November 27, 2007

Cute Taxidermy

Why settle for old-fashioned taxidermy?

You can get some good squirrel pieces. (Looking around this website was kind of giving me the creeps, but then I read her artists statement and realized she's just recycling dead animals, so I feel better.) Anyway, that's cool and all, but since cute is the new goth*, I think that googly eyes on taxidermy should be happening more. There are some interesting things going on in the world of taxidermy, but I don't much cute taxidermy. I sewed some eyes on this coyote pelt that Erin gave me -- her dad made it.

Also, given how babies respond ethically to toys with googly eyes, maybe we should be putting googly eyes on more things? Like, googly eyes on cars, for instance. I think that could better communicate "friendliness" than a tail on a car, and a nice, wide-eyed car would be so much better for world peace than a snarling grill. A Wall Street Journal article on, "Why Cars Got Angry" quotes designers: "I'm not saying we promote rudeness on the road," says Eric Stoddard, senior creative designer for Hyundai. But he adds that a mean-looking car may make drivers feel they can keep others at bay. "It projects a message that a driver may be too shy or afraid to express," he says. "An aggressively styled car says, 'Get out of my way.'" Yuck!

Anyway, more cute things, fewer angry creepy ones, please.

*("Cute is the New Black" was a slogan that I wanted to TM for Gadget Cozies, but someone had it for something else, and now it seems to have disseminated itself)

Posted by mary at 6:58 PM | Comments (0)

June 25, 2007

The Real Pica

(By way of CuteOverload)

Posted by mary at 12:41 PM | Comments (4)

December 11, 2006

Age Regression Pet Photography

A service providing age regressed photos of your adult pet as a puppy or kitten.

From this:

To this:

Everyone loves pupppy and kitten pictures, right? Especially ones of their own pets. In fact, pictures are one of the best things about puppies -- in real life, they are messy and destructive, but in pictures, they are tidily adorgable!

One of the drawbacks to adopting an adult dog is that you don't often get puppy pictures of them.

In my case, I was so busy cleaning up after Pica that I didn't take as many pictures as I would have liked. (It's hard to believe it was almost three years ago that we got her.)

So, this service would offer age regression photos of dogs and cats. You'd bring in a contemporary photo, and they'd use Photoshop wizardry to make it look like it might have as a cute lil' ball of fur.

This would help shelters place cats and dogs, I think, because the shelters could show the cute little pictures in the ads for them. So instead of this, they could pitch this.

As it turns out, the age regression/progression word space is fairly polluted, as Chris would say -- with either fetish sites or missing children bulletins (although I suppose "polluted" is maybe the wrong word in that case). Not to mention general wierdness.

Posted by mary at 11:43 AM | Comments (5)

November 10, 2006

Dog Walking Podcasts (a brief review)

Podcasts and dog walks are a match made in heaven, so it should come as no surprise that there are podcasts specifically aimed at the dog-walking crowd.

Some friends have asked me when I find time to listen to podcasts. I was an early adapter and continue to be a relatively avid listener because of the lengthy dog walks Pica has made necessary, by virtue of her being an extremely active puppy and dog. Before the dawn of the podcast age, I was limited to mere music, and Audible.com, which is pretty good -- but that's only an hour of content five days a week.

Podcasts to my consciousness when Pica was just about 6 months old, a little over two years ago. Initially, it seemed like the only content available was Adam Curry, who I never really listened to at all (I think I just heard other people talking about him). Then there was The Dawn and Drew Show, which was cute, but sort of bittersweet for a woman with an impending divorce. And I loved Geek Speak, which was the podcast arm of Board Game Geek. But overall, it was pretty hit and miss for me -- there may have been other great things out there, but I wasn't finding them.

Now that there are about a gazillion podcasts, the other day I thought: someone should have a podcast specifically aimed at dog walkers! (I mentioned to Chris that it takes a certain kind of egotism, my kind of egotism, to think, "I have a great idea for a product!" rather than, "where can I get this?" as the first response to identifying a need.) My second thought was, "I'll bet there are some out there."

