View Full Version : Animal lovers, unite!



Pete
12-09-2013, 06:05 PM
I'm a huge animal lover, especially dogs.

I have three big, crazy Labradors... The yellow is Reina -- pushing 12 and still has the energy of a pup. She is the mother of the other two: Jette (8) and Violet (6).

https://scontent-b-lax.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-prn2/189014_1009390309641_2740_n.jpg

I also have an Abyssinian cat named Venus. I got by first Aby about 14 years ago when I lived in an apartment and couldn't have a dog. They are very dog-like in their personalities, and I have always called them my dog-substitute. Venus' mother Sunny passed away a couple of years ago but Venus grew up with my dogs and loves them.

https://scontent-b-lax.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-frc3/199948_1009387549572_8560_n.jpg

All four (used to be five) sleep on my bed. :)

https://scontent-b-lax.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-frc3/200452_1009387309566_6779_n.jpg


https://scontent-a-lax.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-frc1/188582_1009386709551_2414_n.jpg


https://scontent-b-lax.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-frc3/189590_1009389829629_8165_n.jpg


https://scontent-b-lax.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/9234_1226121727791_2114902_n.jpg

Achilleslastand
12-09-2013, 06:17 PM
Those are some very beautiful labs. We just lost our 11 yr old aussie shepard mix last night and while being a lifetime avid dog owner/lover losing one does not get any easier.

Pete
12-09-2013, 06:21 PM
Those are some very beautiful labs. We just lost our 11 yr old aussie shepard mix last night and while being a lifetime avid dog owner/lover losing one does not get any easier.

Aw, that really sucks.

It's by far the worst part of having pets, knowing that one day you'll have to say goodbye. So sorry for your loss.


My oldest (almost 12) is doing so great that almost every day I count as a bonus because I know she won't be around in a few more years, if not before. I'm dreading the day I have to say goodbye because she was my first dog that was completely mine and my relationship with her is very special. Plus, she's a pretty amazing dog.

Achilleslastand
12-09-2013, 06:26 PM
Aw, that really sucks.

It's by far the worst part of having pets, knowing that one day you'll have to say goodbye. So sorry for your loss.


My oldest (almost 12) is doing so great that almost every day I count as a bonus because I know she won't be around in a few more years, if not before. I'm dreading the day I have to say goodbye because she was my first dog that was completely mine and my relationship with her is very special. Plus, she's a pretty amazing dog.

Thank you....

Your dogs also look like they live like kings lol. We adopted a yellow lab several years ago from the pound {ace was his name} and my god he was a holy terror. He actually chewed the side out of a leather chair before I eventually got him a loving home with a family that lived on a farm with room for him to run. I think someone famous once said "I don't know where dogs go when they pass on but that's where I wanna go when its my turn.

CaptDave
12-09-2013, 06:27 PM
Those are some very beautiful labs. We just lost our 11 yr old aussie shepard mix last night and while being a lifetime avid dog owner/lover losing one does not get any easier.

Very sorry for you and your family. Pets become like kids. My Catahoula was killed over three years ago and it is still tough.

Jeepnokc
12-09-2013, 06:38 PM
We are also huge animal lovers and currently have two harlequin Great Danes. It is always tough to lose a pet because they are part of your family. Achilleslastand, I am sorry for your loss and will give my danes an extra hug tonight. There is a poem that always gives me comfort when I think of my previous friends that have passed over the years we have had pets. Hopefully it will give you comfort also.

Just this side of heaven is a place called Rainbow Bridge.
When an animal dies that has been especially close to someone here, that pet goes to Rainbow Bridge. There are meadows and hills for all of our special friends so they can run and play together. There is plenty of food, water and sunshine, and our friends are warm and comfortable.

All the animals who had been ill and old are restored to health and vigor. Those who were hurt or maimed are made whole and strong again, just as we remember them in our dreams of days and times gone by. The animals are happy and content, except for one small thing; they each miss someone very special to them, who had to be left behind.
They all run and play together, but the day comes when one suddenly stops and looks into the distance. His bright eyes are intent. His eager body quivers. Suddenly he begins to run from the group, flying over the green grass, his legs carrying him faster and faster.

