Pawcurious: With Veterinarian and Author Dr. V

Celebrating the truth that pets make people better.

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Do you ever feel like a plastic bag

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The call came yesterday evening, when I was sitting on the couch trying to block the sounds of the upstairs neighbor's daily dance exercises out of my cranium. He or she was dancing to "Firework" on this fine evening, jumping up and down to the beat on top of my head. Do you ever hate (jump) walls so paper thin (bump) Like the ceiling's bout (smash) to come caving in (crash) Neighbor you're a piece (thump thump) of work- (thump thump) C'mon let your ear (tap tap) drums burst - (splat ... Read more »

Wordless Wednesday: Rescue Me

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I've tied more knots in things over the last two days than I have since suture week at vet school. Knot after knot after knot after knot. But we have to: it doesn't matter how brave your rescue attempt is or how fast you make it to the victim, if your knot bites it, so do you. So practice we did. I thought I would show you a couple of teaser pics from our water day. This is Bobby, our willing disaster victim. Bobby routinely tumbles into rivers, falls down cliffs, and needs to be lifted from ... Read more »

Wordless Wednesday: Happy Place

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When the going gets bad, the prey runs. When it comes to fight or flight, I'm a flier. Unfortunately, there are lots of stressful situations- moving, for example, in a mere three weeks with no particular place in mind as of yet and two large dogs to manage in the process- where flight is potentially a less than optimal response. So in those cases, I hold in my head a file folder of Happy Places to which I can retreat, if only for a moment, if only in my head. A Total Recall, if you will, of my ... Read more »

Hi, I’m Dr 3

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Man oh man, I have been so remiss on the blog this week. In my defense, I have been running around at SuperZoo all week, checking out new cat and dog stuff and in general thinking and talking about pets for three days straight, but I've had so little time in my room to post about it as the good folks at the convention center weren't in the mood to provide wifi to us writing types. C'est la vie. It was great and I saw some of my favorite people, and got to meet some new favorite people, and I got ... Read more »

Asante sana

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I actually have an Ask Dr V segment I did yesterday that covered my favorite travel items I'm packing. I filmed it. Did I edit it? No. Am I out of time? Yes. So, I guess I can just tell you, though that lacks a certain visual impact, that I refuse to leave without having my buff (of course), my quick dry undies (some places in Africa won't launder women's undergarments), my Steri Pen to kill any garbage in the water, and jelly bellies. A long time ago when I was running a lot and was ... Read more »

Friday Tip: Nip that pull!

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Today I have the pleasure of introducing Andrea Kuska from Rocco's House, who is here today to give you her top trick for training a dog to stop pulling on a leash. As anyone who has eyeballs will attest from being out and about, there are lots and lots and lots of dogs who love to drag their owners down the sidewalk, up the hill, through muddy puddles and across fields in search of squirrels. Working on this will help you, your dog, and most importantly, your rotator cuff. Stop ... Read more »

Oh, the places in the Midwest you’ll go

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When I was in college, I worked for a very prestigious urologist. I think most of you remember that. The Viagra researcher from Beverly Hills. Anyway, he had a beautiful office in Santa Monica, a home in Beverly Hills, and as a pre-eminent ED expert he was flown to male sexual dysfunction conferences all over the world, you know, Bora Bora, Fiji, Reykjacik, where he would stand flanked by, and I'm not joking, two enormous blue pillars and talk about how Viagra would change the world. (Well, he ... Read more »

Alexis Bellino, no, no

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I don't watch any of the Real Housewives shows. I've seen bits and pieces here and there, but my vapid-limit seems pretty easily reached these days so I don't make it a regular occurrence. I try not to be too snarky. I give them credit for having nice hair, for one. I wouldn't want to do what they do, because if I'm being totally honest I like what I get to do about a bajillion times better than sitting around throwing evil side-eyes on camera for a living, so it's good. So when I look at the ... Read more »

Hot cat ladies and other misconceptions about animal lovers

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I read a great article yesterday on msnbc about the incredible work being done by World Vets under the leadership of one of the most amazing vets I have ever met, Cathy King. Then I read the comments. Comments on news articles are a funny thing. People who like to comment on news sites are very odd, aren't they? It's like they have alienated every human they have come across in the real world so they need to go online in order to find somewhere they can moan and groan. On many blogs and ... Read more »

So long, and thanks for all the experimentation

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I just randomly happened upon this story about Chimpanzee Island from CNN yesterday, and it was as fascinating as it was distressing. I've mentioned before that it was spending time in a lab that was conducting research on chimpanzees that convinced me I could not pursue a career in lab animal or primate medicine. It felt wrong, deep in my bones. I was not the only one who felt this way. In the past ten years, the scientific community has refined protocols, developed alternatives, ... Read more »

Westminster in pictures

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I'm not sure if I'm bone tired, beyond tired, or jetlagged beyond repair. Any way you look it I'm even more incoherent than usual, thanks in part to some shenanigans during the travel home and a dearth of sleep. So, while I shuffle through all the pictures I took at Westminster, here's a few to kind of give an overall picture of the event. Like I said before, this was my first time alone on the DSLR with no training wheels, so they're not perfect, but I learned a lot. One, Westminster is a ... Read more »