Soaping ins and outs

I've noticed quite a few new soap makers at the forum lately, and have had emails from some of you with soap questions, so I thought it would be timely to give a few thoughts, not so much about how to make soap but about those things that are associated with it. Please remember I'm not an expert soaper. I make my own soap - one that is plain, unscented and not coloured. So I don't know much

Babies and books

I've been wanting to share some really special photos with you and today I have a good reason for it - apart from the fact that they're just so darn cute. Shane and Sarndra had some professional photos taken recently - a day in their life, and they said I could share them with you. This first photo of Alexander is part of that series, taken by photographer Hsu-Yin. I think you'll agree with me

Martin Scorsese on Doberman Discrimination

Martin Scorsese knows movies and he knows a bit about dogs too. In a letter to The Los Angeles Times, he writes that:

One recent morning, I turned on the television, and imagine my surprise when I heard the nominations for the first Golden Collar Awards for Best Dog in a Theatrical Film. After all, we had Blackie the Doberman in our movie. How could she not be nominated?

I listened in vain for Blackie's name to be called, and then to all the hullabaloo over a certain Jack Russell terrier named Uggie. Actually, Uggie is so adorable that he received two nominations for two separate pictures. Well done.

OK, let's lay all our cards on the table. Jack Russell terriers are small and cute. Dobermans are enormous and — handsome. More tellingly, Uggie plays a nice little mascot who does tricks and saves his master's life in one of the films, while Blackie gives an uncompromising performance as a ferocious guard dog who terrorizes children. I'm sure you can see what I'm driving at....

I detect... deep-seated prejudice at work. Jack Russell terriers were bred in the 19th century for the purposes of fox hunting by an Englishman, the Rev. John Russell. Dobermans were bred by a German tax collector who was afraid of being bludgeoned to death by the citizenry. But does that mean we must condemn the entire breed? Must we forget the magnificent physical achievements of such legendary Dobermans as Bingo von Ellendonk (who achieved a perfect score in the storied Schutzhund competition), Borong the Warlock, Baracuda Liborium or Caravelle Drillbit?

No Mr. Scorsese, we have not forgotten, and that's the problem.

You see, it was Doberman's that ate Gregory Peck in The Boys from Brazil.

There was an entire movie with trained Dobermans's as bank robbers (The Doberman Gang), and Magnum PI was always being intimidated by Higgen's dogs, Zeus and Apollo.

And then there's They Only Kill Their Masters. The plot is right there in the title.

As for the magnificent physical achievements of Bingo von Ellendonk, that was for Schutzhund, in which a dog is instructed to attack a human, albeit a human clothed in a lot of padding to soften the rather formidable bite.

So have we forgotten the Doberman?  No we have not! 

But is the world going to salute a tax-collector's dog designed to intimidate and rip into human flesh, rather than a Jack Russell terrier who redeems human life and makes us all laugh?

No, probably not.

The world still loves happy endings.
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Three keys ways to save time and money

Thanks to everyone who sent an order or an inquiry about buying my book. I've answered some of you and will answer you all when Hanno gets more information from the post office. We're trying to get the best possible price for you all but so far, for overseas sales, it's looking pretty expensive. I'll have more information this afternoon and I'll try to answer all the emails from other countries

Signed copies of my book

I'll be sending in an order to Penguin soon so I can sell signed copies of my book. If you'd like to order a signed copy, please send me an email (rhondahetzel@gmail.com) with this information:

your name and address
the number of books you would like to order
the name you want me to write in the inscription



I don't want to over-order and be left with books here. If you read this at the forum

Dog Shows in the Age of Dog Show Ridicule

I sometimes read something on a handheld device, send it to email, and forget it's there. Trolling through some old files while looking for something else, I came across this old gem from 2009: Bitch Please;  Dog shows in the age of dog show ridicule.

If you're looking to mock, a dog show is an easy target. You could note how many of these people pursuing perfection in dogs are themselves fairly overweight, and eat too many funnel cakes, and dress in a way that would kill any chance of a social life were they actually in high school. Spending time at the dog show, however, the group came less to resemble some kind of wacky subculture, and more just the culture. A common trait of Americans — blue and red, gay and straight, X and Y, whatever — is that they largely want to be good at something, to be recognized for doing at least one thing well, and maybe that's at the expense of everything else. Poetry writing, bass fishing, cooking, competitive eating, you name it. So you spend months or even years in triathlon training. You juggle Family Feud and reality TV and dog show gigs. You learn about breeds and how to groom and how to rub your dog in just the right family unfriendly way to make its tail stand straight up for judging.

I think this piece has it exactly right: these are just people with limited talents trying to get good at something. And yes, in order to get good at this something, they are willing to give up quite a lot -- money, time, time with family... and even the health of dogs.

This is the dark little secret of dog shows: they are not about dogs. A dog will not cross a room for a rosette, much less drive 300 miles across two states and spend two nights in a bad hotel for the privilege.
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Coffee and Provocation

Public Lockable Dog Crates?
What do you do when you have your dog with you, and you want to go into a store?  In Norway, at leas one place has a "Hundehiet" box where you can stick your dog inside until you’re done.   I am not sure I like the idea, for reasons that seem obvious:  abandonment, heat, cold, sanitation.

Here's a List of 20 Ancient Living Things:
The youngest is 2,000 years old, the oldest about 500,000 years old.  And yes, they are all living.

Something Is Brain Damaged
Christie Carr, a 39-year-old woman from Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, nursed a partially paralyzed and brain damaged Red Kangaroo back to heath after it suffered a fractured neck, and now the animal shares her bed at night. ‘He’s always stealing my pillow,’ she said.

