When I first hatched the idea of the Blogathon back in November, a new commenter I had just gotten to know a little bit sent me a note saying, "Hey, I got plenty of dog food. If you want to eat some for your blog let me know." I told him to send me his most bland vegetarian dog food. A couple of days later, a can of Evanger's arrived, along with what he later confirmed to be the most disgusting flavor he could dig up from his warehouse: unagi and seaweed. "Feel free to try this one instead," ... Read more »
Be The Change
Eyeing you all suspiciously
When I was speaking at BlogPaws I looked out into the group and saw some people looking back, others taking notes, and a third group tapping away at keyboards. In the olden days (you must read this in a geezer voice) that would be a major insult, but I assumed after watching people all morning that the typists were giving real-time updates on Twitter which is actually highly complimentary. Of course, you never know if they are speaking well or poorly of you until you get a chance to check ... Read more »
Be The Change: How to Participate
I know some of the details of what we are trying to accomplish here may be a little bit vague, and that is mostly because the details are kind of working themselves out as we go along. At the end of the day, by participating in a good cause- be it by writing, donating, or promoting, you ARE the change. Every piece is important. We selected Pets Without Parents at random during the session as the beneficiary of this particular effort, but to me the act of coming together and making those ... Read more »
Be The Change Challenge
A few months ago, Caroline (aka Romeo the Cat's staff, aka co-founder of BlogPaws) asked me if I would consider being a speaker at BlogPaws on the "Be The Change You Want to See" panel. I immediately said, "Heck yes!" followed up with, "But, uh, why? I'm not entirely sure I qualify." Caroline assured me that yes, they did want me to be a part of the talk specifically because I had zero experience and no clue what I was doing when I started out with the blogathon and Hounds for Haiti. Of ... Read more »
BlogPaws- if you missed it, I’m sorry because it was totally awesome.
You ever come back from a whirlwind event and just kind of sit there slack-jawed, thinking to yourself, "Wow, I can't believe I just got to be a part of that"? That was BlogPaws. I've sat in many conferences in my days, listening to various keynote speaker types tell their story, and every single one of them has some singular path-altering event where the skies parted, the sun shone down, and they knew that their life was about to get really interesting. I know, in that ineffable way one ... Read more »
2010 Brody Awards Ceremony
It's going to be low-key. I'm sure you all are hung over from your Super Bowl celebrating or whatnot anyway, so no gowns necessary. I tried to get Fergie to perform, but all I could get on this short notice was Pauly Shore so I figured we could do without the celebrities. ;) Thank you SO much to everyone who voted! Despite the many people who voted, some of the winners were only TWO votes ahead of the second place blog out of over 100 votes. Take that as a measure of the quality of all the ... Read more »
2010 Brodies Finalists are announced!
And it was NOT easy. I was hoping that in each category half of the blogs would be amazing and half would be meh, leaving a neat delineation for the separation of the finalists. That was not the case. Originally there were four judges, but even that wasn't enough and I needed to recruit an additional three judges at the last minute to help me figure it out. I hate judging. What was I thinking? You're all aces in my book. Speaking of books, Kathie Meier has donated 2 signed copies of Dr. ... Read more »
Auction summary
One of my relatives was looking at me in befuddlement this week as I sat at the computer at 1 in the morning, tap-tap-tapping away at the keyboard. "Why are you doing this?" he asked, looking over my shoulder at the pictures I was uploading for one of the auctions. "It seems like a ton of work." I nodded magnanimously. Truth is, I was sharing the guest bedroom with my mother and she was snoring so I would have been up anyway- so it was either raising funds for the Red Cross or playing Peggle. ... Read more »
Let’s Work Together
One of the best parts about reading a blog is finding other blogs. Looking at the blogroll of a site you enjoy visiting often leads you to corners of the internet you would never have found otherwise. Soon you start commenting, then you're going back and forth on Twitter, and before you know it it's 11 at night and the dog's still waiting to be fed. Not that I know from personal experience or anything. Point is, it's a community. Certain specialized blog niches- parenting bloggers, for ... Read more »
Brief Brodies Update
I closed nominations, and I'm working on getting everything categorized now. When I'm done, I'm going to assemble a top-notch panel of experts (read: suckers willing to volunteer) to help me narrow the nominees down to finalists in each category. Then once I figure out the appropriate Wordpress plugin everyone gets to vote. I have no prizes other than bragging rights, but I will say you guys nominated some fantastic blogs I've never seen before, which is reward enough for me. :) ... Read more »
Nominations are OPEN!
