Pet Monologues

Holiday shopping. Here come the animal products!

Peek-a-prize toy

Tick-tock-teaser

Seen above are just a few of the Smart Toys from SmartCat

Holiday shopping. Here come the animal products!

Life size mice are ready for a good game of cat and mouse. Hand stitched in designer wools, cottons and faux furs, each mouse is deliciously stuffed with certified organic catnip and fattened with poly-fill. 12 different fabrics and colors to decorate your floor.

Designed by and seen at Itchy Knee

Holiday shopping. Here come the animal products!

These Orbee-Tuff® Woof and Fetch. Balls are durable, bouncy, boyant, mint-scented and, of course, 100% guaranteed.

Non-toxic, recyclable and rinses clean. Rated 5 out of 5 chompers.

Seen at Planet Dog

Today I visited Modulator and came across one of those posts that “get you” to alter your list of things to do. Here is what he had posted…

If you’re reading this blog…you are a…

So I did what most would do—many wouldn’t admit—played the game and here’s what I got…

Note: I dialed in petmonologues.com/pet022207

Eight hours later back at it again…

Note: dialed in petmonologues.com

One hour later back at it again…conclusion. If you have two “pets” in your name or have a name like Balloon Juice we get what we deserve. If you have an “.org” after your name you are a genius unless your url is “usgov.org” (try it). Having a “.com” at the end of your url obviously makes you smarter looking.

At this writing no answer for why Byzantine Shores or Watermark gets this…

Of course, if you have an “.edu” you already know what the answer will be. What about Fishalicious or Animals as Friends??

This post celebrates World Animal Day and Bless the Animals. Follow the links to learn more about PM’s initiative which started on October 4.

A new category: critter labels.
A leading market-research company, ACNielsen, has decided to define a wine category by its label design. A “critter label” is any label that features an animal, from a hippo to a frog to a penguin. They say 438 viable table-wine brands have been introduced in the past three years, and 18 percent— nearly one in five— feature an animal on the label. “Combined with existing critter labels,” the firm said in a summation of its research on this matter, “sales of critter-branded wine have reached more than $600 million.”

Finishing touches on billboard

Yellow Tail has recently launched one of its largest ad campaigns in the brand’s history, created by Cramer-Krasselt (New York). Featuring a tag line that reads “Tails, you win,” the ads include a variety of three-dimensional billboards and interactive print advertisements, including massive replicas of the famous 1930s Kit-Cat Clocks, glowing fireflies and temporary tattoos. The campaign also includes TV ads and event sponsorships and runs through December 2007.

Creative background: the distributor
WILLIAM J. DEUTSCH was apprehensive when he first agreed to import an unknown Australian wine called Yellow Tail into the United States in 2001. Its handsome black-and-yellow label featured what looked like a kangaroo, and he felt that animals had no place on wine labels. But he liked the wine. “So,” he said recently, “I agreed to take 25,000 cases.”

His son Peter disagreed about the animal. “That label is fabulous,” he told his dad. Read the rest of this entry »

This post celebrates World Animal Day and Bless the Animals. Follow the links to learn more about PM’s initiative which started on October 4.

Here is a story by Stu Bykofsky, columnist with the Philadelphia Daily News

I am an elephant.

I was not born for your amusement any more than you were born for mine.

If you see me in the zoo, and especially in the circus, which arrived here yesterday, I am not there willingly.

I was kidnapped and carried far, far away from my home and my family. I might have been an adult, but was more likely a baby when captured. Some “brave” hunter might have killed my mother—who could be dangerous—and sold me to a zoo or circus as an orphan.

Elephants have large families, as you may know, each headed by a female. When a female is born into the family herd, she never leaves.

Closely and happily, we travel together, eat together, play together, rest together. For elephants, every herd is a “village” in which the baby is cared for by its mother, and her sisters, and her mother. Being connected to family is as much a part of our being as our floppy ears. It harms us to be separated from our family. Can you understand that? Read the rest of this entry »

Adoption saves lives.

If you’ve done your research and decided on a specific breed, adoption through a breed rescue or local shelter is a great way to give a dog a second chance. Read the rest of this entry »

Chapter 9: The stories that nourish a newspaper.
By John Armstrong

[This is the ninth of 14 excerpts, running Tuesdays and Thursdays, from John Armstrong's memoir of the working life: Wages.]

When a cement truck lost its brakes on a hill and ploughed through someone’s backyard, you needed the parents and relatives of the dead and wounded, the name of the driver, the owner of the company, the neighbours (to fill out the background and describe the terror they faced daily with Big Trucks roaring though their neighbourhood) and someone from government licensing to comment on why he and his department hadn’t checked this truck’s brakes.

It was also important to get the Opposition critic for that department who would describe how the government had failed so tragically in this case, despite his repeated warnings that such a disaster was coming, and how his party would do things differently if they were in office….

The same was true of any local tragedy whether it was the man who hacked up his wife and mailed her postage due to her parents or an immigrant woman who spoke and read no English and bled to death in the emergency room because she couldn’t fill out the admittance papers. Read the rest of this entry »

I found during the past 18 months there were six deaths from dogs being dragged to death. Few were accidents and I have been hesitant to post these stories. Just too darn sad and maddening. And when I do see pets, animals, children, sitting in the back of a pickup truck, it makes me very uncomfortable. I don’t think anything should be back there that cannot survive a rollover, a sudden stop. And yet, the dead dogs were leashed to the vehicles and your dog, Jackson, was not.

And then this story! Count your blessings!!!

The story…

Well, one of my worst fears took place yesterday afternoon. Jackson fell out of the truck. Read the rest of this entry »