And lo and beyond, there are, and here are a few I've found. I'm going to link to websites, not feeds, and you can either click around on their websites for the feeds or do what I'd be more likely to do, which is search for their podcast in the iTunes store. None of them do exactly what I want a dog walking podcast to do, which is alternate a chatty discussion of dog science with instructions on how to do a trick or behavior that you can do while walking your dog and dog songs or even just good music to walk to, but all the same, these have been interesting.

Canine Campus is my favorite so far. The people are smart and their conversations about dog behavior have just the right balance of science and praticality to appeal to me. I've listened to a couple of them, and Deven Gaston, one of the main people on the show, seems intelligent, wildly enthusiastic, and fun. I'm not a dog training nerd, so as far as their school of thought goes, I'll just say that it seems to be pretty much in the positive reinforcement camp. The episodes I've heard have been two people talking about dog training, and close with a nice song. They make a few plugs for the products on their website but in a way that makes sense to me.

Dances with Woofs seems to be a one-woman show, with a trainer who talks you through the steps of getting various behaviors. I like the way her website combines the podcast with photos (although for me it defeats the purpose of a podcast I can take on a walk). She has a sense of humor, too, which is nice. But the episode I listened to described getting a dog "down" by stepping on the leash or pushing on his shoulders. It probably works for her, but for me, the treat method seems a lot better.

I probably wouldn't recommend the Leerburg Kennel Dog Training Podcast to most of my friends simply because he takes a very different approach to dog training. He explains his philosophy in Episode One, but it's the episode on "Who Can Pet My Puppy" describing how he tells strangers not to pet his dogs, and that within his family, none of them can pet or play with each other's dogs. Maybe it's a German Shepherd thing, but I suspect, having read his views on the war elsewhere on his website, that the differences go deeper than that. I think it's genuinely heartbreaking when someone equates opposition to the war with contempt for soldiers -- but that's another topic!

Dog Cast Radio is British, and probably closest to what I had in mind: a kind of light-hearted radio magazine format. Segments include breed profiles which, as a mixed breed owner, I find breed talk kind of interesting, but not totally fascinating; a newsdesk, with news about, guess what, dogs; and "Puppy Playtime" which, if you like listening to English schoolgirls, you'll love (I do, and I think the kid doing the segment sounds adorable). Overall, I found it enjoyable, if not deeply intellectually stimulating.

"Cocos Pupcast" is, alas, no longer available, although it's listed in iTunes. I'm sad because I am intrigued by their episode: "Sleeping with your dog -- cozy or creepy?" which includes a segment on "songs to put your dog to sleep by." Something I truly could have cried buckets to.

In the meantime, I bought pupcast.com. And now it's time to get a walk in before it gets dark.

This one's for you, Katy!

Posted by mary at 4:15 PM | Comments (0)

July 31, 2006

Dipped Dog/Dirty Dog Photo Contest

Here's another kind of hand-dipped dog -- Pica dipped herself in the mud of the Columbia Slough.

If I had a pet grooming place, I'd hold a Dirty Dog Photo Contest for my clients. Sure, some would cheat and cover their dog with whipped cream or whatever, but it would still be fun.

I have a lot of pictures of Pica looking filthy. Something about when she's all covered with smut makes me grab for my camera.

Posted by mary at 9:51 AM | Comments (0)

June 23, 2006

Pica and a Bunch of Balls

They sell tennis balls for $.10 each at the local racket club. What a bargain!! If you can think of anything brilliant to do with tennis balls other than trying to blow your dog's mind by giving her a bunch at the same time, let me know.

Pica keeps running upstairs to visit Keno, Erin, Justin and the big fluffy rug. It's kind of cute to hear her thunder up and down the stairs. I think so, anyway. And it's good that she's acclimating to spending time up there, since I'll be gone for six days in July. I'm a little worried about leaving her for so long.

Posted by mary at 12:29 PM | Comments (0)

April 21, 2006

Floating Squirrel Proof Bird Feeders

Sandra had the idea of a floating bird feeder that squirrels couldn't get to. I thought you might hook one up to a hellium balloon. But then it occurred to us: what do you do to keep it from just floating away? If you have any ideas, let me know.

I have problems with squirrels eating my bird food, even when I feed the squirrels themselves.

