We went away this past weekend with Rita to visit my mom. My brother and his family were there as well, with my brother's mastiff, Leo, and my nephew's Lab-mix, Lucy.
Big boy, Leo, licking the ice-ring that formed in the birdbath
No, I'm not writing about Rita after she comes home from the beach (although I could probably enter a sand castle competition with the amount of sand she brings home from Fiesta Island). Instead, I'm talking about Hurricane Sandy. Helen Woodward Animal Center (where I volunteer) got 45 cats
and dogs this past weekend from shelters affected by Hurricane Sandy. Forty-five!
You can read more about it
here, but basically each of the pets that arrived was already up for adoption before the storm hit. However, there were so many displaced pets after the storm, that the shelters didn't have room for the adoptable dogs/cats anymore and needed help.
HWAC, Southwest Airlines, SeaWorld, Delaware County SPCA and Save-a-Pet all worked together to fly the dogs and cats out to San Diego. Here's a super-sweet little video:
If
this video doesn't warm the cockles of your heart, then your cockles
need some serious thawing. I'd suggest putting them in the microwave on
auto-defrost and just leave them in there for as long as it takes.
A lot of the pups
weren't ready to be adopted yet when I was there on Monday for my usual
shift, so I didn't meet any of the dogs in the video but I did meet some other real sweethearts!
In
other Helen Woodward-related news, remember the other day when I posted this picture of the
gorgeous but somewhat, um, crazed looking pup that I was in love with...
...well,
when I went up on Monday, he was already gone! Hopefully he's being
spoiled rotten in his new furever home even as you read this. Hopefully all the "Sandy" dogs and cats will soon find their furever homes as well.
A Special Shout-out for Tripawd Warrior Princesses
The day after Thanksgiving will probably always make me think of our beautiful Abby. We brought her home from HWAC on 11/27/09, the day after Thanksgiving. We are very thankful that we got to have that special girl in our lives, even if for way too short of a time.
Sadly, this week, the last of the original Tripawd Warrior Princesses that I dedicated the drawing below to earned her wings.
Tripawd Warrior Princesses: Rio, Isabelle and Abby
I like to think our special girls are all together now, with their capes and their wings. Goodbye sweet Isabelle. You were truly an inspiration, surviving Hurricane Katrina and two kinds of cancer. Run pain free and say hi to my Abby!
I hope everyone here in the States had a lovely Thanksgiving!
The hub's physiotherapist suggested freezing cups of ice and using them to ice-massage some of the continuing trouble spots on his knees post-surgery. Well, Rita (who is completely uninterested whenever I try to give her an ice cube) has decided that these are super tasty.
Today, we have a guest mischief-maker that we're featuring - the delightful Pixie. (Rita's just been such an angel, we had to go hunting for mischief.) Doesn't she look sweet?
Today I've got a very Hellen-Woodward-centric post.
Dr V. (not our Dr. V, whom you might remember from Abby's oncology visits, but a different Dr. V.) of www.pawcurious.com has teamed up with BlogPaws and the folks at Iams (with their annual "Home 4 the Holidays" campaign) to highlight National Animal Shelter Appreciation Week.
Dr. V. asked that bloggers do a "drive-by" of a local Home 4 The Holidays shelter or rescue and drop off a donation. She said it could be something "as simple as
bringing them an old towel from your closet or as complicated as you
wish. I like simple. Simple is good and repeatable and easy and is what I
will be doing."
So, I did something simple. I gathered up a small bag of some sheets and towels we no longer needed. I also checked Helen Woodward Animal Center's "wish list" page. If you've been reading the blog for a while, you know I volunteer at HWAC. They actually started the Home 4 the Holidays campaign. In fact, a certain little girl we know and love was adopted during that campaign:
How could we resist bringing this face home with us?? (Miss that girl...)
Around here, we can't resist an underwear snatching pooch. (If you don't already know what the dog ate, well, he ate some panties that didn't belong to his momma. This is no spoiler, since it's revealed in the opening line of the book: The vet handed Maggie Baxter a plastic specimen bag containing a pair
of size-tiny lavender thong panties extracted from her dog; but they
were not hers.)
So, of course we fell in love with Ecco, the underwear thief, when we first met him a few months ago. Ecco is the "nawty dawg" with a big heart. His mom contacted me about spreading the word for Ecco's 2012 "Underwear Everywhere" Drive.
The flyer is a bit hard to read on my blog (I couldn't post it full size or it wouldn't fit), but below the image I've typed up the text.
"Please help Ecco, the naughty dog with a big heart, collect NEW socks, hats, gloves and underwear for the 300 plus homeless served by the Union Mission Ministries. Every year, Ecco tries to redeem himself by donating more underwear than he has destroyed over the past year. It's never too late to turn your negatives into positives! Thank you for helping Ecco with his goal of collecting over 1000 pairs of socks and undies! Please send all items to p.o. box below. If you are local (Hampton Roads), we will be happy to provide pick up! Donations can also be made via our web site, www.nawtydawgbigheart.com under the "BIG HEART" tab. Please write "Mission" in the comments to ensure the proper allocation of your gift."
P.O. Box 1007, Smithfield, VA 23430-1007
Rita is, amazingly, the first dog we've had that doesn't steal our undies. It never occurred to me to take a photo of Bailey or Abby scampering around with our undies (probably a good thing), but luckily we have the adorable photo of undie-thief Ecco to enjoy for Monday Mischief.
