Some Thanksgiving Tips from my Furry Friends

Today, I braved the hoards at several airports across the country to travel to my father's house for Thanksgiving. This year promises to be filled with good food, family, and lots of laughter. By way of a brief Happy Thanksgiving wish, my furry friends would like to offer up a few choice holiday tips for everyone.

Baby the giraffe says, "Savor every moment."

Emeril Junglefowl recommends more veggies this year.

Arnie the water buffalo says, "Make time for friends!"

Cinco says, "Keep Tums handy, just in case."

Mercy was fond of the post-turkey nap.

Nita and Teela were always partial to family hugs.

Above all, tell the ones you love how special they are!

Happy Thanksgiving. Have a safe and happy holiday.

All photos by Amanda C. Sandos except the junglefowl photo appears courtesy of John Ireland.

Etsy, Here Comes Earth Art By Amanda!

Yes indeed! I finally got myself in gear and opened my new Etsy site, Earth Art by Amanda, my first little online shop to sell my art and jewelry. So far, I have only worked on posting the beach glass jewelry to it, but eventually, I plan to have several pages which will also include my paintings, drawings, and photography. First, however, I have to work towards getting better photos taken of my jewelry.

Where I am good, but not yet great, at photographing nature and animals, I seem to be not so good, and definitely not great at photographing jewelry. People who can take pictures of small, inanimate objects and make them look fantastic have a whole new respect in my book.

I am planning to recreate a beach scene and try putting my jewelry into it. Then, I can photograph it like I do when I find something in nature, and perhaps it will turn out better. I'll keep you posted. Or better yet, you can make frequent visits to my new etsy shop, Earth Art by Amanda to see for yourself if the new pictures are up. For now, they are just boring images of each necklace on a black, velvet board.

Still, the new logo and banner rock the house. Thanks so much to my friends Gene Bjerke and Poet Miller for helping me design these out of one of my paintings. Thanks also to Poet, and her Mom Andi Miller, for pretty much walking me through setting up shop. It's good to have friends who know computers, cause I seem to have some glitches in my system. No, not the computer, the brain. It short circuits when a computer enters the loop.

In related news, I am now an official sponsor to The Oceanic Society and you can view this on their upcoming conference page here. Thanks to all of you peeps who purchased jewelry in the past year to help me sponsor such a great cause. Its good to know others are willing and ready to help, even in small ways, in the effort to clean up our seashores and oceans. Pass on the need and who knows, maybe someone else will join the effort and start picking up the beaches and making art out of it. Stranger things have happened.

My Angel of Mercy

Ten years ago, I met my angel of Mercy. She did not come in the form I expected, no hail of glory, no white wings and glowing halo, but she was an angel and she saved me, none the less. We were introduced by a friend while I was still grieving deeply over the loss of Isabeau, my first Rottweiler, who had lost a long and horrible battle with cancer. Although I swore I would never put myself through the sorrow of losing another dog, my friend knew I was in need, and she happened to know a dog who needed me, too. Mercy was the angel I never saw coming.

One of the best things about Mercy was that she simply loved everyone. If you gave her a cookie and a pat on the head, she would help you carry the TV and anything else you wanted to the car. She loved kids, and often put up with whatever they could dish out. Five minutes after meeting my four-year-old cousin Grant, pictured above, she was wearing his Pirates hat and his blanket and playing Superdog without complaint. She seemed fine with helping Katie, who is two, get over her fear of big dogs, too.

When we met,she was named Mercedes and she was in serious need of help. I went to her house skeptical that I was not ready for another dog, that I could not handle the emotional attachment. But, when I saw Mercy at two years old, weighing nearly 200 pounds and suffering greatly from obesity, I knew I had to take her home with me. She was a sweet and lovable klutz who was badly in need of a health overhaul, not unlike myself. We dieted together, but she was much more successful at it than I was perhaps due to the personal trainer. I could be so regimented with her and am still unable to keep myself in line. Go figure. Anyway, she lost enough weight to make up a whole second dog until she was down to the normal 120 pound mark. In the deepest hours of my depression, helping Mercy made me stronger. She was a loving friend who pulled me back into the land of the living.

Mercy did not just rescue me, however, she rescued another, or actually we rescued her together. One day, on my way to work, I found a female Healer / Terrier mix in the middle of the road nursing a litter of puppies near the back gate to the zoo where I worked. About half of the puppies in the litter, there were a lot of them, resembled the male pure bred rottweiler, so they had their tails docked. Since the owner of the dogs had already been caught several times selling half breeds as pure, and since I was a member of the local humane society, we chose to confiscate the puppies. Later, all of the other dogs were removed from the owner and he was fined, as well.