Posted by mary at 10:01 AM | Comments (4)

November 20, 2005

Air Freshening Skunks

In this age of plastic surgery and biological modifications, there's no reason to put up with stinky skunks in the neighborhood any more, and they're so darned cute, who wants to kill them?

We should be able to pay for a service that will trap these skunks, remove their stink sacs, and replace them with things that released nice smells like roses and lavender. That way, when you startled a skunk in your backyard, it would be a pleasure! Skunks could smell as cute as they look!

You might have to insert a new suppository every once in awhile, and maybe you'd pay the same people to do it -- it could be an ongoing service like getting your lawn done.

Or you might tame them to make them delightful indoor pets -- one for the kitchen and one for the bathroom!

(Boris gets joint credit for this concept.)

Posted by mary at 1:36 AM | Comments (4)

September 17, 2005

Another picture of Pica, Emily and Rocco

Posted by mary at 12:58 PM | Comments (0)

Pica was reunited with two siblings today!

This morning at the dog park a guy came in with two dogs, one of whom (Emily, in the middle) really looked like an Austrian Shephard/Beagle mix so I asked him and he said, yes, that's what she was. Then he asked how old Pica was and I said about two years (her birthday is just around the corner). His too! turns out, they came from the same litter! He got his dogs from his boss, who adopted them both from Home at Last in the Dalles (just like Pica). And they really enjoyed playing with each other! He said Emily and Rocco has also been royal pains. Emily is shy like Pica, while Rocco (who looks the least like Pica) is outgoing and friendly. They are both fast like Pica, too.

Posted by mary at 12:55 PM | Comments (2)

August 13, 2005

Dog Modeling School

Pica and I were at the dog park the other day and struck up a conversation with this nice woman who I've seen before a few times with her dog -- she's always super friendly to me and Pica and this time we got to know a little bit more about each other. It turns out she's a photographer who shoots a lot of stock photos to sell through various databases. I didn't really know this was a career option but of course it makes sense. She asked me if Pica had ever done any modeling. Well, okay, no she didn't -- she actually asked if I thought Pica would be well behaved walking around with a model on a set and I had to say, "no way -- she'd freak out and go crazy." But this gave me an idea, which is for:

Dog Modeling School

A six week course in which your dog is taught to do things like: behave well around a camera crew on a set with lots of equipment and noises and stuff; be led around by models in high heels; ignore big plates of model spagetti; hold a pose for a long time; and various and sundry other photogenic tricks.

At the end of the course there will be a dog model show (friends and family invited), at which they will be led down a runway by models (probably just the other people in the class), while the pupparazzi takes photos. Each dog will get a couple of head shots and the opportunity to purchase a full photo portfolio, as well as a certificate that they have taken dog modeling so that owners can represent their dogs better to modeling agencies. This course should be co-taught by a dog trainer and an experienced photographer. For some, it would just be a fun forum for teaching your dog to behave in wierd situations, with the added bonus of providing some photos at the end. For others who think their dog is extra photogenic, it could just be the extra added edge they need to make it in the tough, dare I say dog-eat-dog, world of animal modeling and photography.

Seriously, I'll bet a lot of people would pay a fair amount to take a class like this. Oh, it looks like they already are. Oh, well. I don't think they are offering it in Portland, anyway.

Posted by mary at 1:53 PM | Comments (1)

August 26, 2004

Canine Norplant

I'm feeling strangely back-lashy towards the whole "you must spay/nuter your dog unless you're a breeder or shower" thing. Not because I think there should be more unwanted puppies (awwww) -- and don't think I'm deaf to the puppy plea, but I am feeling very anti-pure breedish, and certainly very anti-AKC, and I'm not alone in my resistance to the AKC.

What I want is for people to breed for the best possible companion dogs -- and I don't mean a damn labradoodle. I mean -- you know, sometimes you meet these great mixed dogs that have all this character and you know they won't get to pass it on because if you have a mixed dog and don't fix it than you're a terrible person.

I noticed when we were looking for a puppy the relative shortage of nice, adoptable dogs at the shelter and it seems that spay-nutering efforts are having interesting effects.