Three Million Lakes
Canada has at least 3 million lakes.  Other odd geography facts here.

Guns for Less?
A shipment of 86,00 M1 Garands and 770,00 M1 Carbines held by the South Korean military since the Korean war in the 1950s, will soon be coming to the U.S. after an objection by the State Department was overturned.

What Percent Are You?
Want to know where your household income ranks?  Punch in total household income and see.

A Dog Tag for Your Keys?
I have a dog tag on my keys with my cell phone number on it.  This seems like a nice version and you get two numbers, so one tag can actually go on the dog!
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One of our Own

I talk often of how this blogging community 

blesses us all with love and friendship.

One of our own has lost her life partner,

her husband Bruce,

this day and she will need our prayers 

and love for many months to come.

If you do not pray, then send 

hope and grace out into 

the universe on Jane's behalf.

If you can afford to, please donate

 in Bruce's name to an ALS fund.

100 of us each giving even $5.00

makes hope possible.

Please visit and give your love 

to Jane and her family.

Comfort will be hard to come by,

but showing our love will, in small

measure, remind this lovely, strong woman

that she never walks alone.

Mamie Jane

Weekend reading

This is my regular Friday feature in which I share a few things I've read or watched recently and some blogs that have inspired me in some way. We all know the internet is an amazing place, with many nooks and crannies to explore. I hope these links reveal interest and beauty you might not otherwise have found.



Wabi-Sabi Wanderings blog



Adalyn Farm blog - chickens in the snow



Peppers

Fearless Beauty is on Duty

"Beauty" was a wire haired terrier who belonged to a People's Dispensary for Sick Animals (PDSA) officer and who led the Animal Rescue Squads during the bombing of London in World War Two.

Beauty received the Pioneer Medal from the PDSA for all the lives she saved; a medal usually reserved for humans. She also received a silver mounted collar with the inscription, 'For Services Rendered'. She was awarded the Dickin Medal in January 1945.
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How far is too far?

