His skill is extraordinary!

Yappy Hour @ Chateau Animaux

Bonnie, tell us how to make our dogs behave like yours!

Lara and I went to the second Saturday "Yappy Hour" at Chateau Animaux in Capitol Hill on Saturday. This is a space where dog owners can chat openly, pets can sniff freely, and delicious treats abound for all. The highlights of the events were:

1. Seeing the biggest dog of my life--a st. bernard that looked just like Falkor in the "NeverEnding Story" (more photos to follow)

2. Meeting pet coach Bonnie King-Taylor, aka the Doggy Lama, and her ridiculously well-trained dog Bartleby, a dalmatian/hound dog mix. She talked about keeping our pets happy during the holidays by controlling our own stress levels and buying them giant candy canes filled with cat nap. As Lara and I just purchased a cat nip-filled banana for our cat photography sessions, we felt we were on the right track.

3. As mentioned above, yet I feel I must repeat, they gave out really delicious treats for humans and dogs! The Chateau provides a classy spread of wine, cheese, and cookies (all I am going to say is chocolate chip rugula), as well as a platter of gourmet dog biscuits made in-house. My only other comment on this is that the dog biscuits were so delicious-looking and so strategically placed right next to the human cookie platter, that it made me wonder if good-humored store owner, Dennis Bourgault, wasn't plotting a holiday practical joke on attendees. If true, he would be immediately welcomed into my family for having the right kind of humor. Regardless, the Hannaukah dog biscuits with their little sugar-free icing yarmulkes were freaking adorable.

4. Finally, we got to meet Cocoa, a beautiful chocolate lab who was rescued by K9 Lifesavers and needs good home. K9 Lifesavers were holding a raffle to raise money for an operation on her torn ACL, which will cost more than $1,000. Adopt her! Or contact K9 or us for more information on how to contribute.


Lara and Cocoa agree that it feels good to make new friends.

Many thanks to la Chateau for inviting us to attend. If our calculations are correct, the next Yappy Hour will be held on January 10, 2009. Hope to see you there!

Birthday sisters

Liz looking lovely at my desk yesterday.

Happy Birthday to Liz! Most of my family have mid-December birthdays, so its only fitting that my roommate and close friend Liz should share a birthday (although she is slightly older and wiser).

Also, for anyone out there that likes astrology, my yoga teacher just told me that Obama's cabinet is highly Sagittarius--she said it was as high as 12 out of 15 appointees thus far. Obama is a Leo and Leos and Sagittariuses are supposed to get along incredibly well because Leos respect that fact that Sagittariuses are incapable of telling lies (and anyone who knows me will tell you this is true in my case). We also are very open-minded, idealistic, witty, and enterprising, and can be overly blunt without meaning to be.

Yea for 4 years of truthful, free spirits who say what they mean in the White House!

Gracy
www.houndstoothphotography.com

How about a little adorable to go with your Sunday?

Mary Wright (Bath, Ohio): Beagle Violinist
Copyright ©2001 The American Photography Museum, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Menagerie reader Jay Resnick forwarded me this online gallery from The American Museum of Photography. The pictures, which date as far back as the 1850's, show that our interest in photographing animals is not a current trend.

I was particularly taken by these bizzare and highly creative photo collages by Mary Wright from the 1950's made with antique calling cards. This next passage is taken from the website:

"Mary Wright was a breeder of Boston Terriers, but she had another keen interest as well: photocollage. In the 1940s and 1950s, she gathered old photographs and carefully replaced the heads of the human subjects with dog's heads. Because the new heads are halftones, we can safely presume they were cut from magazines or dog show programs. Wright's collages are highly exacting-- the heads match the figures in position and scale, and also seem to have just the right expressions. They offer a wry twist to the old claim that people and their dogs tend to look alike."

Maybe we'll have to give this technique a try. Any volunteers?

A sense of things to come

Peruvian Sheep.

I was listening to Metro Connection on NPR.org today while I was making lunch and was fascinated by the show they were doing on how many animals survive during the winter. Naturalist Mark Garland talked about how local aquatic frogs will spend the season in a state of near death as they float about in frigid water. They can only survive because their metabolism has slowed down enough that they can survive off of stored body mass and the oxygen expelled from the muddy floor.  When it gets warm again they need to act quickly to find food sources and restore their energy. Unfortunately, many frogs don't survive this impressive hibernation, yet year after year enough do emerge from Winter that the population continues. 

I hate being cold and usually feel a bit down as soon as it starts getting dark before 5 pm. However, this year it's helping me to learn more about our life cycles. The more I learn, the more I think that it's really important to have this time when most of the world slows off and dies down. Nature is forcing us all to take a break and save up our energy reserves for the coming Spring.  It's like, universal permission to sleep-in. 

This also makes sense when I start thinking about the economy.  In the United States we are used to continued growth all the time, even if it means pushing ourselves past our limits of health and safety. As scary as this economic turn is, it seems really natural to me that our economic cycles would follow an up and down pattern. Of course, this is more "down" than than anyone would want, but maybe if we can utilize this time to slow down and relearn about the how to enjoy a simplier life, the next cycle won't be so extreme. Or at least we will find the faith in ourselves that we can weather a hard time and still emerge to start a new season. 

Gracy

www.houndstoothphotography.com

Chickens!