So I think we need canine norplant, in case your mutt turns out the be the best thing ever the world will at least have a chance to pass it on. Maybe it would be more like a doggie IUD, which could be removed if your dog won a certain number of contests sponsored by someone other than the AKC -- like best companion dog, or best babysitter, or best paper-fetcher, or something. Because otherwise, if the spay/nuter thing was totally successful, the only choice we'd have is to pic out a dog from a fairly limited number of AKC-defined breeds.

btw: I'm not thinking of Pica when I say all this.

Posted by mary at 4:40 PM | Comments (1)

August 25, 2004

Historical recreations using dogs

This was sort of Chris's idea, and sort of mine. He wants to film a movie about WWII using dogs, and I just want to do historical recreations (like Civil War battles) using dogs. This reminds me of Orca's idea of making a movie of "Where the Blue Begins." using human actors in dog masks, I think it was, and Jeff Ong's idea about dog waiters.

Anyway, in my version, you would have hundreds of dogs in grey and blue uniforms pretending to duke it out on a muddy field. There would be no actual fighting between dogs, because that wouldn't be fun -- just highly stylized fake fighting.

You could also use dogs for other recreations, like the signing of the Declaration of Independence, or the last spike in the transatlantic railroad, etc. It would be like the dogs playing poker picture, only with historically signficant scenes. I think it would make history a lot more appealing for some people -- dog lovers, anyway.

Posted by mary at 8:02 AM | Comments (1)

May 19, 2004

Pica is a Catahoula Leopard Hound! (maybe)

Here she is sniffing for wild boar.

Yesterday afternoon while I was walking Pica this nerdy little girl, about 12 years old with long black hair and glasses, came bounding out of one of the little houses we passed: "What kind of dog is that?" she asked eagerly. I said, as usual, "Blue heeler and beagle, we think." "Oh, I thought she might be one of these really rare dog from Louisiana -- wait a minute while I get my book."

Before I could say anything, she bounded back inside her house, where some dog of her own (about 2 pounds, by the sound of it) was barking up a storm. Then she ran out again holding a big dog breed book. She stood next to me and flipped through the pages.

"Here!" she said, having found the page she was looking for. "Oh, a Chesapeake Bay Retriever?" I said, looking at the left side of the page and thinking "what a sweet, yet clueless little girl" (Chesapeake Bay Retrievers look nothing like Pica; among other things, they have a curly coat) "no, here!" she said, and pointed to one of these -- a Catahoula Leapord Hound! AKA a Catahoula Cur!

And by God, I think she may be right! The picture in her book looked even more like Pica than these guys -- it had the 1/4 face mark and everything.

An interesting part is, they are used to herd wild boars! This way, if I ever decide to actually take up my all-pork-I-killed-myself diet, Pica can help me out. Apparently hog herding can also be competitive -- or a sport or something -- although I think considering that Pica is a little shy, it might be more than she's up to, and I might not want to get embroiled in the Louisianna hog-dog controversy. I think we'll stick to obediance for now.

The more you read about Catahoula Leopard Hounds, the less appealing they may sound: suspicious, one-family dogs, stubborn, "not for the inexperienced dog owner." But Pica is obviously not a pure-bred Catahoula Cur, and I actually think it's more likely that American dogs like Catahoula's and other Cattle dogs such as heelers tend to revert back to looking like their common ancestors, and that may be the connection between them, rather than Pica having any real connection to Louisanna (although given that she came from horse and cow country, it's not that unlikely that someone would have had one of these dogs out there).

In any case, I think we should start calling her a Catahoula Leopard Hound when people ask -- it sounds a lot cooler than "Heeler-Beagle mix" that's for sure. And if we ever see any wild boar, I'll let you know how she does.

Posted by mary at 11:04 AM | Comments (16)

January 31, 2004

Fast Food Dog Treats

This is Chris's idea.

Fast food restaurants should offer a dog menu for drive through customers with dogs. Then instead of feeding your dog french fries or whatever (which we don't do anyway -- we never eat fast food, of course), you could buy a doggie treat which was healthy for your dog. The point wouldn't really be animal health; the point would be to make money, so don't bother telling me that fast food is unhealthy.

Posted by mary at 6:55 PM | Comments (0)

Fast Food Dog Treats

This is Chris's idea.

