jewish wedding before this last weekend, I don’t know. My background is rich in cultural diversity and I’ve attended a wide variety of weddings that included new age, a 4th of July theme, vows said in Hungarian, and one in which the bride was “piped in” with a lone Scottish bag pipe. I even attended a dog show wedding that occurred after Best in Show; That bride and groom left for their honeymoon through an arch of shiny new pooper-scoopers held over them by exhibitors in the same fashion as the arch of swords held by Marines, a tradition that never fails to give me goose bumps (done with pooper-scoopers, however, not so much).

My family was even invited to a Hindu wedding that took place over the course of three days and involved a bride who’d never met her husband before the ceremony. Utterly disappointed when my parents sent their regrets, I now understand and can only imagine how much it would have cost my parents to take a family of five to India.

In this sari, was I worth my weight in gold?

I did get to meet the bride after all. "Dinesh's" new husband brought her back to America and I met a shy and endearing person who wasn't a whole lot older than I was. And she was intrigued with western style clothing. When her husband, “Jugal,” wasn’t looking (yes, it was that kind of marriage), we swapped clothes and stared at ourselves in a mirror. I realized that I was built to wear a sari, and Dinesh couldn’t get over how exposed she felt in my denim mini-skirt. I was staggered when Dinesh told me the cost of her sari in American dollars. While the photograph I have from that afternoon isn’t great, the shimmer of the fabric is still detectable, shiny in a way that satin is. The shine in this sari, however, came from 24 carat gold woven into the fabric – all nine yards of it.

But I’ve digressed.

The Jewish wedding was held at the edge of a mountain lake outside Denver, the chuppah (or canopy under which a Jewish couple stands during the ceremony) just a few feet away from the crystal clear water. We arrived in hellacious weather I can only describe as an Old-Testament-wrath-of-God-thunder-and-lightening storm. Wind blew over decorations, soaked the chairs and caused mayhem. I felt awful for the bride and groom.

Everyone scrambled to turn an outdoor wedding into an indoor one. Water was poured out of candles, the chuppah broken down and reassembled, chairs moved and guests rearranged. Forty five minutes later, Andrea and David choked back tears of joy as they said their vows literally surrounded by friends and family crowded in around them. The weather had forced all of us to squeeze into a small space, but it had also generated intimacy. It forced the bride and groom to rethink the ceremony, but also to recognize what was important. It was a wedding made better, I think, by the forces of nature.

It strikes me that when something is right, the rain won’t matter. In my own experience, this has included dog shows.

I once read that “back in the day,” show judges were known to toss water over a dog to better see the dog’s outline and structure. Now this could just be so much “dog show urban legend,” but thankfully, this isn’t the case nowadays. This isn’t to say that some of us haven’t shown our dogs soaking wet – and the truth is that I have some very fond memories of shows held in lousy conditions. I think what I like about showing in rain is that as competitors, we’re all in it together, partners in misery. And, I’ve come to decide that under competitive circumstances, bad weather reveals a lot about ourselves.

One dog show in which I was entered was hit with a serious downpour just as the herding dogs were gathering to enter the group ring. The harder the rain fell, the more we squeezed together under a small ringside awning. Since my breed looks much the same wet as it does dry, my dog wasn’t much affected by the rain other than that it would be days before he’d be dry again. The same could not be said for others. When the Bearded Collie handler quietly lamented that she’d run out of towels, a disembodied voice came out of the group: “Use the Puli.” Raucous laughter broke out, tensions lifted and we entered the ring in wonderful spirits. At the end, dogs who’d been winning before the show also placed in the group. A good dog dry is also a good dog wet. When it’s right, the rain won’t matter.

Puli fanciers still talk about two national specialties made memorable by weather. Hurricane Hugo made its mark when Michele Billings judged an outdoor Puli specialty in Tennessee. Caught in the fringes of the storm, Mrs. Billings improvised the Best in Breed ring by having the Specials stack inside a small hut entered through a screen door on spring hinges. She would go over each dog inside the hut, then open the screen door for the dog and handler. The team would perform a “down and back” in the wind and driving rain, then return to the hut. I was nine months pregnant at the time, blessed with good health and still agile enough to show. But I made Mrs. Billings very, very nervous. When a ring standard blew over and blocked my path, my dog and I simply hopped over it, completed our ring pattern and headed back to the screen door and one very pale judge. She remembers me to this day. My son, born two weeks after the show, remembers none of it.

The Lexington, Kentucky Specialty was staged in the lush green hills of horse country and held in conjunction with an all-breed show. An immense awning covered the all-breed grooming area while situated some distance away was another large awning. This one covered a central aisle, ten or eleven show rings perpendicular to it.

To say that it was raining would be like saying that Lance Armstrong rode a bike. This was relentless, driving rain that came down with a fury. So much rain had accumulated in the grooming tent roof that with little warning, the structure collapsed. Had they not heard the groaning of the imploding frame in time, handlers and their dogs could have been injured, if not killed.

How wet was it?

Our judge, Joe Gregory, gamely did the best he could during the classes, but visibility became so poor, the grounds so muddy and treacherous, that he, too, had to improvise for the Specials; Best of Breed was held in the central aisle. Handlers were soaked to the bone, shoes squishing water with each step. I’m not especially fond of how my dog and I look in the picture we had taken that afternoon, but it does amuse me for the simple reason that Mr. Gregory and I look as if we just stepped out of a shower. My hair was dripping water down my face, and except for one dry spot under my armband, my dress was saturated, as was Joe’s suit coat.

I exhibited under Joe Gregory recently and we giggled about that Specialty. Less funny to me was that I’m pretty sure I’ve aged since then and Joe Gregory, now almost 80-something, hasn’t aged much at all. Sigh.