Happy Australia Day to my fellow Australians! Whether you celebrate quietly with Vegemite on toast while watching the cricket, or at a BBQ with a lot of people, fireworks and wine, I hope you enjoy today. We have a lot to be thankful for.

~~~~~*~~~~~~



Just after Christmas I had to go to town to buy a couple of things at the post-Christmas sales. I grabbed my trusty small brown leather bag

Six People and a Dog Commute on 50CC

And you drive your SUV to work all alone!
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Too Close for Comfort

This is an ad for some sort of breath-freshener for dogs, but it says quite a lot that so many Pugs actually look like this now. Cut off a dog's face, and a dog's head is not that different from a dog's back end.
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Only in America

Candlelight, Coffee and Comfort

My first cup of coffee in days.

Did not want to confuse meds and caffeine.

I am confused enough as it is.

This is my favorite table...ever...

I work here

 eat here

 visit here

These edges are dreamy

Never far from me,

Miss Justice

doing her morning toilette

hoping toast bits will come her way.

Sadly, no toast just now,

just coffee and candlelight.

Needing to be even closer,

Master Howie

asking to be allowed into my lap.

Not until I finish my coffee

in my favorite mug

...for now

The perfect curve to cradle my left hand

 around it's warmth

while the right hand 

slips effortlessly through the handle

for a secure grip.

1971

an important year

for me to be sure.

Such comfort to me after weeks of illness.

My memory bowl

my table

hazelnut fragrance

best mug 

and

the pooches

in my little world

it is enough

it is, in fact, 

glorious

Making ginger beer from scratch

We had a nice supply of ginger beer going over Christmas. It's a delicious soft drink for young and old, although there is an alcoholic version that can be made with a slight variation on the recipe. Ginger beer is a naturally fermented drink that is easy to make - with ginger beer you make a starter called a ginger beer plant and after it has fermented, you add that to sweet water and lemon

The Nonsense of "Pull Dogs"

In The Working Jack Russell Terrier Eddie Chapman writes:

"Something that makes my blood boil is when I hear terrier men talk about dogs they call Caesar dogs. They will show you a Russell type that has been bred too big and say, 'I use him as a Caesar dog'. If I ask what a Caesar dog is, they say it is a dog which will hold the badger, he won't let go,' they say. I have never heard such rubbish in my life. Besides being unnecessary, it is invariably cruel to the dog and more often than not he will be badly bitten for his pains. Besides that, it is unnecessarily cruel to the badger and the sort of behavior that got badger digging banned. I have tried to explain how to remove badgers from a sett without injury to dog or badger. There is nothing clever about getting a hard dog smashed up by a badger. On the contrary, it shows ignorance and a lack of responsibility and feeling. Bravery in a terrier should never be exploited."

I found it quite refreshing to read this passage, as I have often noted that there is little reason to own a "pull dog" if you actually know how to handle things at the end of a dig. The use of "pull dogs" damages dogs and quarry alike and is wasteful as it often necessitates time out of the field and expensive veterinary work.

In the U.S., the use of pull dogs (what Chapman and some others call "Caesar" dogs) is to due to the prevalence of too many over-large terriers that cannot go to ground in a real earth. To say you have a "good pull dog," is to say you do not have a dog capable of actually going to ground.

If you have followed the Kennel Club dictates, and embraced a 14 inch tall dog with a 17" or 18" chest (or larger!), you are forced to rationalize a job for it. No matter that it is a stupid job forged in pain. Most people would rather see their dog injured than swallow their pride and admit they have drunk the Koolaid offered up by the Kennel Club know-nothings who think a fox den is as big around as a go-to-ground tunnel.

Another factor is that many people simply have no idea of how to handle quarry and so use the dog to to do the job. Having gotten to the end of a dig, they do not know how to get the animal out of the pipe, nor do they know how to dispatch it. In such a situation, the use of a "pull dog" is ignorance in motion.

The simplest way for a novice to handle quarry is with a snare. You can make your own for about $5, or else buy a pig snare from a feedstore.

Groundhogs can also be tailed out alive -- it is not hard if the groundhog's tail is presented, as it so often is. If very much of the pipe is remaining, however, you may find yourself in a tug-of-war with the groundhog who can jamb up inside a pipe so tightly that even a large man can have difficulty pulling one free.

Always use a snare for raccoons -- they can twist all the way around on their short fat bodies. They can grab you with their hands and have crushing bites. Rabies is not uncommon in raccoons, especially on the East Coast.

If you have entangled a fox in a net, be carefully when extricating the fox. The best advice is to pin the animal to the ground under your boot while removing the net. Work the net off the fox in sections, and then release it to hunt another day.
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Simple, hands-on living

I live a charmed life. We live here, on this fertile land with a creek running by it, at the end of a one-lane street, surrounded by a few neighbours and bushland. We use our land; it is one of our assets and to not use it productively would shame us. We grow food and keep chickens and that allows us to eat fresh organic produce that we would not be able to afford if we had to buy it all the

Learning About Dogs by Watching Dogs

In the January issue of Earth dog-Running Dog magazine, Colin Didriksen has a nice article about picking a pup. Didriksen is raising Teckels these days -- working dachsunds -- and the piece starts out:

There was roughly one hundred years of doggy experience between the three men standing in the garden watching a litter of Teckels do what seven week old Teckel pups do.

Their mother was with them and now and again one of the pups would push her too far and receive first a growl and if that didn't convince it to stop then the nip that followed did. It's a pity that some human parents don't take note of the way other animals correct the wrongdoings of their young and act similarly; it would mean fewer badly behaved children and incidents of unsocial behavior would be diminished. Areas where some young people delight in causing aggravation to old people would disappear. A degree of respect is often brought about by a tiny tinge of fear.

Watch any non-human mother and its young. Cats, dogs, foxes, ferrets and the like, usually after a verbal warning in the guise of a growl or a hiss, will all discipline their young physically either with a nip, by swatting them with a paw, or both.

You will have to buy a copy to read the rest, and I encourage a subscription, as it's a good magazine with fine pieces from Didriksen, Richard Christian (the title of his piece this month is Civilization and Syphilisation and very amusing), David Harcombe and others.