Fast food restaurants should offer a dog menu for drive through customers with dogs. Then instead of feeding your dog french fries or whatever (which we don't do anyway -- we never eat fast food, of course), you could buy a doggie treat which was healthy for your dog. The point wouldn't really be animal health; the point would be to make money, so don't bother telling me that fast food is unhealthy.

Posted by mary at 6:55 PM | Comments (0)

January 5, 2004

Dog Toys for Your Dogs

I would like to see some kind of dog toy that you could wear on your feet. It could be a really large Kong, for instance. Pica makes a grab for my slippers the second I take them off. How does she know to do that? And I know better than to give her a pair of old shoes, since she wouldn't know the difference between new and old shoes. One question I have is whether she'd be able to distinguish between a Kong that smelt like my feet and my regular shoes. This makes me think that the Kong company could simply make shoes for people that were relatively impervious to dog chewing.

So far, Pica hasn't destroyed anything that we love. However, she is not teething yet, nor have we left her alone for more than 4 hours. Lucky dog.

Posted by mary at 7:22 AM | Comments (2)

Dog Toys for Your Dogs

I would like to see some kind of dog toy that you could wear on your feet. It could be a really large Kong, for instance. Pica makes a grab for my slippers the second I take them off. How does she know to do that? And I know better than to give her a pair of old shoes, since she wouldn't know the difference between new and old shoes. One question I have is whether she'd be able to distinguish between a Kong that smelt like my feet and my regular shoes. This makes me think that the Kong company could simply make shoes for people that were relatively impervious to dog chewing.

So far, Pica hasn't destroyed anything that we love. However, she is not teething yet, nor have we left her alone for more than 4 hours. Lucky dog.

Posted by mary at 7:22 AM | Comments (2)

December 12, 2003

Name Our Prospective Puppy

Chris and I may get a puppy tomorrow! I found her on petfinder.com yesterday. She is an Australian shepherd (mix) mixed with a Beagle mix. Her mother was the Beagle mix, and weighs around 25 pounds. I'm hoping she'll combine the intelligence and trainability of herding dogs with the pure love and playfulness of a Beagle. But Carlyn said she might be crazy, because Beagles want to go ahead and shepherds want to be behind, and she might be conflicted. She currently resides in the Dalles, Oregon. When I called yesterday to find out about the litter, the shelter said they had received many applications to adopt the puppies, but that I should go ahead and send in my application anyway (although they weren't very encouraging). I don't know if this is a hard sell tactic or what. Anyway, I faxed my application in and later that afternoon they called home and said we could have her! I indicated one of two dogs, Tinsel, who was a male pup and little more classically handsome (dark face with white blaze) and Twinkle here, whose odd asymmetry appealed to me, and I thought might make her a little more available. And she was! We're going to drive to Bend early tomorrow to meet her. If we don't like her, needless to say, we won't take her. Although we'll probably like her just fine. What's not to like in a puppy? This is not a replacement for children, just something to complicate the whole process.

So, Twinkle isn't really an acceptable name.

Chris's suggestions (to date):

Admiral Johanna Q Fuzzywinks
Lemmywinks
Bagle
Biscuit
Dumpy
Squirrel
Jeff Propst
Ruperta (Rupee for short)
Scone
Shortbread
Quadroon
Ashcroft
Little Sniper
Hanging Basket
Paul the 2nd
Daddy's Little Footwarmer
Daddy's Little Baby Replacer
$60 Norplant
Wet Spot (Spot for short)
Two Face
Scare Face
25 cent
Elephant Puppy
Ephedra
Unix
Puppix
BSD4.4
Mac OS X "Puppther"
Mommy's Little Paper Grabber
Michael Bolton
Houseplant
Methusulah
Little Cop Killer

This list will go on and on, I'm sure. Maybe we'll submit the ones we don't use to the world wide web pet names project. Or once we name her we can submit the story of how we did so to this page of interesting narratives. My favorite story there is the one about the kid who named his dog after the shape of a sore the dog had.

We'll have to be sure not to chose one of the most popular pet names unless we want to have that classic schoolyard experience of having six dogs run at us when we call (although with names like Chris and Mary, you wouldn't think we'd care).

