I am going to get straight to the point.

Don’t post pictures of dead and/or cut up animals on facebook in attempt to shock people into going vegan.

1. This rarely works.  I’m not saying shocking images don’t work, but people can come to those on their own.  Or you can provide a link and if they click it and then want to throw up and die, that’s on them because you gave fair warning.  But posting a gory photo in your facebook feed is a) trolling and b) electronically shoving a photo right in someone’s face.  The most likely outcome of this tactic is that people are just going to unfriend you or hide you from their feed.
2. Since the best part of the internet for vegans is that even if we don’t personally know a single vegan, we can connect online, I assume that quite a few of your friends are vegan.  Or if you run a page for oh say, your vegan book or website.  Most of your ‘fans’ are probably vegan.  So, you’re not going to make us more vegan and some of us are soft, delicate flowers.  I became a vegetarian at the age of thirteen because a stray cat killed a squirrel right in front of me*, and I could go into gory details of what I saw, but that would make me kind of a hypocrite.  Point being, creatures being abused and killed upset me.  It’s kind of why i’m vegan.  I made myself sit through Earthlings even though I was already vegan, I have done my self-flogging already.
3. If it doesn’t bother you to see these things and you’re already vegan, good for you.  But don’t tell me that it’s okay to post these things because it ‘needs to be seen’ after i’ve paused in my gagging to tell you that it upset me AND i’m vegan so you don’t tell me to go vegan or imply that i’m not a good vegan because I don’t shove pictures of mutilated animals in the faces of everyone I know.

As shown by my last post, i’m very passionate about animal adoption.  I wouldn’t post a pile of euthanized dogs to illustrate to people that they shouldn’t buy from breeders, though.  A big problem with the shock tactic is that people are so shocked, the message you are trying to convey doesn’t even register.  A shocking photo means nothing if people can’t see past it to get to the message.  If people try to sell you some happy meat, free-range bullshit feel free to lay some facts on them.  Or if they ASK, provide them with some links to videos or photos about factory farms.  Or just post the photo as a link, preview removed, and warn people!  Some of them will click out of morbid curiosity even if they don’t want to see it, they may or may not go vegan.  You will definitely lose friends and followers, and the ‘crazy ass vegan’ stereotype will be reinforced.

If you disagree with me, you’ll probably be thrilled to know that I had nightmares about vivisected animals last night.

In happier, more positive news, did you see that Peter Dinklage is this year’s spokesperson for Farm Sanctuary’s Walk For Animals? Post this video on your facebook, it contains a few sad images of animals in cages, but nothing gory or graphic. And don’t forget to sign up or sponsor a friend!

*Actually, I became vegetarian because I told my mom what happened and how I wasn’t eating meat ever again like a dramatic teenager, and she said i’d never be able to do it. EIGHTEEN YEARS LATER…

Also I know that animals have to eat other animals to survive, it was still gross to see.

I made a joke on facebook that if my fan page got up to 200 ‘likes’, I would post adorable animal pictures. This is a joke because I think like-gating is pretty dumb. Anyway, I did hit 200 a week or so ago, so here you go! Actually, someone unliked the page and I went down to 199, but eh.

Before I start with the picture dump, you might notice a familiar face has come back. Harley belonged to my father-in-law’s daughter and husband, along with two other dogs. Then they had some troubles and had to move, so they asked him to take Harley. After two years and all of us being really attached, they asked for her back and Frank didn’t want to tell them no. Then last month, Frank told us their marriage wasn’t working out, and that Harley was going to be given away. ‘s all around. So we agreed to split the costs of Harley, and the last time Frank went out to visit them in Maine, he brought her back. Brian (not my Brian, her former dad) took her to the vet and got her all up-to-date on her shots, treated for fleas, tested for heartworm, and sent her with all of her records and six months worth of heartworm pills. So other than food, she won’t cost us anything until she needs more heartworm pills.

And…I guess that means I have three dogs now! Jeez-o-petes. I still haven’t wrapped my head around that. We are also dog sitting for my sister-in-law this weekend so there are seven dogs in this house right now (our max was eight, Christmas with dog families is fun). I won’t lie, it’s a full time job. So it’s probably a good thing that I only work part time and my father-in-law is retired, everyone gets along (well, except that Chester is hella jealous of Harley and doesn’t like it that there’s a dog bigger than him), and they’re not alone for more than two hours a day barring emergencies.

So here’s my photo dog cat madness, and underneath is a rant about idiots who don’t get their dogs fixed and the bigger idiots who buy puppies from them. Happy Mother’s Day, spay and neuter/don’t shop, adopt!

And here is where i’m going to rant. A very popular fashion/lifestyle blogger posted about her parents buying a puppy via a sign in front of a random house, and I left her a polite comment about how it made me sad to see her posting about it so casually, especially given how many people read her blog (not surprisingly, she did not approve my comment). I am passionate about several things, but most are personal passions. Like, I am passionate about veganism, but I recognize that being vegan means changing everything you eat, wear, use, etc. for most people. It isn’t difficult, but you definitely have to turn the way you were brought up on it’s ear.

I am really, really passionate about animal adoption. There is no fucking reason to spend hundreds and up to thousands of dollars on a god damned dog. A shelter dog vs. a breeder dog isn’t going to make a difference to you, but it makes a big difference to the homeless dogs. I hear:

“Oh, but we want a specific dog.”
That’s great. Go on Pet Finder and search for that breed, if you can’t find one in a local shelter, I can guarantee you that there is a breed-specific rescue.