I always find it amazing that the pet and show ring people are always quick to wax nostaligic and romantic about the history of dogs, but seem entirely blind to the fact that canine history is being written every day by men and women who actually work their dogs above and below ground.

And guess what?  Take my word on this: true working dog men and women have something to say and to teach.

The fox in his burrow and the sheep on the hill do not judge up the leash, do not care about some scrap of pedigree paper, nor are they concerned about coat color, nose color, or "expression."

But, of course, people are people, and how is it that we choose a pup from a litter at eight weeks of age?

Ah well, you will have to buy the magazine and read the piece.  But yes, it's very amusing.
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The Impact of Ebola in the Forest

In three essays in Natural Acts: A Sidelong View of Science and Nature, David Quammen profiles the work of Mike Fay who did a 2,000 mile walking "megatransect," with pygymy porters, through the wildest and most inhospitable parts of the Central African Republic and Congo, ending up on the coast of Gabon after 18 months of walking through poacher-infested forests and leech-infested swamps.

Quammen writes of what they found -- and did not find -- in the Minkébé National Park in Gabon:

They found spectacular zones of forest and swamp, stunning inselbergs, networks of streams, all rich with species and virtually untouched by human presence. They also found — as Mike Fay has been finding — a nearly total absence of gorillas and chimpanzees. It wasn’t always so. In 1984 a paper appeared in the American Journal of Primatology, by Caroline Tutin and Michel Fernandez, in which the authors described their census of gorilla and chimpanzee populations throughout Gabon. Using a combination of field transects, habitat analysis, and cautious extrapolation, Tutin and Fernandez estimated that at least 4,171 gorillas lived within the Minkébé sector, representing a modest but significant population density. Something seems to have happened to those apes between 1984 and now. It may have happened abruptly in the mid-1990s, when three Ebola epidemics burned through villages and gold camps at the Minkébé periphery, killing dozens of humans. One of those outbreaks occurred in early 1996 at a village called Mayibout 2, on the upper Ivindo River. It began with a chimpanzee carcass, found dead in the forest and brought to the village as food. Eighteen people who helped with the skinning, the butchering, and the handling of the chimp flesh became sick. Suffering variously from fever, headache, and bloody diarrhea, they were evacuated downriver to the Makokou hospital. Four of them died quickly. A fifth escaped from the hospital, went back to Mayibout 2, and died there. That victim was buried in the traditional way—ceremonies were performed, and no special precautions were taken against infection.

By early March, thirty-one people had fallen ill, of whom twenty-one died, for a mortality rate of almost 68 percent. Then it was over, as abruptly as it started. Around the same time, according to later accounts, dead gorillas were seen in the forest.

... [Fay] spends hours in his tent, collating the latest harvest of data on his laptop. Within the past fourteen days, he informs me, we have stepped across 997 piles of elephant dung and not a single dung pile from a gorilla. We have heard zero gorilla chest-beat displays. We have seen zero sprigs of Marantaceae chewed by gorilla teeth and discarded. These are numbers representing as good a measure as now exists of the mystery of Minkébé.

See National Geographic's interactive web site for more information.

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Pre-ordering the book

With less than a month to go until the book is released, there has been a lot going on here behind the scenes.  Hanno and I are planning our trip down south and the publicity and promotion have step up a notch. Penguin have added a "look inside" feature to my section of their website. If you go there, you'll be able to see the table of contents and a couple of pages of the book. And  for

Mary Chapin Carpenter :: Come On Come On

video url

Down the River Road is not a metaphor. River Road is a real road.  Mary Chapin Carpenter used to live in the D.C. area near me.  I drive down the River Road quite a lot when I go hunting.

Back about 13 or 14 years before this song was recorded at Wolftrap, Mary Chapin Carpenter would perform for beer money at Food For Thought on Connecticut Avenue, and I was a $5 and $10 tipper when she passed the hat. I remember her well as I thought I was being extraordinarily generous with my money considering that $10 back then could buy two pitchers of Tuborg beer, and I was making less money than the receptionist in my office. 
..

The Lessons On Mountain's Muzzle

Mountain is curled up in her bed next to me. There are a couple of scars running down her nose from a few fox encounters in her youth, and if you look carefully, you can see the very tip of her nose is cut off from a groundhog bite. A front canine is broken -- a little something to remember from a sette with double raccoons. 

Mountain works a little differently now -- she will stand back and bay a little more.  Now she knows butt from breath.  Old dogs know more than young ones do.

And yet this dog wakes up every morning to check what pants and shoes I am wearing. She lives for Carrharts and boots.

My point here is that this dog has not "bellied over" from a few natural aversives, and neither have any other dogs that I have owned.  She has not been too cowed by bites, barb wire and brambles.

For that matter, neither are the cows who seem to be very happy living behind their electric fence.  They are not too traumatized by having been nipped by the wire a few times in their life.

All of this is a wind-up to a truly excellent piece from Ruth Crisler about real world aversives and the fomented fear and contrived crisis fanned by certain dog trainers who seek to browbeat the world into thinking there is only one way to train a dog.  Read the whole thing.

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Remember When We Played Outside?

The irony here is at the end...
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Thrilled - Proud and smelly?

It's out- Old Grey Mare is in it. I'm thrilled.

It was great to work with April, Sunday and Mark.

Thank you.

Thank you for all the emails and comments and calls

of get well wishes to me over the past few days.

I know I will mend that much faster because of it.

I am cRaZy for all of you my dear friends.

You are the best.

Non bloggers do not know what they are missing.

but we do... <3

we give and receive love

with no agenda

no judgements

no limits

oh, sometimes we falter with a few nasty folks

but we always rise above it.

I am proud, yes PROUD,

to be part of this community.

I am blessed beyond measure 

because of it.

Much love,

z

for those of you stopping by for the first time,

you may want to scroll back a few posts to

 get past the cough-cough-cough stuff of me being sick.

I'll return to my feisty, irreverent self soon enough..

hopefully wearing something besides mismatched pj's with a hole in the crotch, and a bra to hoist the girls back into place, some makeup, and a hairdo that does not 

resemble Alfafa's or the hunchback of ND.