I did pretty well at those shows, but would I still have the “warm and fuzzies” about them had my dog lost? Probably not, but I also don’t think the precipitation would have been the reason. If anything, I've always thought that dogs feel friskier and show with more animation in the rain. Rain feels good. It feels natural. I can't help but think that most coated dogs like it, too.

Having said this, I would be writing a very different blog entry if the topic was about heat.

And this leads me to mention that in an upcoming blog, I’ll be reviewing two cooling mats: The “Cool Pet Pad” by TheGreenPetShop, and the “Cool Bed III” by K & H. They’ll be tested on the road and at a dog show this weekend. Stay tuned.

Bees vs Puli

2011-08-17T18:21:00.000-07:00

Not my bees. Not sure WHO they are.

It seemed like a good idea at the time, putting bee hives on our property last year. After all, seemingly every other week, newspapers sounded the alarm with articles reporting that honey bees were in trouble; Decimated by Colony Collapse Disorder, their hives laden with pesticides, bees themselves were mysteriously disappearing.

But they were thriving in my garden. They loved my American Germander, lost themselves for days in zucchini blooms, got obnoxiously drunk off lavender and cat mint, then somehow staggered over to water-filled bird baths to sober themselves up. Bees in trouble? Not on MY patch. Wanting to help the bees out, I got the idea to invite bee-keepers to keep hives on our property.

"Jo" visited my place and wasn't out of her car for five minutes when she spotted a naturally occurring swarm in a near-by tree (what are the odds?) Swarms are like candy for a bee-keeper and she was delighted to take me up on the offer. I was thrilled to have her, or more accurately, her hives. Having them around felt, oh, I don't know, so organic, so green, so 2010.

And so we became hosts to two hives. The bee-keepers were allowed free access to them whenever they needed, and in return, we were given a few jars of honey produced by "our" bees. We were given one simple ground rule: Don't wear dark colors near the hives. Bees equate dark colors with bears and will attack it to protect their home (which is why bee-keepers always wear white).

That first summer went exceptionally well, though it wasn't without a bump. With my dogs watching on during a fine, sunny day, I was watering the vegetable garden wearing my sleep pants (one of the perks of living in the country) when a bee flew up the leg of the flannel bottoms and made its presence known the usual way. As stings go, it wasn't too bad. But in the same instant I was stung, I realized with horror that the bee was trapped. I can only recall that having a bee buzzing about in one's pants is best described as equal parts exhilaration and dread. Funny what goes through one's mind when a bee is captive in one's nether regions. In heartbeat, instinct kicked in and I did what I had to do. I pulled my pants down.

This might not have been an issue had I been wearing, say, a long t-shirt. I wasn't. My dogs looked at me in amazement, but this likely paled in comparison to what my neighbors with the high powered telescope in their living room window must have been thinking. Over the years, these retired folks made do with binoculars, but the goings-on at my house must have been so entertaining as to warrant a high powered telescope strong enough to see footprints on the moon. Trust me on this, the moon they were seeing now didn't require much magnification. I suppose what made the scene all the more bizarre was that I was holding a hose and watering the garden - an every day scene if you don't factor in the pajama bottoms around my ankles and the giggling I couldn't suppress as I considered how this must have looked.

The rest of 2010 passed by without note. Winter came and the bees slept through New Year's Day. In April, we brought home a new puppy from England whom we named "Katie." Katie took to us, and for us, it was love at first sight. She was black with a little white chest spot which I believe we kissed as often as she took breath. She loved her new home, loved being able to run about recklessly while the weeds were dormant, the rattlesnakes inert and the Red Tailed Hawks not yet conceived. A blustery spring morphed into summery-type days and it was time again to water the seeds in my garden.

It's probably helpful at this juncture to mention that the bee hives are some 50' away from the garden.

You can tell where this is going, right?

It was a weekend. I was watering the garden, my husband working on a project. The dogs were sitting some distance away watching me sprinkle water gently over the lettuce seeds. The peculiar movement of a dog caught my eye and I looked up. It was Katie. Her body language amplified annoyance, confusion and alarm all at once. To this day, I don't know why I knew what I knew. My only thought was to scoop her up in my arms and head for a hose.

As I raced towards water with her in my arms, a sound emanated from her that I'll never forget, though I wish I could. Muffled buzzing. Dear God, I thought, she had bees in her mouth. And suddenly, I realized that I had bees in my hair. Instantly, I remembered something Jo had told me in passing the year before: Once a bee from a hive stings you because of a perceived threat, it releases pheromones that act as a distress signal to all the other bees from the hive. I realized I had to get us both inside the house before the other bees found us.

We headed for the dog tub. I fumbled with a packet of Benedryl and broke a tablet in half, and somehow at the same time, I called the vet to tell them we were coming in with a four month old puppy attacked by bees. We hosed her down while pulling drenched bees out of her thick coat. We found none in her mouth.

In hindsight, I sometimes think about the event from Katie's perspective. She was enjoying a fine day when out of the blue, strange sensations overcame her. In a span of 20 minutes, she was doused with cold water, had her mouth pried open and searched, had a pill shoved down her throat while her hair was pulled at, then had a thermometer shoved up her rectum for the grand finale.

Strange people, these Yanks.

In the end, Katie was fine. We had acted before the bees could sting her and she slept VERY well that night. We have no idea why the bees went out of their way to attack her and not the other dogs sitting next to her, nor why they bothered to travel some distance from their hive to do it. We still have the hives, but we're far more careful with the dogs now. And I wear long t-shirts and leggings to water the garden.