“Dogs from breeders need homes too!”
Breeders are selling a ‘product’, and like all people in a business, if their product isn’t selling, they’ll stop making them. Will they dump unpurchased puppies at the pound? They might, but if you think they’ll do something like that, why would you want to give that person your money anyway? I tend to not give my money to businesses if I think they’re run by shitty people.

OR: “These people were selling puppies on the side of the road for $50 and they looked soooo sad.”
Same thing. Don’t reward people for being irresponsible. Do you think they’re going to take that money and get their dog fixed? No, you’ll probably see them back on the road with another litter next year.

“The ad in the paper said free puppies, why would I pay $100+ to adopt a dog when I can get one for FREE?!”
Spoiler alert: dogs aren’t free. ‘free puppies’ means, “I was too lazy to get my dogs fixed and then they humped/got humped and now I need to dump all of these puppies.” Those puppies will need shots, and if you are anything close to responsible, to be fixed themselves. The initial shots and the surgery will cost way more for you to do with your vet than it costs to adopt a dog from your local shelter. My local APL often has ‘deals’ where dogs and cats over a year old are a special price. I can get a cat that’s been completely vetted and fixed for $20 right now.

“Shelter dogs were dumped for a reason. I don’t want a dog with problems/I want a new puppy.”

Yeah, they were dumped for a reason: either their owner legitimately couldn’t care for them anymore, or their owner is a dick who dumped them. Neither of those things means that there is something wrong with the dog. Dogs are like people, some of them are assholes. Some of them are more difficult to deal with than others. Sometimes it’s the way they were raised, sometimes it’s their personality. If you want a dog with specific traits, going to a shelter is actually BETTER because you can talk to foster parents about the dogs, or the staff can usually tell you a lot about the dogs if they’ve been there long enough to get settled. When I agreed to take Bonny when she was a baby, I got lucky that she wasn’t a stereotypical yorkie and a pretty awesome dog. I don’t think i’d ever want a puppy again.

I also don’t understand why it seems to be accepted that we get cats from shelters and no one really breeds cats (unless they’re fancy kinds), but the same people who adopt a cat from a shelter and talk about homeless kitties think it’s a-okay to buy a dog from a breeder, which creates more homeless animals. I love cats, I love dogs, and I wish there weren’t so many of them around.

Hey, remember when my dog slid down the stairs and dislocated his hip?  And we spent around a grand total to have it put back?  And then it came right back out and he had to have surgery?

Okay, it didn’t come RIGHT back out.  During a visit to get his bandage re-wrapped, someone finally thought to tell me that his hip might come back out.  I believe my exact internal monologue was, “You have got to be fucking shitting me.”  If I had known that right off the bat, I would’ve just opted for surgery, which cost more but there wasn’t any question on if it would work, and the recovery time would’ve been shorter than the bandage wearing time.  Anyway, when they took the bandage off they told me to continue carrying him around and keeping him isolated when he’s alone for two weeks, and if it doesn’t come out in that time frame, it’s probably fine.

We made it one week, five days.  Now i’m sure you’re like, “You irresponsible ho, what did you let him do?”  Chester jumped back onto his hind legs, tried to turn, and that’s all it took.  And this is after he took it upon himself to leap onto a few couches the second our backs were turned.  So the answer is yes, I am a horrible mother.

Thanks to Care Credit we were able to afford the surgery, but his doctor ended up doing an emergency c-section and a few other emergencies that day, which was a Friday, so we had to take him home for the weekend and try to keep him doped up.  Chester lost about six pounds during this whole thing, and it was mostly because every time he had to go to the vet, he would be pissed off and refuse to eat/he was in too much pain to care.  He wouldn’t eat at all that night and I had to literally pry his jaw open just to get him to take his regular meds and his pain pills.  Chester would swallow the kitchen sink if I let him, so him not wanting to eat made me really sad (that and the fact that he would yelp in extreme pain whenever he had to be moved).

After his surgery, he was only out of it for a day or two before he started to perk back up, eating normally, and all that jazz.  We had to do physical therapy on him, playing with his joints to keep them moving since he had barely started to put his foot down before he hurt himself again, so he had been walking on three legs for over a month at this point.  We also had to try and put a heating pad on him.  All of that was very fun and just as well received as you might think.

During the surgery, the doctor found that the tendon that connects the leg bone into the hip socket was completely snapped, and he had a bunch of turn butt muscles.  That means that it had no chance of staying in, and he was in way more pain than we thought and that he let on.  Chester is a trooper and despite the jaw prying and grumping about the therapies, he was so good through all of this.  I love my dog.

Chester a few days after surgery:

Grudgingly (look at that face) accepting the heating pad:

And this is how I knew he was better.  He won’t jump on the bed (and he also won’t sleep with us at night anymore, boo), but after a week he started wanting to nap on it so I pick him up and put him on it sometimes (he can get down fine).  Chester’s favorite toy is the bed.  He likes to burrow under the covers and thrash around, and we ask where Chester is and when he pops back out he’s like “Dude, here I am!”  One day he seemed to realize that his hip was okay and he could once again roll over on his back and kick back and forth like an overturned turtle or something:

And now he is mostly back to normal. He sometimes runs on three legs still because it’s easier, and he has a wicked 18 o’clock shadow where his fur is growing back. But he doesn’t have to sleep in a pen anymore and since he’s not doped up and asleep all the time his personality, of which he has a lot, is back in full effect.