Dog walks

Trying to do more dog walks. The dogs love them and the exercise (for them and me) is great! Here are some photos from a couple of dog walks over the weekend:

Let it snow!

A view of our snowy outside, looking through a thick glass block in the outside wall at my work. I took this photo yesterday during the storm; we ended up getting about 8 inches of snow!

Merry Christmas from Bose

My friend Linda submitted a photo of my dog Bose to a national organization, Corgi Aid, for their Christmas Card. And he won! This card went out to Corgi Aid people all over the country -- and there are thousands!

Some background: Linda runs Pet's Second Chance, a not-for-profit organization in St. Louis focused on Corgis who have been abandoned by their owners due to divorce, moving, birth of children, and the many other reasons that families may no longer be able to keep their Corgi. I fostered Bose for Linda starting in October 2007 and eventually adopted him several months ago. Bose is both deaf and epileptic and has been helped by Corgi Aid.

Chilly!

Two quick things:

1) Here in St. Louis, it's quite chilly on this first day of winter; the temperature is dropping all day to a forecasted low of one degree tonight.

2) Head on over to The Snikk Blog for a great posting about my canine buddy, Chilly Dog!

Frightening and jolly

My nephew Willie having some fun:

You'll want to reach out and hug "Bolt"

My freelance review:

If you love dogs, you'll love Bolt, Disney's new cartoon movie. (And if you don't love dogs, you should.)

The voice of John Travolta is the voice of Bolt, a dog who -- day after day -- faces danger and intrigue to rescue his "person" Penny (voiced by Miley Cyrus) from a new set of bad guys. He's quite the super-hero, but he's just doing what a dog should do -- kind of like an exaggerated version of barking at the mailman!

But it's all a facade. Bolt doesn't see the special effects crew making all of his Indiana Jones-style antics possible -- nor the cameras filming it all. That is all kept from him, for fear that if he finds out what's going on, neither he nor his #1 TV show would be quite the same.

Bolt is a delight, a sweet story with plenty of action, comedy and heart. Bolt says things that I imagine my own dogs saying, if they could talk. And after he accidently falls into a shipping box that sends him from Hollywood to New York, Bolt teams up with a jaded cat named Mittens and a sarcastic hamster named Rhino. Mittens helps Bolt realize the joys of being a normal dog -- for the first time, and the trio head cross-country to get Bolt back home to his "person."

I think Bolt is going to have great appeal throughout the holiday season. The animation, most of which is computer-generated, is superb but not overly-done. There's an overall beauty to the visuals that hark back to the old hand-drawn Disney classics.

And in select theatres, Bolt is in 3-D, making it all the more tempting to want to reach out and hug Bolt!

Polly the kitten

Some people can be so cruel and others so kind. Observe the stark contrast here: