I RESCUED A HUMAN TODAY

  
Her eyes met mine as she walked down the corridor peering apprehensively into the kennels.   
I felt her need instantly and knew I had to help her.  
I wagged my tail, not too exuberantly, so she wouldn't be afraid. 
  
As she stopped at my kennel I blocked her view from a little accident I had in the back of my cage.  
I didn't want her to know that I hadn't been walked today.  
Sometimes the shelter keepers get too busy and I didn't want her to think poorly of them. 
  
As she read my kennel card I hoped that she wouldn't feel sad about my past.  I only have the future to look forward to and want to make a difference in someone's life. 
  
She got down on her knees and made little kissy sounds at me.  I shoved my shoulder and side of my head up against the bars to comfort her.  
Gentle fingertips caressed my neck; she was desperate for companionship. 
  
A tear fell down her cheek and I raised my paw to assure her that all would be well.

Soon my kennel door opened and her smile was so bright that I instantly jumped into her arms.  
I would promise to keep her safe.  I would promise to always be by her side.
I would promise to do everything I could to see that radiant smile and sparkle in her eyes.  
I was so fortunate that she came down my corridor.  
So many more are out there who haven't walked the corridors.  
So many more to be saved.  At least I could save one. 
  
I rescued a human today.

Mystery Scene Magazine has just published a reprint of my Maxwell Award-winning article, WADDLING IN DWIGHT, cited by the magazine as Most Popular. I also just received an invitation to be a guest at the 2011 Illinois Basset Waddle. Looks like I may be waddling with 1,000 bassets again in September.

PEACHES AND BEAU WANT TO KNOW: WHEN IS THE ROVER RAPTURE?

I don't usually like to discuss religion or politics, but if predictions by the END OF DAYS kooks are correct and the "chosen ones" will be sucked up into Heaven or the Mother Ship, or wherever they think is better than the blessing of life right here on planet Earth, tomorrow at 6:00 p.m. (sorry, I have other plans), it begs the question where all the dogs are going and when.

To quote the great humorist, Will Rogers, "If there are no dogs in Heaven, I want to go wherever they went." They'll be in Heaven long before any of us will, anyway.

See you Sunday!

THUNDERBUMPER BEAU

Poor Beau. It was another Rescue Remedy day for him with all this unseasonable wild weather. I was walking both dogs at the school when I heard the first volley of thunder. I could see him starting to freak out, so I hustled him and Peaches back to the car, and we made it home before all hell broke loose. I double dosed him with RR before he made a beeline for my bed. I hopped on top of the eiderdown with him and he buried his head under my arm. He was shaking so much I thought I was lying on one of those motel vibrating beds.

I turned the TV on with the volume loud enough to drown out the thunder and comforted him until the storm passed. I don't think I've had a dog before as afraid of storms as Beau is. I always wonder why he's so fearful of thunder and hope it wasn't something unpleasant in his past that made him this way. But I'm glad I can be here for him and make it all better on stormy days. Now if I could just get the neighbors to stop using their electric leaf blowers. He hates those, too!

Join Happy Tails Pet Sanctuary for

Antiques & Collectibles

"Barking Lot Sale"

Happy Tails Pet Sanctuary

No Kill ♥ All Volunteer ♥ Cage Free Saturday, May 21, 2011

8 a.m. to 2 p.m.

Happy Tails Pet Sanctuary Adoption Center 6001 Folsom Blvd., Sacramento, CA 95819 (Corner of 60th & Folsom Blvd.)

Antique, vintage and collectible furniture, art, dishes, china, dolls, crystal, garden décor and more!

The “early dog gets the bone” — or, in this case, the wonderful treasures awaiting you at Happy Tails Pet Sanctuary’s Antiques & Collectibles “Barking Lot Sale,” featuring many fabulous finds all donated by community members to help support Happy Tails Pet Sanctuary, Sacramento’s no-kill, all-volunteer animal rescue organization.

It's time for Spring cleaning or Clutter's Last Stand, as I like to call it. What a wonderful opportunity to de-clutter our homes and also benefit our animal friends. To donate items for the Barking Lot Sale, please contact Happy Tails Pet Sanctuary at (916) 556-1155 or purrball@happytails.org.

While shopping the Barking Lot Sale, also take time to go inside the Happy Tails Adoption Center and visit the many furry felines all awaiting their “forever homes.” The center is open Wednesday through Sunday, noon to 6 p.m.

To all you devoted mothers of four-legged kids:

HAPPY DOG MOM DAY!