You have been spotted, and when you and your special friend finally meet, you cling together in joyous reunion, never to be parted again. The happy kisses rain upon your face; your hands again caress the beloved head, and you look once more into the trusting eyes of your pet, so long gone from your life but never absent from your heart.

Then you cross Rainbow Bridge together....

Author unknown...

kevinpate
12-09-2013, 06:53 PM
Good looking critters Pete.

flintysooner
12-09-2013, 06:54 PM
Jimmy Stewart's recital of his poem, I’ll Never Forget a Dog Named Beau (http://www.mnn.com/family/pets/stories/the-dog-poem-that-made-johnny-carson-cry) on The Johnny Carson Show in 1981.

The words are beneath the video.

CaptDave
12-09-2013, 07:10 PM
I am not a cat person at all, but those look like a neat breed Pete. Never heard of them. Love the labs!

OKCDrummer77
12-09-2013, 07:13 PM
We are also huge animal lovers and currently have two harlequin Great Danes. It is always tough to lose a pet because they are part of your family. Achilleslastand, I am sorry for your loss and will give my danes an extra hug tonight. There is a poem that always gives me comfort when I think of my previous friends that have passed over the years we have had pets. Hopefully it will give you comfort also.

Just this side of heaven is a place called Rainbow Bridge.
When an animal dies that has been especially close to someone here, that pet goes to Rainbow Bridge. There are meadows and hills for all of our special friends so they can run and play together. There is plenty of food, water and sunshine, and our friends are warm and comfortable.

All the animals who had been ill and old are restored to health and vigor. Those who were hurt or maimed are made whole and strong again, just as we remember them in our dreams of days and times gone by. The animals are happy and content, except for one small thing; they each miss someone very special to them, who had to be left behind.
They all run and play together, but the day comes when one suddenly stops and looks into the distance. His bright eyes are intent. His eager body quivers. Suddenly he begins to run from the group, flying over the green grass, his legs carrying him faster and faster.

You have been spotted, and when you and your special friend finally meet, you cling together in joyous reunion, never to be parted again. The happy kisses rain upon your face; your hands again caress the beloved head, and you look once more into the trusting eyes of your pet, so long gone from your life but never absent from your heart.

Then you cross Rainbow Bridge together....

Author unknown...

I have to admit, having lost a couple of cats in the past (1998 and 2005), I got a little misty reading that.

Achilleslastand
12-09-2013, 08:10 PM
Jimmy Stewart's recital of his poem, I’ll Never Forget a Dog Named Beau (http://www.mnn.com/family/pets/stories/the-dog-poem-that-made-johnny-carson-cry) on The Johnny Carson Show in 1981.

The words are beneath the video.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V3unTt67nxg

Now I need more tissue.....

boscorama
12-09-2013, 08:28 PM
I presently have six dogs, all boys.

betts
12-10-2013, 07:11 AM
51935194

These are Ffionn and Rufus, my male Pembroke Welsh corgis, ages 3 and 4. They are my surrogate children, 3 of my 4 actual children living out of state, and the other one old enough to live away from our home.

Whoops, not sure how to make them bigger or turn the photos.

bandnerd
12-10-2013, 07:50 AM
OMG those cats. They're beautiful, Pete!

Callie the dog:
5195

Anchovy the cat:
5196

Extra and Tolstoy's pictures are on my Facebook account, so another time.

kelroy55
12-10-2013, 08:59 AM
Those are some very beautiful labs. We just lost our 11 yr old aussie shepard mix last night and while being a lifetime avid dog owner/lover losing one does not get any easier.

Sorry to hear that. It's like losing a member of the family and I like my dogs better than some mebers of my familt.

kelroy55
12-10-2013, 09:01 AM
51935194

These are Ffionn and Rufus, my male Pembroke Welsh corgis, ages 3 and 4. They are my surrogate children, 3 of my 4 actual children living out of state, and the other one old enough to live away from our home.

Whoops, not sure how to make them bigger or turn the photos.

I have a Corgi too, he's 12 now and my last Corgi lived to be almost 17.

SoonerDave
12-10-2013, 09:20 AM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V3unTt67nxg

Now I need more tissue.....

