Rottweilers Ate My Laptop

Rottweilers. Computers. Cameras. World Domination. Not necessarily in that order.

Rottweilers.
Computers. Cameras.
World Domination.
Not necessarily in that order.

Link love

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Since my own output of quality prose is somewhat sparse at the moment, and the makeover of my blogroll and links list and page has come to a grinding halt, please allow me to introduce (or re-introduce) you to a few loved links!

The Denora has been on hiatus for a few months, and I missed her! But now she’s back in fine form, with a spiffy new design and new location as well. Go visit, you will enjoy!

Joanna at Ruffly Speaking just got a new puppy, so you could visit for adorable puppy photos alone. Even more valuable, though, is her great commentary on puppy socialization as “Friday” becomes part of their family. UPDATE: Now with a new location and great new layout at http://blacksheepcardigans.com/

I’ve written here before about Jim Nelson’s and René Agredano’s Tripawds resource site for three-legged dogs. They have made many updates and additions to the site following a donation drive this past spring, and just this past weekend, hosted a get-together in Longmont, Colorado for three-legged dogs and their “pawrents.” Sounds like it was quite a success! As always, applause to Jim and René for all of their work in providing this resource, and much love from angel Jake, my own dearly-missed tripawd.

I have many loved links, and I hope that by highlighting a few of them, I didn’t give anyone the idea that my other links are not loved as well. Go visit them all, well, as soon as I get the blogroll organized again anyway!

(NaBloPoMo | August ’09: 17 of 31 | 75% Challenge: 205 of 274)

Random follow-ups (16 of 30/82 of 274)

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Tonight I’m not up to leading, so I’m just going to follow up on a few things I’ve posted about this month.

  • The Honolulu Heart Program at Kuakini Medical Center, which is home to the longevity study that my dad is part of, has received additional funding. My mom tells me that she and my dad both went in last week for follow-up interviews. Out of the more than 5,800 middle-aged men who started in the study in 1965, about 800 are still alive today. The youngest is 89 and the oldest is 106. No word yet as to whether my dad has that longevity gene, or whether I inherited it from him.
  • Tripawds, the wonderful support site for canine cancer patients and accident victims who have or need amputations, is one-third of the way to their server upgrade fundraising goal!
  • Is it just me who is irritated by the media sources who are reporting that First Dog Bo Obama is on his fourth home? They count the breeder as #1, first owner as #2, trainer as #3, and White House as #4. Sorry. WRONG. You don’t count the breeder, and you don’t count trainers or handlers as homes either. Bo is on his SECOND home.
  • I was very happy to get the news that K9 University has started drop-in Obedience/Rally Obedience classes on Wednesday evenings. That should help greatly with our quest to get Freya’s Rally Obedience titles.

Growing a place on the ‘net (5 of 30/71 of 274)

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During the last few months, I’ve thought about refocusing this blog completely on pet-related matters. So the title of a recent post on the Dolittler veterinary blog, How to start and grow a top pet health site…with love, intrigued me. My original blog was devoted almost entirely to pet health. As I am not a veterinarian or a journalist, it was a personal blog discussing only the pets owned by me and my husband, and occasionally those of family members or friends. At the time, our pets numbered four dogs, three cats and two birds, so there was ample material for me to write about. After the two oldest dogs passed on, I didn’t have it in me to keep writing regularly. Effective tools for fighting comment spam were not quite ready for prime time then, and trying to keep up with it sapped any enthuasiasm still remaining.

Comment spam isn’t the problem it once was. I would probably need to expand the focus of a new version to include dog training, dog showing, dog sports competition and pet-related legislative issues, because most of my pets are thankfully young and healthy, and I won’t have many health issues to write about, hopefully for a while yet. I’ll need to give this a bit more thought before I make any changes. My pets are my favorite subject, but I do enjoy writing on other topics now and then, too.

Back to the Dolittler post, though. One of the pet health sites profiled was Tripawds, a site inspired by and supporting all three-legged dogs, primarily cancer patient amputees. My own three-legged dog Jake passed away in 2002, so I had no idea this site existed until this week. Back in 1998, there was not much information on the ‘net to help owners of amputee dogs. I think I found just one site, Cassie’s Three-Legged Dog Club, which still exists and has expanded quite a bit since then. Back then, I wrote to Cassie’s Club founder Cynthia Davis, got some good information, and had Jake join the club (he is the bottom Jake on this page). I updated my then-website to add a page about Jake’s accident and amputation, which I have never taken down.

I still get email from that page occasionally, and as I have done since the beginning, I always try to respond to those emails as quickly as possible. I never thought of the possibility of an entire site to support tripod dogs, but I am very glad that Jim and Rene were inspired by their Jerry’s illness and amputation to create the Tripawds site to provide an awesome resource for those facing the same issues.

Times are tough for all of us, but if by chance you have a bit to spare, please consider visiting the Tripawds site and donating towards their server upgrade. Back in 1998, I would have loved to have a site like that, with not only information available, but a forum and chat to actually talk to others in the same situation. I was glad to be able to make a small donation today in Jake’s memory.