My SoCal buds gave to me.... 9 Surfin Santas! Eight Toes a-Twinklin' Seven Noshes Nibbled Six things to lay on Five faaaavorite things Four doggie nerds Three Irish Hounds Two turtles, Dove And a cat messing up my new tree! You all know I love me some SoCal Surf Dogs. I wish I had more time to spend with this amazing group- the times I have gone out with them have reminded me each and every time of the absolute best that the dog world represents (their dedication to charity is ... Read more »
Features
A Dog’s Holiday Wishlist
One of my favorite holiday traditions is going over to Fox5 News and doing a bit with Rancho Coastal Humane Society talking about the dogs' holiday wishes (next to being adopted, of course.) Just me, Santa, and a bunch of adorable dogs all doing our best to avoid any sort of Ron Burgundy stereotypes about San Diego programming. Here's the segment with the 6 adorable pups. :) It's always hard to pick just 6 items, but here is what we presented this year: 1. The ThunderShirt ... Read more »
On the eighth day of Petmas
My stylish love gave to me: Eight Toes A-Twinkling! Seven Noshes Nibbled Six things to lay on Five faaaavorite things Four doggie nerds Three Irish Hounds Two turtles, Dove And a cat messing up my new tree! Thank you Andrea! I love how your pup's paws are crossed just so. STAY TUNED everyone, I have a surprise- a bunch of Flash Giveaways coming up in the next few days! Check back soon! ... Read more »
On the seventh day of Petmas
My teensy tiny love gave to me: Seven noshes nibbled Six things to lay on Five faaaavorite things Four doggie nerds Three Irish Hounds Two turtles, Dove And a cat messing up my new tree! I had actually been planning on doing a seven myself as I didn't have anyone grab that number (7 and 11 were never claimed for whatever reason), and I was debating what sort of indignity I could impose upon Brody when, like a little gift from heaven, this adorableness landed in my inbox ... Read more »
On the sixth day of Petmas…
My true love gave to me: 6 Things for Laying! Five faaaavorite things Four doggie nerds Three Irish Hounds Two turtles, Dove And a cat messing up my new tree! Seriously, this cat is a pillow aficionado of the highest order. Won't touch a cat bed, but if it's human-scented, she's on it. Her favorite pillow is my husband's laptop case. ... Read more »
On the fifth day of Petmas (sing it now)
My true love gave to me (with feeling!) FIIIIIVE FAVORITE THIIIIIINGS! Four doggie nerds Three Irish Hounds Two turtles, Dove And a cat messing up my new tree! Thank you Lisa and the adorable Miss Sophie! ... Read more »
On the fourth day of Petmas
My true love gave to me.... Four doggie nerds! Three Irish Hounds Two turtles, Dove And a cat messing up my new tree! I'll admit it, I fully LOL'd when I saw this one. Kristen, this is all sorts of amazing. All it needs is a Game of Thrones in there and we would reach full Nerdvana. ... Read more »
On the third day of Petmas
My true love gave to me: 3 Irish Hounds! Two turtles, Dove And a cat messing up my new tree! Thank you Susan! ... Read more »
On the second day of Petmas
My true love gave to me: Two turtles, Dove And a cat messing up my new tree! (Thank you Heather for sharing your awesome crew! I'm always so impressed when people pull of the literal translation) ... Read more »
On the first day of Petmas
My new pet gave to me: ... Read more »
Some Veterinarians Sell Unnecessary Online Memberships By Throwing Colleagues Under the Bus
Some Veterinarians Sell Unnecessary Shots, Tests to Make Extra Money, Says Former Vet Did you see this bit on 20/20 this weekend? Ah, media. Titled "Veterinary Confessions," the piece follows a couple of dogs through a series of veterinary visits where different vets offer different services based on their clinical experience, interspersed with the contrite admonitions of a former veterinarian who says that he was, before he relinquished his license (more on that later), the medical ... Read more »
Better With Pets
Hardened criminal. Swimsuit model. New media revolutionary. NPR host. Animator. What do they all have in common? Their lives have been made better by having a pet. And we're not talking oh, I have a cute cat and I sometimes feed it and it makes me chuckle, I'm talking about people whose lives have been profoundly affected by the animals in their lives. I assume if you're here reading this blog, you feel it too. Something about the bond between ourselves and our pets goes way beyond the ... Read more »
Flashback Friday: Depressed Puppy
So I was looking through old Brody photos for a Flashback Friday and found this one: Which was awesome all by itself, and then I realized he was the perfect candidate for some captions. So I turned him into a Depressed Puppy Meme. Hope you have a better long weekend than this guy! ;) (If I recall the true sadness was not being allowed to chase my mom's hellkitty around) Feel free to make your own caption, they always entertain me. :D ... Read more »
I think I need to break up with Disneyland and its 999 Happy Haunts
I spend a lot of time thinking about customer service, and how we as veterinarians are sometimes so focused on being amazing clinicians we neglect to remember the fact that we are in a customer service industry. You can be the most astute diagnostician in the universe, but if your front desk staff or technician (or you!) is rude, ambivalent or just generally unpleasant, it ruins the whole client experience. It doesn't take much to be minimally pleasant, but I'm amazed how uncommon that has ... Read more »
It’s Bad Poetry Friday: Emails and spam
This is what happens when you leave me alone in the first rainstorm of the year with a bottle of port, a pile of Dr. Seuss books, and a backlog of emails asking, asking, asking, asking for me to once again be a Nice Veterinary Writer/ Pet Blogger and do some more free work. Mostly, it's just a silly Friday I need to Apologize to Dr. Seuss Once Again kind of post. I dedicate it to all of you who know this feeling all too well. E-Mails and Spam I'm Dr. V. Dr. V is me. That Dr. V! That Dr. ... Read more »
I’ve got a crush
Crushes are a terrible thing, really. I mean, they are fun at first, when you get that wobbly-in-the-knees breathlessness, those daydreaming flights of fancy that knock you off balance. The heady combination of possibilities and "wow, we are SO well matched" wonderment can be downright addictive. But when the object of your affections doesn't reciprocate, those overwhelming feelings can instead be downright painful. Perhaps, one might think, it's better to go with the safe choice instead of the ... Read more »
Going rate for the blond one: 20 cows, plus shillings.
This post is part of a series documenting a trip undertaken by a team of volunteers with World Vets who traveled to Arusha, Tanzania in June 2012 to provide veterinary care for the under (or should be say un-) served donkey population. For the full series of posts covering World Vets, please click here. I think genuine smiles are much more interesting than canned ones. You can tell. You can always tell. And as much as posed photos work in certain circumstances, I tried to avoid overly ... Read more »
Inside Natura: The Clean Machine
Last week I finished my last dose of typhoid vaccine (interesting fact: typhoid, if you did not know, is a type of Salmonella.) Not fun, but much less unfun than typhoid itself, I'm sure. Around the same time, I received an email from the World Vets team leader, whose job entails not only running the clinic but making sure the newbies don't get into trouble abroad, reminding us that no matter how adventurous we might be, the street food in Tanzania must not be consumed. "One word," she said. ... Read more »