Man, talk about irony - I was ACTUALLY AT THAT TONIGHT SHOW TAPING as a 16-year-old kid. I remember Jimmy Stewart's appearance quite vividly. Unbelievable. My mom and I took a vacation out there and waited at the famed old Burbank studios all day to see the show. We did all the touristy things - took the NBC studios tour, and then just...waited in line until about 5pm, when they let all the tourist buses in ahead of us, THEN let the rest of us in.

I mean, what are the chances of someone posting a clip of the one Tonight show out of the thousands that were made that someone here actually attended?

Sorry for the minor thread hijack, but I just couldn't believe that clip when I saw it.

Achilleslastand
12-10-2013, 09:49 AM
Sorry to hear that. It's like losing a member of the family and I like my dogs better than some mebers of my familt.

Thank you...
And I as well have/had dogs that I liked better then some members of the human race.

Jim Kyle
12-10-2013, 12:31 PM
I also have an Abyssinian cat named Venus. I got by first Aby about 14 years ago when I lived in an apartment and couldn't have a dog. They are very dog-like in their personalities, and I have always called them my dog-substitute. Venus' mother Sunny passed away a couple of years ago but Venus grew up with my dogs and loves them.5197My current cat, a mix that looks mostly Abyssinian and so is named Abby, is a polydactyl who's been with us since 1999. In the past 55 years, there have been only a few months during which my family hasn't included at least one feline member, and even now we're feeding a half-dozen or more ferals who know that our patio always has a plate of cat chow available for them...

kelroy55
12-10-2013, 12:38 PM
Thank you...
And I as well have/had dogs that I liked better then some members of the human race.

Most dogs have better charactor than most humans I know. What's that saying.... I want to be the kind of person my dog thinks I am.

RadicalModerate
12-10-2013, 01:44 PM
Unfortunately, for the sake of non-bickering argument, dogs aren't created in God's image and therefore have no free will nor power of choice.
(i love the majority of dogs. really. but dogs can't be accused of having or not having character. they are dogs. they probably shouldn't be anthropomorphized. i hesitate to say that dogs don't have 'personalities' on account of they do, except they aren't exactly 'persons" so . . . =)

Next to the beagle over the fence, to the rear, when I was a child, named "Dutchess"--50 years ago--the dog that used to reside on the other side of the chain link fence next door--only a few years ago--was my favorite dog. She was a border collie mix (mongrel) and she figured out how to climb the fence. She would quietly hang out on the patio with us and eventually would go back home. If you gave her a fake dog bone treat, she would bury it on account of that's what her instinct told her to do. One day Josie The Fence Climbing Dog wasn't around anymore. It still makes me sad. Now that I think of it.

Edited to Add:

Another poster, somewhere in a Universe, far, far away posted this and I borrowed it:

Read this poem several times to make sure you are very familiar with its ideas and images.

The Flying Cat

Never, in all your career of worrying, did you imagine
What worries could occur concerning the flying cat.
You are traveling to a distant city.
The cat must travel in a small box with holes.

Will the baggage compartment be pressurized?
Will a soldier's footlocker fall on the cat during take-off?
Will the cat freeze?

You ask these questions one by one, in different voices
over the phone. Sometimes you get an answer,
sometimes a click.
Now it's affecting everything you do.
At dinner you feel nauseous, like you're swallowing
at twenty thousand feet.
In dreams you wave fish-heads, but the cat has grown propellers,
the cat is spinning out of sight!

Will he faint when the plane lands?
Is the baggage compartment soundproofed?
Will the cat go deaf?
"Ma'am, if the cabin weren't pressurized, your cat would explode."
And spoken in a droll impersonal tone, as if
the explosion of cats were another statistic!

Hugging the cat before departure, you realize again
the private language of pain. He purrs. He trusts you.
He knows little of planets or satellites,
black holes in space or the weightless rise of fear.

by Naomi Shihab Nye

My daughter, as a very young girl, thought this was a good poem.
She read it in class as part of an assignment.
Her "teacher" didn't get it at all.
Oh, well. =)

MsProudSooner
12-11-2013, 12:35 PM
Pete, thanks for posting pics of your furry friends! I've missed seeing them.