EDITION OF FRIDAY, OCTOBER 27, 2017 (PetPowellPress) -- Anybody else know what you were doing on October 27, 2004?
We’ll get to that in a minute.
Let’s help some animals first, maybe throw in a wisecrack or two, make a suggestion for making the world a better place for man and beast.
That dog? Yes, she does look like a high-fashion model. She is so beautiful. Her name is Sandi. She's 6-months-old, a Retriever mix and currently on the clock in the Mesquite shelter, according to our tipster Judi Brown. Her # is 36870893. Call 972-216-6283 or email [email protected]. On the clock, we emphasize. That’s why she may be trying to 
“fade into the wall” in the second photo.
But Sandi's "on the clock" is less specific than Kirby's.The third photo is a Spaniel mix named Kirby, probably under 2, came in as a stray on Oct. 20 and is on the clock for 9 a.m. Friday, Judi says. He weighs 14 happy pounds. His # is 36874417. Use those same Sandi contacts above to save this little guy’s life.
You should use them in a hurry.
WHAT TO DO THIS WEEKEND
The State Fair of Texas is over and you’re not interested in any kind of football these 
days. Check with your favorite rescue group for activities. And, you know, this is a great weekend to visit animal shelters and get a new friend -- go to smaller shelters that have no public relations/marketing budget to match the big places. Wilmer. Red Oak. Corsicana. The Colony. Check your Zip Code for the nearest public shelter and save an animal’s life and, maybe, even your own. An unstressed moment with a dog or cat is worth a handful of pills that will keep you from playing in the NFL.
That brown dog with the socks is Valentine (36697993), waiting quietly at The Colony. And if you 
click on this LINK you can learn about Sugar’s challenges (ID 36831934).
Shelter Manager Mark Cooper’s presentation of Sugar’s situation begins, “There's nothing more upsetting than encountering a dog who's happy-go-lucky spirit has been beaten and broken. It's heartbreaking to see a dog live in constant fear of EVERYTHING, because someone beat them down and broke their trust in all humans. It takes A LOT of time and dedication to earn a dogs trust when they assume all humans are here to harm them.”
THE DAS BELL CAT
&
A BALLERINAHUAHUA
As I was perusing the current cats at Dallas Animal Services (see ‘em online HERE), I spotted this fantastic face among the adorable adoptables. This is Kelly (A1009442). As you may recall, DAS is running specials on orange cats and black cats through October -- they’re free. Not sure if Kelly qualifies as half-off because of a dash of both colors here and there.
Can you see that at first glance she appears to be wearing a bell on her red collar? It's not a bell (not in the city budget, probably), but it inspired me to think, ‘We’ve never put a bell on any of our cats.’ Then I remembered why: Ours have their own cell phones and prefer customized ring tones. A good cat knows how to screen the calls without picking up the phone.
Then, I went to the adoptable dogs and spotted this photo of Bella (A1011447), a Chihuahua girl who is clearly getting ready for the season and practicing a pas de deux she’ll perform while appearing in a local holiday production of The Nutcracker. [LARRY ASIDE: If Bella were my dog, I’d finish that move with a genuine hug and give that baby some treats and a blanket on the couch. How does such a dog wind up on the clock in a shelter that buys euthanasia juice in bulk? Who betrayed that girl Bella? OK, I’ll go take a sedative and wish Dallas didn’t have a limit on household pets and I didn’t have a limit on income.]
See how to adopt her and Kelly at dallasanimalservices.org.
THIS DOG HAS A BABY
AND THEY BOTH NEED OUT
Our tipster Amy Poskey reports that this dog and her baby need to be out of the Denton McNatt Animal Shelter. “Sweet Lavender is a 1-2 yr young Labby mix who gave birth to a single male puppy last night [Wednesday] at the shelter. They need out ASAP as we all know the puppy won't do well in the shelter environment. Lavender is as sweet as pie and non-reactive to dogs walking by. Can anyone PLEASE take in this wonderful mama and her pup?”
Contact Amy at [email protected] or email these shelter contacts: [email protected], paul.o’[email protected], [email protected], and/or [email protected]. The shelter phone number is 940-349-7594.
That's the dog and the pup on the right and there's a good reason that we have connected that photograph to the story about the "Grrr moment," as you will see. Read on.
ANOTHER GRRR MOMENT
FROM OUT A THE LAKE
We have no photo of this found dog, but, trust me, you’ll know what she looks like (look at Lavender from Denton and give a soft squint -- that’s what this “found dog” kind of looks like. Our found dog tip came from Sydney Busch, the veteran observer of human treatment of animals.She’s with Friends of the Animals at Cedar Creek Lake, the group that operates the world’s most successful spay/neuter clinic at Gun Barrel City, Texas.
She wrote, “Grrrr--very young Black Lab needs her forever family. What’s better than a Lab?!? A very young Black Lab, found about to cross the highway near Athens ... rescued by a caring person who cannot keep her.”
The dog is, Sidney writes, “microchipped but not registered (screams BREEDER --grrr). Probably not spayed.”
Time at the rescuer’s is limited. The Friends “will spay her at no charge for a good home,” Sydney says. (To ask about the dog, call Jenny Zimmerman at 903-675-2027 and leave a message.)
CONTEMPLATIONS:
IN HONOR OF MY FELLOW 10/27s
Back to today’s opening note, i.e., “Where were you on Oct. 27, 2004?” Me? I was getting the heave-ho out of that building with scores of other 
people. That’s The Big Paper Downtown, its legendary "Build The News upon the rock of truth..." message captured by a University of Texas at Austin photo. It was my professional home for 30 years -- loved every minute there except, maybe, the last 15 or so -- pretty disappointed in the management team, bless their sweet hearts. The Big Paper Downtown is not so big anymore. But, this isn’t the era of kids on bikes throwing papers into the shrubbery. This is the era of reading “the paper” on a phone -- yeah, anybody can publish, but how do you make money off ads that are too small for fine print?
So, what was I doing on that afternoon 13 years ago? Having been excused from further participation, I left the historic Rock of Truth building and Martha and I went to our all-time favorite Arlington event, the (now-defunct) Book Fair of the American Association of University Women. We have quite a collection from years of shopping the Book Fair -- cookbooks, textbooks, books by local authors and friends and even books of poetry by Rod McKuen -- I have a friend I send those to -- now and then, she sends ‘em back.
| mention all this so my fellow 10/27s will realize that they are not forgotten, that their unpleasant day in October 2004 has not been erased from history by the passage of time, the challenges of economic survival for newspapers m or the sad executives who try not to look back at the lives and careers they destroyed. Many of you 10/27s have gone on to new triumphs, a few in journalism. Some were “aged” out of the field, even though we can type, read, write, know the entire alphabet and make Mr. Subject and Mr. Verb agree. Most of us have kept busy.
I can’t remember what the paper’s stock price was in 2004, but it used to soar beyond the $20 mark and it certainly wasn’t what it was Thursday afternoon: $4.50 a share. Those poor major stockholders. Ouch. They’re the ones with the professionally done signs that read “FIGURATIVELY HUNGRY! WILL CONSULT FOR FOOD.”
Here’s the bottom line: Journalism is important to the survival of democracy -- let’s all remember that, whether we are readers or writers or reporters or editors or the poor souls in management. And remember, also, what Heraclitus of Ephesus (born 535 BC) said, “There is nothing permanent except change.” We’ll end with a quote from the insightful 20th century philosopher, Woody Boyd: “I hate change.”
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