The first puppy I picked up from the pile in the road burrowed under my hair and began to make a soft, whimpering noise. After helping the humane society volunteers who came out to help pick up all the dogs and capture the mother, I was still holding this one puppy under my chin, and I literally could not put her down. I so did not need a second dog, having just taken Mercy home and feeling like she was not even settled in yet. But, I took the puppy home thinking I would just elect myself in charge of finding the one pup a good home.

Mercy took immediate charge of the tiny, little thing, cleaning and protecting her. They romped and they played and their famous freedom races at the end of each day probably aided Mercy in losing that last pesky pound or two. My favorite game, however, started on the first day they met. Mercy would play tug-o-war with the puppy, offering her the favorite toy, and after tugging for a bit, she let the little one win the game every time. They laid together with the puppy tucked safely between Mercy's front legs every night to sleep. I found several friends with farms who were interested in giving the puppy a home, but when they came over to meet her, Mercy placed herself between them and growled. Nobody was taking her baby away, least of all me. So, I named her Cinco de Mayo, after the day I found her, and we call her Cinco for short.

Mercy, Cinco and I became a family, a pack if you will, and we have been the best of friends. Sadly, and most likely due to Mercy's obesity in her youth, she contracted both thyroid and cushings disease, both of which are endocrine diseases. She was diagnosed about a year ago. Although the thyroid was treatable, there is nothing much to do for cushings except treat her symptoms and keep her comfortable. Even the cutting-edge, best drugs for the disease are questionable and do nothing to cure the animals. In the end, it is degenerative and eventually shuts down the internal organs due mostly, I'm told, to an excess of steroids in the system.

Mercy was amazing all the way to the end. She never complained, and she always stayed in the best frame of mind. Even a trained observer like myself had a hard time telling when she suffered. Most dogs become depressed, stop eating, stop grooming, or show signs of hurting, but Mercy stayed stoic, eager to please, eyes bright, and happy to be alive even as her kidneys were shutting down. After the tremors began to cause her to flop around and kept her from walking well, and she started having trouble standing up and laying down, even when she stopped processing food well, and started flinching whenever she was touched, she was never depressed. She would just shake it off and move on as if nothing was wrong. But, after it became apparent she had made it to the acute renal failure stage, we finally made the decision today to prevent any more suffering.

Right up until the end, Mercy was giving me kisses and hugs and panting with her big, sloppy smile even as she splayed out on the hospital floor and was unable to stand back up. She seemed more concerned about me and why I was upset than the fact that she could not stand up on her own. Once I sat down on the floor beside her and gave her another hug, she seemed happy to just stay where she landed and let the doctor work on her. She let me hold her and gave me kisses right up until the very end, and I know that if any dog has a special place in heaven, Mercy does. I told her I thought St. Francis probably had another assignment for her already, some other lost soul who needs rescuing. Mercy literally saved me, and although I can't really speak for her, I'm betting Cinco would say the same. We already miss her more than words can express.

Thanks, my Angel of Mercy!

Interning with Pam Longobardi

Well peeps, the time is here and I am so stoked I can barely see straight. I leave ultra early in the morning on Saturday for the long drive to Atlanta and my long awaited internship with the fabulous artist Pam Longobardi. We met quite serendipitously while I was working an internship for my undergraduate studies at The Maier Museum of Art. I walked into the room to help hang the show which was focused on artists addressing environmental issues, to find Pam busily pinning to the wall small pieces of colorful, plastic trash she had collected off of South Point Beach on the Big Island of Hawaii to create an eye color test chart that read Dead C in its center. I happened to be wearing a necklace I had created from beach glass collected off that very same beach. We bonded instantly over our mutual love of Hawaii, the ocean, and all things environmental. Now, several years later, after Pam and her wonderful Drifter's Project have been shown all over the world (pictured here at the Art Life Gallery in Venice), and I have dutifully continued trudging through school hoping to learn how to create such amazing and inspired environmental art works as Pam, I have been given the incredible opportunity to work with her on her latest installation called Material Drift in the Sandler Hudson Gallery Atlanta next week. So, in honor of this exciting moment, I have copied the link to my article on Pam's upcoming show recently published at Got2BeGreen. It has all the details on Material Drift opening May 21st in Atlanta. I hope to see some of you there. Thanks to Pam for providing this opportunity and the photo of her work.
For more go to Got2BeGreen.