Oh Lord, I look bad...

( and I may smell like day old Vicks)

If there was a way someone could 

sneak in and photograph me I would 

be plastered in one of those "seen at Walmart" emails or 

at the very least a huge Glamour Don't.

So look at the pretty houses and pretend 

I belong there OK?

Home Defense?

Don't tell me you have a gun for home defense, when you're not doing a thing to help save the home planet. 
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We Are All Marianne Gingrich

We are all Marianne Gingrich (from Newsweek):

".... the Republican right continues to promote the virtues of traditional marriage, espousing conventional gender stereotypes that conform to Christian dogma by relegating wives to subordinate status while giving familial authority to their husbands. Other evergreen conservative refrains include the criticism of feminists and working mothers for supp...osedly abandoning their domestic duties in favor of paid work outside the home.

"But what happens to the woman who adheres to this retro feminine mystique? If she becomes a homemaker and depends on her husband for support, what if the family breadwinner turns out to be a guy like Newt Gingrich? The wife who sacrificed her ability to earn a living finds herself in deep trouble when hubby rewards her trust by running off with a newer, younger, blonder babe.

"... If Republican men want women to follow such a dangerous course, they should have to answer for how they lived up to their end of that deal in their own personal lives.

"And if they want us to elect them to high office, they should also be required to explain how voters can reconcile their private conduct with the consequences of their public policies.

"Because if we elevate them to the White House, the rest of us are also going to have to live with the gap between what they say and what they actually do. And in that scenario, we all become Marianne Gingrich.

Nature's Viet Cong

In Natural Acts: A Sidelong View of Science and Nature, author David Quammen writes about one of the world's most despised insects:

"...the mosquito is taking a bad rap. It has been victimized, I submit to you, by a strong case of anthropocentric bias. In fact, the little sucker can be viewed, with only a small bit of squinting, as one of the great ecological heroes of planet Earth. If you consider rainforest preservation. The chief point of blame, with mosquitoes, happens also to be the chief point of merit: They make tropical rainforests, for humans, virtually uninhabitable

So as Europe was being stripped of its virgin woods, and India and China, and the North American heartland, the tropical rainforests largely escaped, lasting into the late twentieth century—with some chance, at least, that they may endure a bit longer. Thanks to what? To a concatenation of accidental and deterministic factors, no doubt, among which should be included this: 10 million generations of jungle-loving, disease-bearing, bloodsucking mosquitoes—the Culicidae, nature’s Vietcong.

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A Coffee Cup Quote Starbucks Missed

The chief mate of the Pequod was Starbuck, a native of Nantucket, and a Quaker by descent....

"I will have no man in my boat," said Starbuck, "who is not afraid of a whale."
. - Moby Dick, by Herman Melville

The Coolest Man in the World Has Throat Cancer

Over at the Querencia blog, Steve Bodio mourns that his mongolian friend, Aralbai, who was deemed to be "the coolest man in the world" by Field and Stream magazine, has throat cancer at the very young age of 54, and he is refusing chemo and radiation. Read the rest here.
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Weekend reading

This is my regular Friday feature in which I share a few things I've read or watched recently and some blogs that have inspired me in some way. We all know the internet is an amazing place, with many nooks and crannies to explore. I hope these links reveal interest and beauty you might not otherwise have found.


mkhandmade - a beautiful blog by Michelle
Handmade At Home - Kelly in UK

Coffee and Provocation

Greenland's Sirius Special Forces

Greenland is under the control of Denmark, which is is responsible for both its police patrol and its national defense. In order to protect the native sled dog population of Greenland, however, no snowmobiles are allowed in the north of Greenland, nor are imported sled dogs allowed -- a way of making sure that gasoline and degenerated dogs from the Kennel Club do not wreck the native canine gene pool which has been 5,000 years in the making.  The result is "Sirius," a special forces team that moves by native sled dog.  Photographer Fritz Hoffman has put together a photo exhibit of the dogs patrolling one of the largest and most rugged frozen wildernesses in the world.

Remember Stamps?  Remember Working Dogs?
The U.S. Postal Service is issuing four 65-cent postage stamps featuring “Dogs at Work".  The dogs shown are a tracking dog, a guide dog for the blind, a search and rescue dog, and a "therapy" dog (Seriously?  A therapy dog?).  For those of you who have not mailed a letter in 15 years, a 65-cent stamp is the postage for sending a first-class piece weighing between one and two ounces. 

Hollywood Terriers
Terriers are taking the limelight this year, with a cartoon Snowy (Milou) starring in the new TinTin movie, and Uggie the Jack Russell terrier, the star of "The Artist," apparenrly the most exciting prospect for an Oscar after his knock-out performance on stage at the Golden Globe awards.  Finally, Christopher Plummer gave a shout-out to the Jack Russell terrier Cosmo, his co-star in the film Beginners.

The Horror of Dogs on Chains
I hate to see a dog on a chain, though I have to say these two characters seem to be having a lot of fun.

Pet Connection Comes Back From the Dead
The old Pet Connection blog will be coming back at a new location and with just dogs at HonestDog.com.  Things should fire up around February 1st.

Pimp the Ride
For a small tour of American awesomeness in the motor home department check out this ride.

The Pretentiousness Scale
Calvin Trillin describes a new social index in this delightful little read.

Paula Deen Moves from Fat Pusher to Drug Pusher Who is Fat
Paula Deen, an overweight TV cook, is famous for pushing fat- and sugar-soaked food on her TV show.  Now it turns out she had had diabetes for three years and has only now decided to announce it after securing sponsorship from diabetes company Novo Nordisk.  And yes, she is still going to be pushing lard and sugar on her TV show -- now all you have to do is take drugs for the disease she is  encouraging you to get!  This is like someone promoting cigarettes who then gets paid by the chemo companies while forgetting to mention that your Medicare, Medicaid, and private insurance dollars are supporting it all.

Two Awesome YouTube Video Remixes and Mashups
The first is Elvis and Duffy.  I always hated this Elvis tune, but with the addition of Duffy it becomes pretty good.  And how about this catchy little mashup of The Fresh Prince of Bel-air?

So Why Are the British So Pasty White?
I am told that no point in Great Britain is more than 75 miles from the sea.

Good Luck With That
The Federated Farmers of New Zealand are calling for sheep shearing to become an Olympic sport.  And I am sure that will happen -- right after I win the bronze for digging on the terriers. 