Anyway, I think we'd better have a "Name Our Puppy" contest. Since none of my contests cost me much. Usual rules: submit the name here. I decide and announce it here, on this entry. It's possible no one will win. First prize: something from the mary's great ideas shop.

Posted by mary at 10:13 AM | Comments (23)

October 31, 2003

Last Day for World's Ugliest Non-Human Baby Mammel Contest

Granted, this is a hard contest. But so few have even tried! What I want to know is why I haven't gotten more entries like this or whatever. I mean, it's so easy!

Chris, will you take a picture of me making my ugly face tonight so I can enter?

Posted by mary at 10:58 AM | Comments (5)

October 24, 2003

Surrogate Puppy Birth as a Teen Pregnancy Deterrent AND UGLIEST NONHUMAN BABY MAMMAL CONTEST!!

(I wish movable type had a spell checker! does it have one somewhere?).

So you know how high schools and middle schools have those programs where kids have to carry around a 10 lb sack of flour or an egg in order to supposedly learn what it's like to have a kid? And actually, I think we all know they've gotten pretty sophisticated and even have drug babies, in addition to the regular Baby Think it Over curriculum. And to make it even more realistic, you got your Empathy Bellys [sic].

Simultaneously, the mad scientists of the world I think've gotten dogs to have kittens and other examples of interspecies pregnancies. Or maybe they haven't. Here's a discussion of interspecies birth on slashdot (I haven't checked to see if my suggestion came up in the conversation).

The problem with the empathy bellies et al. is that they don’t really get into the most immediately and viscerally terrifying parts of motherhood: actually giving birth.

My idea: implant dog embryos in the wombs of "at risk" teenage girls and have them give birth to puppies.

Maybe you could let them chose kittens or puppies depending on their personal preference.

You might be able turn it into a profit deal by having "at risk" girls act as surrogate mothers for breeders of very expensive dogs and cats.

The problem with this idea is that puppies and kittens, unlike new born human babies, are very cute and might just encourage those young sluts (hey! will my visibility go up now that I've use that word?!) so we might have to try to find some species that is even less cute than human infants, which is hard to think of among mammals. Maybe Chris will find me a picture of a mammal baby that is less cute than a human.

Or maybe I can have a CONTEST! Everyone loves a contest.

The person who sends as a comment to this blog entry a link to a picture of the ugliest baby mammal gets a "Mary’s Great Ideas" mousepad from cafepress.

I want something that will really scare the bejeezers out of those slutty teenage skeezers when they see it emerging from their loins and make them think two to six times (depending on size of litter) about having children of their own before they are lawfully wedded, and possibly forever.

Contest rules: Contest ends November 1, 2003. Entries must be sent to this page as a blog comment linking to the picture. I decide which is the ugliest and creepiest baby. Pictures must be photographs of actual existing mammals. I'll announce the winner on this page Nov. 2nd and then we'll have to figure out a way for me to get your info. if I don't actually know you already-- in other words, you should all continue not putting your email in your blog entries or putting some spam-proof one or whatever (you know like joeSPAM@blow.com or whatever -- I don't actually know how that works but anyway, I'm not interested in collecting info. for spammers). If no one enters, no one wins. If I only get cute or lame entries, no one wins -- in other words, there can be no winner even if a lot of people enter but the entries don't fit the bill. Otherwise, there will be one winner. I reserve the right to completely renege on any of these rules and call the whole thing off. I'll be sad if no one sends me any, though. I'll probably have to fake some entries just to maintain my dignity. And who knows? Maybe there are only cute mammals out there. But this contest should settle that question once and for all.

Disclaimer: Please note that I don’t actually have anything at all against real human babies, and am generally more for than against them and I'm kind of an agnostic where teen pregnancy is concerned. I just don't think human babies are very cute right out of the chute and I think I'm not alone in this.

Posted by mary at 12:00 PM | Comments (17)

September 22, 2003

Susan's Great Idea: Dog Rental

I invited Susan to post her great idea, and she responded!

OK. Here it is.