Where've You Been?

To borrow a title from Kathy Mattea, I'm sure those who read me are wondering what the heck happened. Well, perhaps after reading the last post about Goddard and my entrance into graduate school they might have a clue, but still. I have been bad about sitting down to blog. I have missed it and most of my writing terribly. Holding down a part-time job, running a pet sitting business, painting commissioned works, and freelance writing all four was a bit too much. The part-time job had to go. I worked my last days there just last week. That gives me twenty hours of my life back. It may not seem like much, but you'd be surprised. Lately, whenever I have a moment free, I find myself up on the parkway taking photos of the monarch migration and wishing them a safe journey and a safe haven to return to in Mexico, knowing full well both are improbable at best, but it never hurts to put the positive energy forward. The photos included are from these forays onto the Blue Ridge Parkway. The two below are called Coexistence One and Coexistence Two.

I love my pet sitting gig, most of the time, but after this summer, I have to admit I'm glad the traveling season is slowing down a bit now, for others anyway. It will be picking up for me. I have booked a trip to DC and to NYC both to look at the galleries and museum shows. It's such a hardship having to travel to the city to look at art. I don't know how I'll survive this graduate school gig. As a result, I will spend my fortieth birthday in one of my favorite cities on earth, New York. Mom got us a hotel five miles from Manhatten, basically across one of the bridges and several blocks from MOMA. To all you Shakori Hills peeps, never fear, my actual birthday is the week after the festival, so I WILL be celebrating at both locations this year. After forty years, I think I deserve a double whammy. This promises to be a great birthday.

Anyhow, that sums up most of the news for me, oh except I forgot to mention one tiny little thing. My poems have now been published. One in a book called Watermarks that is for sale by the Maier Museum of Art, and the other by Hip Pocket Press in the Canary. You can read that one here, and feel free to pass the link along to your friends. I hope you enjoy and promise to try and return to the regularly scheduled blogging program.

Dog Friendly

My fabulous weekend at the Biltmore in Asheville, North Carolina proved that I really can find a "dog friendly" town. Three of my dearest friends and I spent four days charmed by this smokey mountain city. As one might suspect, friends of mine are usually animal lovers, and we were all particularly excited to see the number of dog lovers milling about everywhere we looked. Even on the Biltmore Estate grounds people were walking all variety of dogs through the gardens to enjoy the festival of flowers.

Apparently, one living in the area can purchase an annual pass for only slightly more than the day pass most visitors buy. Any and every pass holder is free to walk their dogs about on a leash, although I doubt they are allowed in the estate house itself. For the really adventurous annual pass holders, one can even bring their horse in to ride the trails. I live too many hours away to take advantage of this, but I would certainly be a regular dog walker there if I could.

The Biltmore isn't the only dog friendly establishment in town. Dogs were abundant everywhere, and many of the area hotels, even the nicer ones, advertised allowing pets. In the downtown area, people were out walking dogs all around the city. Dogs were in the stores shopping or hanging out with their companion shop keepers. They were in the cafe outdoor areas enjoying tea and crumpets. One was even sunning himself in a local shop window display. Nowhere did I see a muzzle, nor did I find people cringing when a Rottweiler or a German Shepherd walked by. There was none of the seeming reticence about certain breeds, and one's best friend seems free to accompany them out most everywhere for an afternoon on the town. It was everything I expected from my visit to Paris, but didn't get.

I have said for many years, particularly in times when politics in this country were not going my way (like the dark days we have recently, and finally, moved beyond), that some day I was going to move to Paris. Last May, not having been to that city, I decided it was time to be prepared for the worst the following November. Plus, I wanted to be sure Paris lived up to my romantic ideal. Well, let me tell you, it's a lovely city, and contrary to their undeserved reputation in our country, the people were also lovely. At first, I was sure it was the city for me. The art, the architecture, the night life, the culture, all things were fabulous, and I was so ready to pack my bags until...I saw a man walking a very timid Rottweiler with a muzzle. The dog was panting and seemed uncomfortable in the humidity, and I couldn't understand why this sweet thing needed to be subjected to a caged mouth. My friend Leon explained in his very French accent, not knowing the can of worms he was about to open, that "Rottweilers are dangerous, and it is law that they must be muzzled if they are taken out in the public." I'm sure his ears rang for several hours after. He knows me well, and still speaks to me regardless of my response that day.