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This is Good and Worth Reading

No, I did not write it. That's why it's good and worth reading.

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Summer knitting

Of all the things I do during the course of a normal day, the one thing that is guaranteed to help me relax is knitting.  Who would have thought that winding a long piece of wool or cotton around a couple of bamboo sticks would clear the mind and produce such wonders. And it's such an old craft, unchanged over all our years, and more. I always have some form of knitting on the go. The repetitive

This is Not a SOPA Protest

I do not know enough about SOPA or PIPA to support or oppose, but I note that everyone from Wikipedia to Google are flying blacked out sites or logos to protest the proposed laws.

Rather than jump on a bandwagon that I know nothing about, I am simply posting a nice black square.

This is what inside of a den looks like to a working terrier.

There is no light at all -- there is only pure darkness, and the beat of the dog's own heart, and the faint beat of another up the tube.

There is only the scent of fur and urine, water and mold.

There is only the sound of my shovel above, and perhaps the growls, clicking teeth, and rumble of rock and dirt ahead.

This is the world of the working terrier.
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ONE SILLY GOOSE

One silly stupid goose am I.

I just could not figure out 

why I was having adjustment issues

to new work etc....

I am a tough old bird, I can juggle 

with the best of them.

So tired, feeling very poorly, persistant cough etc.

Turns out I was trying to do it all

while I had pneumonia.

AGAIN!

Stupid Z.

so...no new posts till...?

and sale postponed.

Letting antibiotics do their thing.

Off to bed.

See you on the other side 

of wellness.

Now don't you be a silly goose.

Take care of yourselves.

HONK!

Rising child care costs

There is no doubt about it, the cost of living continues to rise and unless we take stock of what we can do in our own lives, we'll be swept along with those rising costs. I watched a TV report on child care costs last week. Apparently, in Australia, those costs are about to rise. When I looked into it further online, Australia isn't the only country this is happening in. I found information

Four Minutes of Lies and Confusion

This morning, the Kennel Club came out with a 27-minute video entitled "Dogs -- A Healthy Future".

I do not have time this morning to go through all 27-minutes of the video, but it turns out I do not have to in order to make the essential point, which is that this is an in-house industrial self-promotion video which does NOT tell the true history of the Kennel Club, nor does it actually tell you what is wrong in the world of pedigree dogs, or the way forward in the world of dogs.

You can see the video yourself, here, but let me detail the first four minutes:  what is said, what is not said, what is an outright lie, and what small steps forward are actually being taken.

1. Killing off working dogs.  The video starts off (at 0.38) with the narrator gushing about Poodles, Old English Sheep Dogs, and Border Terriers.  What is not said is these three breeds were once working dogs, but they do not work anymore. In fact, these are three perfect examples of what happens when you draw a dog into the Kennel Club and the dogs are either denatured or exaggerated to the point that they are useless in the field. Work a dog? The Kennel Club affords ZERO points for work, same as it affords ZERO points for health.  The result is what you see in the Kennel Club:  guns dogs that have never heard a shotgun, sheep dogs that have never seen a sheep, and terriers too big to go to ground on a fox.
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2. A nation of dog lovers?  The narrator says (at 0.42) that to visit a dog show is to see that Britain is a nation of dog lovers. You will notice, however, that the announcer does not advise visiting a Kennel Club-approved puppy farm to see the horrifying scenes there, nor do they advise visiting a local kill shelter, such as Battersea, where about a third of all healthy dogs are put down because no one wants them. A nation of dog lovers? Yes, there are a lot of dogs in Britain, but there is a lot of institutionalized cruelty as well, and the Kennel Club and its paid apologists have been part of that cruelty for 140 years, banging the gong for predictably diseased dogs bred in a closed registry system, saluting deformity and exaggeration at every turn, and always pushing back at those who say the nation can do better.
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3. One big, happy (entirely white) family.  Steve Dean, the new head of the Kennel Club, shows up to suggest (at 0.51) how friendly and fun everything is at a Kennel Club dog show.  This is the same Steve Dean who, when asked just ten days ago whether the Kennel Club would welcome as members everyone in the world of pedigree dogs, answered: ”It is not open to everybody as this carries risks: if you do not filter the applicants then any group of people can join and thus effectively change the entire organisation.” Right. Watch the film and see if there is anyone in it who would not look perfect in an Aryan Nations film.  Britain is a very diverse place, but the Kennel Club is not very diverse, and they do not see any problem with that, as their own self-promotion film makes clear.  A non-white face in a 27-minute Kennel Club film?  What an odd idea!  And yet the tin-ears at the Kennel Club seem shocked that anyone would note that while the world went from Bassets to Auschwitz in 50 years, the Kennel Club never left that stage, saluting closed gene pools at the front end while winking at sterilization and gas chambers at the back end, all the while keeping a firm eye on coat color and social class -- of people and dogs alike.
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4. Looking after canine welfare?  The narrator claims (at 1.00) that the Kennel Club has been looking after the welfare of pedigree dogs for almost 150 years. This is a naked lie. In fact the single greatest threat to the welfare of pedigree dogs has been the Kennel Club itself. The reason for this is that the Kennel Club has:
   
   ... a) Generally closed breed registries with less than 50 dogs;
   ... b) Required all dogs be bred within closed gene pools;
   ... c) Routinely saluted morphological exaggeration, and;
   . . d) Afforded zero points to health in the show ring.
   
   The result, today, is that breed after breed on the Kennel Club's roster is a genetic and structural wreck.  Canine insurance companies now charge higher premiums for Kennel Club dogs which are deemed to be less healthy than cross-breeds or mutts.  Can there be any more powerful indictment of what 150 years of Kennel Club stewardship has meant for pedigree dogs?