There are times when you want a dog, and times when you don't. Taking a walk in the park or at a beach is a great time to have a dog. So, why not have a dog rental agency to meet this unrecognized demand among all those non-dog-owning, walking people? Imagine yourself in a beautiful natural setting, strolling past a table and set of kennels and/or nice dogs on leashes... and for a mere $15/hour, you could take one of those love-emanating, frisbee-catching mammals along with you.

With just a small array of friendly dogs in a variety of sizes and with a variety of specialties, it wouldn't be hard to develop a devoted customer base of joggers seeking companionship or security, singles who want to connect with a dog owner, or just dog lovers whose lives do not easily accomodate the day-in, day-out caretaking demands of dogs.

The real money-maker is figuring out how to combine this with a dog walking and dog sitting business, but it seems like the liability issues might get complicated. But there's got to be a way to throw that in as an extra revenue source.

Posted by mary at 11:02 AM | Comments (6)

August 18, 2003

Lita

Here's a picture of Lita.

Lita, RIP.

Posted by mary at 6:40 PM | Comments (5)

Sad Idea: Dog Hit Man

I'm sorry to say that my 15 year old dalmatian Lita went the way of all things last week. My mother had the at-home euthenasia lady come while Chris and I were at the beach on our honeymoon. Lita had gotten so weak and incontinent that it was her time, but with the wedding and all I literally didn't have time -- or the will -- to do it. Thankfully, Betsy was able to do it, and I am very grateful to her. I worry I should have done it myself before the wedding started, but Lita was actually in pretty good shape up until the wedding, and I was hoping she'd be able to stay in a doggie day care place. But they sent her home because she kept crapping all over the kennel.

ANYWAY: All of this is to say, while I was debating what do to about poor old Lita, I had an idea for a service: a doggie hit man. You would contract with this person to take out a hit on your dog. But, here's the good part: you would agree that the hit man would come to your house in the next 6 months or so and put your dog down peacefully, but they would make it look like natural causes OR (this is the key) -- they *wouldn't* come by in the next six months, and your dog would die of actual natural causes.

See, the point is, you'd never know, and could thereby avoid the painful step of consciously and willfully taking your dog's life. This would be very handy for people in the situation I was in. My dog was not so sick that I could bring myself to kill her, but she did have some serious health problems (heart murmer as well as nerve damage in her back).

Now I know there will be those of you who might say that this is part of being a dog owner, and that we need to face up to our responsibilities, and that the dog might like us to be there with them, etc. but I think this would still sell.

Posted by mary at 10:34 AM | Comments (5)

July 29, 2003

"We're Cleaning Up (America!)": Dog Waste Disposal PR Campaign

This would be a public relations campaign for some big national pet company or a doggie day care place or maybe an off leash area lobby group.

First, with every sale they would include a little package of somehow biodegradable dog-waste pick-up bags which would be brightly colored (maybe yellow?) and have slogan on it like,:

"Joe's Pet Store and You:
We're Cleaning Up
America!"

Then there would be extensive TV and print ads showing people walking down the beach and in public places carrying these highly recognizable bags.

The ads would be all feel-goody with inspiring music and maybe soft focus, and would show slow motion pictures of people walking barefoot, kids rolling in the grass, and responsible dog owners pickling up (and here's the sweet part): LITTER.

Joe's Pet Store would look great because they encourage dog owners to leave parks cleaner than they found them, not just to pick up their own dog's crap. (Plus, you can't really show people picking up crap on TV.)

For dog owners, the other advantage is that it would mean one step away from the humiliation of carrying a sack of crap around, because -- who knows? -- maybe it's just a bunch of popsicle wrappers in there?

There are other obvious reasons why people don't pick up after their dogs, but I think one reason why is because it's vaguely humiliating to carry the sack around afterwords. It's awkward when you meet someone and have to decide if you're going to shake their handsor whatever, because even if you are perfectly clean, you feel sort of tainted. And on the other hand, since you've already picked up crap, why not grab that little piece of cellophane while you're at it?

By having a massive "You're an American Hero for Picking Up Shit" campaign, everyone could feel downright proud for having that bag.

It could get so high-status that some people might start carrying bags with nothing in them.

And maybe, just maybe, we might save some lives ...

Posted by mary at 3:43 PM | Comments (4)