SOME NICE DOGS AT THE HUMANE SOCIETY

It's time to tell you once again about some more of the poor, homeless dogs at the Humane Society of Greater Kansas City, because maybe some of my kind-hearted readers would like to adopt them.  And if you don't live in the Kansas City area, then you can go to a shelter near you, or else to a rescue group to find a dog to adopt.  But whatever you do, don't buy a puppy from a pet store!  Because if you do, you will be supporting the...

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THE BULWER-LYTTON FICTION CONTEST

Back in the 19th Century, there was an Englishman whose name was Edward George Earle Lytton Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton.  But since his name was so incredibly long, he mostly just went by Edward George Bulwer-Lytton.  He was born in 1803 and died in 1873, and during his life he was a politician, poet, playwright, and novelist. Lord Bulwer-Lytton wrote a whole bunch of dime-novels that were very popular with Victorian readers, and he...

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MANX CATS

A lot of people have heard of Manx cats, and that is probably because Manx cats don't have tails, which makes them different from most other kinds of cats.  The reason Manx cats end up with no tails is because they are born that way  And they are born that way because of a certain mutation in their genes that makes them have a shorter tail or no tail at all.Manx cats come from the Isle of Man, which is an island off the west coast of England....

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MY LIFE AS A NEUROTIC GREYHOUND, by Nicky

Mom thinks that most greyhounds are neurotic, but that I am may be the most neurotic of all.  Of course, she has not lived with all that many greyhounds, so it's quite possible that she is making a gross generalization.  I will admit to having a few quirks, but hey, who doesn't?  And it's their little quirks that make a person or a dog interesting, at least to my way of thinking.Another thing Mom says about me is that I may be autistic....

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A DOG NAMED UGGIE

This coming Sunday night, the Academy Awards will be given out, but sadly, Uggie will not win one.  I know this for sure because Uggie was not even nominated for an award, and the reason for that was because he is a DOG.  I hope you can see that this is discrimination of the very worst kind, since Uggie is clearly a Very Important and Talented Movie Star, and he should be recognized as such.Uggie is a very cute and energetic Jack Russell...

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JEEVES HAS SURGERY

Yesterday Mom took Jeeves, our little yellow, tailless foster kitten, to the shelter to get some surgery.  This was not just the regular boy-type surgery -- although they did that, too.  This was a more complicated surgery because Jeeves had a hernia.  Maybe you remember that I told you Mom felt a weird lump in the lower part of Jeeves' tummy area, but she wasn't sure what it was.  Well, it turned out that it was a hernia, and...

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EAR MITES!

One of the things that is wrong with our new little foster kittens is that they have ear mites.  It turns out that cats tend to get ear mites more often than dogs do, which is not to say that dogs don't get them.  Ferrets also get them, and so do bunnies.  But humans don't usually get ear mites because they are always taking showers and cleaning out their ears. Anyway, you can often tell if a cat or dog has ear mites by looking in...

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PEKINGESE DOGS

Photo by Seth Wenig/APIf you watched the second night of the Westminster Dog Show, you already know that the winner of the Best in Show award was a Pekingese named Malachy, or CH Palacegarden Malachy, if you want to use his formal name.  This was not the dog that Mom and I and Mel and Barry wanted to win.  Our first three choices were:1.  The Dalmatian2.  The Doberman Pinscher3.  The Kerry Blue TerrierWell, except for Barry,...

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