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5. The ethos of the Kennel Club is health? Steve Dean, the new head of the Kennel Club, is seen sprawling on the grass (at 1:10) while dressed in black pants, blazer jacket, tie, and penny loafers (mind the dog poop Mr. Dean!).  He tells us that "the whole ethos of the Kennel Club is the health and welfare of dogs, and that includes "all dogs, pedigree dogs, cross-bred dogs, mongrels."  This is, of course, complete nonsense.  To refresh, the Kennel Club is an organization that is focused on registering purebred dogs, it is an organization that is pushing people to buy only purebred dogs from registered breeders, and it affords ZERO points to the health of any dog in the show ring. This is an organization that registers thousands of puppy farm dogs a year, and which does nothing to promote adoption from shelters. In short, Steve Dean's statements here are as tortured and contrived as his squat in the grass.
   .
6. The Kennel Club runs Crufts, the most famous dog show in the world. Following the showing of Pedigree Dogs Exposed in 2008, the Kennel Club lost all of its major corporate sponsors for Crufts. Scrambling for any major sponsor, the Kennel Club accepted sponsorship from a discount furniture chain which required it to change Cruft's logo to include a sofa.  No, I am not making this up! Now, Crufts has lost that discount furniture store sponsor, and other major sponsors have yet to come forward. And why would they, when Crufts and the Kennel Club are more likely to be associated with canine misery and defect than quality?!
   .
7. The Kennel Club registers all dogs.  The narrator claims (at 1.32) that the Kennel Club registers "all dogs" but in fact that is a dramatic overstatement. The Kennel Club is focused on registering purebred dogs, and only those dogs whose owners want them registered, and will pay a fee. In fact, most dogs in the UK are not registered with the Kennel Club.
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8. The Kennel Club regulates 708 breed clubs. The narrator goes on to note (at 1.32) that the Kennel Club "regulates the 708 breed clubs." Are we to take it that this means the Kennel Club is in charge and can make the breed clubs do what it wants when that needs to be done?  Does this mean that if there is a problem with pedigree dog health, it's not the fault of the breed clubs, but the Kennel Club's hierarchy itself?  Is the Kennel Club finally going to stop hiding behind the skirts of breed club matrons and (supposed) legal impotence?  Time will tell!
   .
9. The Kennel Club helps to stamp out puppy farmers?  The narrator claims (at 1.45) that the Kennel Club works to stamp out puppy farms, but this is a lie. The Kennel Club has actively recruited puppy farmers and registered their product since the beginning, and it continues to do so to this day. The objection of the Kennel Club is not to puppy farms -- but to anyone that might be breeding a cross-bred (and therefore unregistered) "Cocker-Poo" or "Dorgi, as well as to anyone who might be breeding pedigree dogs that are not registered by the Kennel Club.
   .
10. The Kennel Club registers a quarter of a million puppies a year.  Steve Dean tells us (at 2.22) that the Kennel Club registers a quarter of a million puppies a year. Amazingly, however, the Kennel Club puts its brand on these dogs even as the organization manages to slip out from under all consumer regulation. How does that work? The Kennel Club licenses breeders, its creates and sanctifies breed standards, and it says it regulates all the breed clubs and is dedicated to canine health, and yet the Kennel Club accepts NO responsibility for defective, diseased and deformed dogs, and it offers NO guarantee about the health of any dog or puppy carrying its brand. Amazing! How is that possible? If a car company put its logo on a car, could it claim it had nothing do with the defective brakes that came from its supplier? How then, does the Kennel Club not fall within similar regulatory oversight since, according to its own statements, it controls all facets of pedigree dog breeding under its own registry?
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11. The Kennel Club is trying to 'control the loss of genetic diversity in dogs?'  We are told (at 2.40) that the Kennel Club is trying to "control the loss of genetic diversity in dogs." Really? What does that mean? Not what you think! In the Kennel Club, "controlling the loss of genetic diversity" means that you keep breeds separate and in a closed breeding pool. In fact, the entire rationale for the Kennel Club is not to promote genetic diversity, but to trap dog breeds in genetic bottles cut off from the rest of the canine gene pool. When the Kennel Club talks about "controlling the loss of genetic diversity" what they really mean is putting more dogs in more breed bottles!
    .
12. The Kennel Club is working to eliminate inherited diseases?  When the Kennel Club says it is "working to eliminate inherited disease," is does not mean that the Kennel Club is opening up its roles in order to increase genetic diversity and reduce the level of inbreeding.  It does not mean that the club is banning brachycephalic breeds with faces so pushed in they cannot breathe. It does not mean they are banning super tiny dogs whose brains cannot fit in their skulls, and it does not mean they are banning giant breeds that die of heart failure only a few years after they stop growing. What the Kennel Club means when it says it is "working to eliminate inherited diseases" is that it is looking for new health care tests so that already-too-small breed pools can be pared down even more. And even here, the solutions talked about are often complete nonsense. How do you get rid of mitral heart valve disease in Cavalier King Charles Spaniels when 85% of the dogs will die with that affliction? It cannot be done!  How do you get rid of brachycephalic breathing disorders and whelping problems in the English Bulldog when the breed standard requires smashed faces and huge heads?
    .
13. The Kennel Club is working to tighten regulations at dog shows?  We are told the Kennel Club is "working" to tighten regulations at dog shows. Really? Again, what does that mean?  All Kennel Club shows operate under the dictatorship of the Kennel Club. It is the Kennel Club that creates and legitimizes breed standards, which trains and writes the rules for dog show judges, and which sanctions and promotes the dog shows themselves. Every regulatory aspect of a dog show is under the Kennel Club's control, so there is no "working" to regulate a dog show; either the Kennel Club does it, or it allows the dysfunction, disease, deformity and defect that is on parade. In fact, the Kennel Club has winked at defect, deformity and disease at dog shows for more than 140 years.
    .
14. We must unite to fight "inherited diseases." Having just told us that the Kennel Club has complete control over pedigree dogs, and that it has always put canine health front and center, the announcer tells us (at 2.45) that the world of pedigree dogs must unite to fight inherited diseases. What?! There are widespread health problems in the world of pedigree dogs?  How did that happen if the Kennel Club has complete power and has been putting breed health first for nearly 150 years? Suddenly, the entire narrative comes crashing down, and it comes crashing down for a very good reason:  almost everything we have heard up to now has been a lie.
    .