Since the Weblog Awards went kaplooey for the year, I decided to make up my own awards specific for that underrepresented segment of the blogging world, the pet lovers. So far I have, like, 5 participants so hopefully I can drum up enough nominees to actually make something fun here and spread the word about some of the fantastic pet blogs out there on the net! These are the categories I have so far: 1. Best Dog Blog -For best blog about our canine pals. 2. Best Cat Blog -For best ... Read more »
May your days be merry and bright…
The parvo puppy is still hanging in. Every day he survives is a victory, and I'm allowing myself to feel optimistic for the first time since he was admitted. On the second day he was hospitalized, he was struggling. The plasma transfusion we performed had been minimally helpful. So once again, I pulled a Hail Mary and called in the quarterback. He's so big now, and the wee pup so small, I barely needed anything to get enough for a blood transfusion. Fresh whole blood has some majorly nice ... Read more »
Hour 24: SuperBrode is my hero
We are all inspired by our pets- to be kind, to give a little more than we take, to play hard and snuggle a ton and enjoy every little moment in life. They encourage us to connect with one another. And they push us to do a little more. Last week, an hour before closing, a family came in with a 4 pound, 10 week old poodle puppy. She was vomiting, had diarrhea, and no history of vaccinations. They had just enough money to confirm the diagnosis of parvo. Her white blood cell count was 1, meaning ... Read more »
Hour 23: Limping towards the finish line.
The Grand Prize will be announced at 5pm PST- in one hour. The tally is at $2080, but you've got one more hour to mess it up for whoever's about to win the $100 GC. 5 cans of soda: $5 Small Brody accident because I was being horrible and didn't let him out in time: 5 minutes of cleaning and one $20 pillow. Cheese for the dog food: $0.05 Raising two thousand dollars for shelter pets when I was expecting to raise two hundred and seeing the best people in the world come out to support? ... Read more »
Hour 22: Onto the maudlin
This is the part where I lay down on Brody and start feeling sorry for myself. Not really. I'm just running out of brain cells to remember things and direct my fingers to type them. I was looking through the files of my old journal and came upon this little gem from last Christmas. Last Christmas was rough. Mulan was very sick (she was euthanized on New Year's Eve) and every death was a reminder of what was coming. I read it today and actually laughed at myself. Boy was I bitter. This year ... Read more »
Hour 21: Now I’m feeling it
Oh man, doesn't Mile 21 correlate with hitting the wall when you run a marathon? That is about where I am now. My husband took the kids out to lunch to get them out of my hair, and it's strangely silent in the house. The dishes are piled up, the china with the dog food waiting patiently in the sink to be cleaned. In just a bit. Apollo and Brody are keeping me company, like they always do. Apollo looks the same as he did 9 years ago. He is aging quite gracefully. When I adopted him, he was ... Read more »
Hour 20: This is why we’re here
Su (otherwise known as the woman who sampled an entire panoply of canned dog food live on the net) just sent me a link to a really cute guy named Punk Rock. He really takes the whole punk thing to a new level. Apparently Punk Rock felt he was not punk until he had piercings, so he found himself a porcupine to help him finish the look. (Sadly Dad didn't let him keep the piercings.) Punk Rock: living the dream. Rescued from the El Toro shelter in 2002. Stories like this are why I'm ... Read more »
Hour 19: Pet Insurance
Kim asked me what I think about pet insurance. Me? I love it. It means people who would normally be unable to afford an emergency surgery or illness are able to get their pet treatment. Most veterinary clinics don't offer payment plans. We all wish we could. The problem is not that we don't want to deal with it, but that they never work. There are too many people who renege on it and ruin it for everyone else, so the only way we can stay in business is to be paid at the time ... Read more »