Rottweilers, yes, have the potential to be dangerous. So too does every single dog breed of every single size and shape. And, if one wants to talk about the danger factor, I will take a dog of any size over a cat any day of the week. I've said it before, folks, and I'll say it again, animals of every kind have individuality, for which I have coined the term "animality". Just like humans, each individual has the potential to be dangerous. Often, in the case of animals, it is the humans and their abuse or neglect that create the danger.

My first Rottweiler, Isabeau, was heavily abused by a drunk man for the first six weeks of her life. This was before I rescued her. She was horribly afraid of strange men, particularly if they were in their cups. A professional dog trainer and friend taught me to work with her so she would not snap, snarl, or growl at every man she met. Through positive reinforcement training, she became able to socialize in public, although being a smart dog owner, I was always mindful to keep her under control and away from parties and drinking. She was not, however, a fear biter as one would suspect, and she never needed to be muzzled, not even with her male vet during painful procedures due to cancer.

My current Rottweiler, Mercy, will help you carry out the television if only you offer her a cookie. Good thing I don't publish my address here, I guess. Be warned, however, that my dingo dog (below), a little thirty pound mutt, will be glad to chew off your right leg and your face and feed them to you, should you care to try it. My mother's Shih Tzu will be there to help clean off your bones, as well. He does a mean imitation of a dobie.

If I had to choose which dog to muzzle in public, it certainly would not be my sweet Mercy. Yet, when people see us out, they make a beeline for the cute little dogs and cringe away from the loving bigger one. For me, this isn't any different than any other form of prejudice. You cannot, and should never judge others, be it by race or species, simply by their outer appearances. In the case of animals, I suggest you might want to take another look here at my previous blog, The Danger Disconnect. A chimp looks mighty cute and cuddly, particularly when it grins at you, but you are a foolish person to approach one, especially if it's smiling.

Having the good fortune to have worked as a veterinary technician back in my younger days, before one had to be certified to do so, my co-workers and I quickly learned which animals were most likely to bite when handled. The worst of all were not even dogs or cats, but our clients feathered friends, particularly the parrots. I've seen them flay the skin open to the bone. This particular gentleman carried his macaw around an Asheville music festival all day, where perfect strangers were perfectly willing to hand it food. If you ask me, they are lucky they walked away with their fingers. If I were one to judge simply on a breed, I might be willing to suggest a muzzle for all Macaws.

But, let's keep it among the dogs for a moment. My fellow vet techs were known to come near blows over whose turn it was to handle to next Chihuahua that came into our clinic. We were perfectly happy to help restrain the larger breeds of dogs. After more than twenty years of zoo, vet medicine, pet sitting, and animal rescue work, I have only ever been bitten by numerous species of birds, several nasty little Chihuahuas, and a half drugged out Cocker Spaniel, who woke up during surgery. So, where does one get off saying that a certain breed is more dangerous and needs to be muzzled?

Enough has been said about a certain sports jerk who got caught dog fighting. Since any press is supposed to be good press, I will not even use that _____'s name(insert really nasty word of your choice here). Yet, most of his confiscated Pit Bulls have been rehabilitated, even after all of the horrible abuse they lived through at the dog fights. We watched the documentaries on television and saw them being trained to get over their fears. Most have been placed in loving homes, some even with children and other pets. Unfortunately, many of those families will certainly now have trouble renting a new home or finding insurance to cover them simply because they chose to do a good deed and give a home to an abused dog.

It is not now, nor will it ever be, simply a matter of the breed or the size of the animal that makes it dangerous. Every animal has this potential. A mouse can deliver death in one bite because of its ability to transmit disease. Perhaps we should make a law that all mice must be muzzled in the city, and if one chooses to keep these dangerous creatures as pets, one should certainly NOT be allowed to rent a home nor purchase insurance!
I hope this never happens again, but, if I ever find myself disgusted with my country in the future, I will not be moving to Paris, nor, I am sad to say, anywhere in France for that matter, unless they rethink some animal laws. Instead, I'll be looking for a place more like Asheville, where I can take Mercy and Cinco for a stroll on the town without muzzles, where we can enjoy a latte at the corner and shop together to our heart's desires. No city will be perfect, but this should be close enough for us.

All pictures provided by Amanda C. Sandos.