15. "They're a working breed... or they came from a working breed." In the Kennel Club's self-promotion video, we are shown some dachshunds, and an owner tells us (at 3:20) that "They're a working breed... or they came from a working breed."  Right.  Came from a working breed.  The Kennel Club dachshund is not a working breed now. A working dachshund is called a "teckel" to differentiate it from the non-working joke paraded around on a string lead at a Kennel Club dog show. We are told "we do have a back problem" with dachshunds, but we are not told what that problem is.  Here's a hint:  it involves paralysis of the back legs, and the dog is either put down or put into a wheeled rack where it spends the rest of its life scooting around the living room. This small "problem" is fobbed off as being in "some lines" and is said to be a "conformation" problem. Not said is that the odd structure of the dachshund is in no way related to the work it does underground. Working terriers are found all over Britain, Europe, Canada, and the United States, and none have the stretched back or the history of spinal injury and rear leg paralysis we see with the dachshund.
    .
16. The Kennel Club has always taken the lead in inherited diseases. We are told (at 3.45) that "the Kennel Club has always taken the lead in addressing the problem of inherited diseases."  Heads up! A small word game is being played here. You see, the Kennel Club has always taken the lead in CREATING the closed gene pools that make inherited diseases so common in the world of dogs. And, to be clear, the Kennel Club continues to salute those closed registry gene pools. By saluting closed gene pools, and encouraging further reductions within them, the Kennel Club keeps the wheels of inherited disease spinning forward at an ever-increasing rate. The history is clear here, and the Kennel Club's own publication tells it. Back in 1897, when the issue of inherited disease sprang up in the world of the Scottish Deerhound, the response of the Kennel Club was not to rush in to outcross to improve breed health, but to rush in to close the registry to preserve breed purity. So YES, the Kennel Club has "always taken the lead in inherited diseases," but not in eliminating them, but in fostering them!
    .
17. The Kennel Club's weak stance on hips.  The announcer tells us (at 3.44) of the Kennel Club's scheme to get rid of hip dysplasia, which they tell us has been in place since 1965.  Not said, is that the scheme has not worked, and it has not worked because the Kennel Club does not require breeders who want to register Kennel Club puppies to follow it!  Dysplasia in Kennel Club dogs has not gotten better.
    .
18. Sequencing of the canine genome. The announcer prattles on  about the sequencing of the canine genome in 2004 (at 4.16), but fails to mention the obvious, which is that we do not need to sequence genomes to know how to breed healthier dogs. We know how to breed healthier dogs NOW, and it is not a closely held secret: 
    a) Get rid of breeds that are selected for defect and extreme exaggeration, and;
    b) Allow breeds to "fall upward" to type so that dogs are bred for real function rather than for a scrap of paper proclaiming breed purity. 

Will we get rid of all canine health problem by simply doing those two things alone? 

No, of course, not.  It would, however, be a simple, quick and immediate step forward.  

Remember:  right now Kennel Club dogs are NOT as healthy as cross breeds and mutts.  

That fact alone stands as an indictment of the Kennel Club's way of doing business.

Is this to say there is nothing good going on? 

No, that would not be true. 

The Kennel Club has suddenly discovered Coefficients of Inbreeding (COI), something that has been around since 1922, and it is providing a computer program to make it easier for breeders to calculate those equations.

The Kennel Club has banned very close incest breeding (sire to daughter, dam to son) which is the kind of thing that has been banned in humans since the days of the Old Testament.

The Kennel Club has named 14 breeds of particular concern -- a real step in the right direction, and one for which they should get some applause, despite the still-timid way that they are going about operationalizing it.

So YES, there are some good things happening, and YES, let's recognize that the Kennel Club is under some duress to "build forward" out of the wreckage of its past, even as it keeps the cash box full.

That said, let's be clear that NOT ONE of these recent changes occurred because of the Kennel Club's own initiative. 

Every single one of these recent changes has occurred because of the exposure and shame heaped on the Kennel Club by the BBC documentary Pedigree Dogs Exposed.

The Kennel Club did not see the light until they felt the heat, and it has taken several concerted years of heat to get the modest change we see here. 

That's the real story, but it's the story the Kennel Club attempts to sweep under the rug with four minutes of bold-faced lies at the front end of this self-promotional film.

Sorry, but the era of lies and disinformation is over. Someone please tell Steve Dean and Caroline Kisko.

Now, do you want to see pictures from the Richmond dog show (the one featured in the film) taken by someone who was not a paid apologist for the Kennel Club?  Good news then!  Those are up over at Jemima Harrison's blog.  Yes, her pictures are more powerful than my text.   See for yourself!

•  Related Links:
  ** So You Want a Dog?
  ** Making and Breaking Dogs In the Show Ring
  ** Inbred Thinking
  ** Dogs as Breed Products
  ** Kennel Club Inbreeding: Data Revealed
  ** Carnival Barkers at the Dog Shows .
  .

I'm still here

Nope, no trips to France for me.

No retreats or spas in my future.

Just doing the day by day thing

and getting the hang of some new changes.

I have read everyone,

commented a little,

and replied a little.

Be patient please, I'll be back.

Your overwhelming support on my last post,

well, it makes me more than a little misty.

thank you so much

On the news side:

Darling daughter has started interning with

a fabulous director and is loving it.

Dearest son has found a house to rent in LA,

and will move literally cross country 

the end of the month.

I get him for three days all to myself.

Local gals....

I am purging again.

Watch for email about preview night.

If you cannot wait till it is all out, email me.

Selling off the last of my Nicole Sayre,

ESC and originals by Angela.

As for me????

BUSY AS A

and still not completely adjusted to my new schedule.

but things will ease up soon. 

This new venture is expanding 

my horizons, and testing my learning curve,

 which is good for me.

For those of you who will relish this info...

Know that my house is truly a mess, OK truthfully 

just kinda untidy everywhere, but for me, that is horrors!

Christmas is still not all down,

the garage studio is only half down.

There are dishes in the sink, 

and laundry in the shoot up to the second floor.

I am way behind on phone calls, blogging, 

yard work, and have only read one book in a week!!

Again...horrors!

Normally I read a minimum of seven a week.

I am in deep withdrawal, so I am going to stop

now and go read with a glass of Baileys.

A LARGE glass.

No comments on this one my friends, unless

you want to give me the latest news on yourself,

because I just know I won't have 

time to answer this week.

I hope ( double cross fingers, pinkie swear)

to have a fun post up this weekend.....

Unless the laundry explodes out the 

top of the shoot and I am buried under

an avalanche of underwear and jammies

and never heard from again.

z