We don't have to put our kids through college.

Our kids don't do alcohol or drugs or crash the car.

Our kids won't put us in a rest home when we get old.

Mariah

Today I'm pleased to host a virtual book tour for my friend and fellow mystery author, Jean Henry Mead. Her latest book is Murder on the Interstate. She also features a dog in her Logan and Cafferty Mystery Series.

Here is her essay about her life spent in the company of dogs and how they influenced her career.

Mysterious Dogs

by Jean Henry Mead

Cats are usually associated with mystery novels, but dogs find their way into mine, from Bert, a retired police dog in Diary of Murder, to Miranda, an Australian Shepherd, who chews furniture in my first children’s novel, Mystery of Spider Mountain.

I’ve always had at least one canine in residence since Brenda, a small bulldog that I shared with four younger brothers. The list grew to include a large variety of mixed breeds, one of who was named Brillo, because the lovable terrier resembled a scrubbing pad with legs. He once jumped with muddy feet into a car full of white-habited nuns, but that’s another (embarrassing) story.

Then there was Prince, a small mixed breed, who learned to dig under a wooden fence to roam the neighborhood. In a matter of months there were a number of puppies in our area that closely resembled him. When I had him neutered, Prince literally disowned me for quite some time.

For a while, we raised Shetland Sheep dogs. The Sheltie is a beautiful, hyper breed that resembles miniature black and white collies, which I’ve always longed to own. We then adopted C.J., whose kennel name was Countess Juanita de Sangria because she came from New Mexico’s Sangria Mountain area. A lovely cocker spaniel, she contracted cancer at the age of 12, and we drove her to the Colorado Veterinary Teaching Hospital every five weeks for chemotherapy. She did quite well for 18 months until we lost her. And as all pet owners know, it was heartbreaking.

We then adopted Mariah, an Australian Shepherd, who served as the model for Miranda, the Hamilton Kids’ furniture chewing dog in Spider Mountain. Mariah only chewed the legs of our new dining room suite and has an almost human quality about her. She’s the only dog that ever owned me who can out-stare me. Most canines will look away after five or six seconds, but Mariah can hold her stare for a full minute without blinking. It makes me wonder whether she’s an incarnated ancestor.

Dogs all have distinct personalities and quirks of their own, which can be successfully incorporated into novels. Although Bert, my retired German Shepherd police dog, appears in the second novel of my Logan & Cafferty mystery suspense series, he’s only mentioned in my new release, Murder on the Interstate, because my two 60-year-old feisty women sleuths were visiting a friend with six cats. That could have generated plenty of conflict but would have detracted from the book’s main theme of homegrown terrorism. But you can be sure that Bert will be bailed out of his kennel in my fourth mystery novel, Magnets for Murder.

Jean Henry Mead has written and published 14 books of fiction and nonfiction. She’s also an award-winning photojournalist. Her novels are generously sprinkled with humor and light romance.

Leave a comment and be eligible to win one of three copies of Murder on the Interstate in a drawing May 28.

The book is now available at Amazon.com.

What a wonderful article in Books & Media's Between the Lines by Allen Pierleoni about my Beanie and Cruiser cozy mystery trilogy, where he writes about "A dogged approach to writing mysteries." Bubba, Basset #6 and my rescued hound dog muse, would be proud of his adoptive mom. He is still so much in my thoughts, especially when he appears in the pages of my hometown paper. I think he must have known, though. He sent a beautiful yellow butterfly fluttering my way today, like the many I saw just after he passed in 2009. He is always with me.

My beloved bassets really have been my guide to success in writing and life in general. Those dogs never give up the scent when following a trail, and neither have I. I've been writing since 1986, although I didn't start writing a mystery until almost a decade later and got the first one published in 2001. I always dreamed of writing books, even as a child when I was devouring Judy Bolton Mysteries. I'll always be glad I followed my dream and never gave up. So many blessings have come my way because of it.

Like a hound, the scent fades now and then and you sometimes lose your way. There are logs and muddy gullies that block your path, but that short-legged hound manages to leap the logs and gullies and perseveres in its goal no matter what. So should any writer. There'll be many things to discourage you along the way and make you want to turn back from the hunt; but if there is one thing I've learned through all of this, it's that you can never, ever quit. That holds true of publication or of any other goal you wish to achieve in life. You must follow the path to its end, no matter what.

HOT DOG PATROL ALERT! The weather has turned hot very quickly. Don't park the dogs when you park the car--not even in the shade. It's too hot for them to wait for you in the car while you shop or run errands.