All in the family

I'm back and blogging...
I think the heat is giving me writers block!!! Sorry we have been away for a bit!! Between Mom being busy at work (UGH) and it has been unbearably hot (for New England that is) resulting in not much blogging this past week.

Probably our biggest news is Mac, my foster brother has now officially become my cousin or maybe some would consider him my uncle!
I know it sounds a bit strange, but after much deliberation it was decided that it would be better for Mac to live with Gramma as his FUREVER home. Mom and I love Mac dearly but between space issues (Mac needed more roaming area than we have here in the city) and personality issues (I was having a very hard time sharing my mom or anyone else for that matter) it seemed all for the best. No one in the family wanted to see him be adopted out to strangers; he is such a lovable lug!

Mac is enjoying lots of yard space, enjoying fresh country air, love and attention from Uncle Harvey and a loving FUREVER home with Gramma. Zach and Mollie are very happy with their new brother, so sadly I am losing a foster brother but happily gaining a doggie uncle! After all it all in the family!!
Okay the sailing picture has nothing to do with the rest of this post - it's just it is hot and nothing says cool breeze like sailing. These are laser sail boats in Marblehead Harbor - we saw them this weekend!

Oh and if you haven’t had a chance, go check out DWB News – I am an aspiring reporter and leaving no stone unturned to get a scoop! (Okay so at first I thought scoop meant scoop of ice cream – but now I learn it means news story too. Humans can be so confusing!) Anyhow check it out and have a great week.

WOOF!

I think this qualifies as a fair and balanced jury pool!! WOOOF!

Ode to Zachary...

Dory's Note: We love Gramma's dog Zachary and since he is so special but doesn't have a blog, we thought we would write and ode, just to him! Besides - the third photo down just cracks us up!

Ode to Zachary:

Zachary you are quite cute, and sometimes even a pain in the patoot!
You are silly and furry, and certainly not a doggie to hurry.
You are goofy and fun. In our book you are number 1!
Your whiskers are getting quite gray, and we love you more each and every day!
Our dear furry friend Zach - remember - we always got your back!

Boston is the bloggiest!

Hi! This is from today's Boston Globe. One thing the article didn't talk about is also that Boston is also incredibly "pet/dog" friendly and we are sure all those dogs and kitties are blogging fools too! At least that is our story and we are sticking to it!!

Post this: Boston top blog city:

Boston has long been viewed as the land of the bean and the cod - and now the Hub may also be the land of the blog.

According to OutsideIn.com, a website that tracks neighborhood blogging, Boston was the "bloggiest city" in America for the two-month period of March and April.

Behind Boston were Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and Washington, D.C.

OutsideIn.com says it tracks blogging activity in about 60 urban areas and nearly 3,500 neighborhoods, and it arrived at its rankings through a "blogging quotient" that factors in a metropolitan area's population with the number of blog posts about a specific location.
By that measure, Greater Boston had 89 posts per 100,000 residents, edging out Greater Philadelphia, which had 88 posts, and Greater Pittsburgh, which had 53 posts, Outsidein.com said.

Surprisingly, perhaps, such well-wired metro areas as San Francisco and Seattle were farther down the list, with roughly 40 posts per 100,000 residents, Outsidein.com said.
Why was Greater Boston number one? Outsidein.com chief executive Steven Berlin Johnson offered this theory: Blogs thrive where locals are wired, well-educated, and obsessed with politics, a topic that inspires bloggers to unleash their prose. Another popular blog topic locally: healthcare.

Outsidein.com is focused on neighborhoods, and its business model is to attract advertising dollars from neighborhood merchants as well as from national businesses looking to target ads by zip codes, Johnson said.

Shortly after its October launch, Outsidein.com examined blogging by neighborhood, using a software analysis that tallied up the number of posts about specific neighborhoods.
Watertown and Newton ranked high, but Brooklyn, N.Y., was the bloggiest neighborhood - indeed, if Brooklyn were regarded as a separate city, it might have eclipsed the Hub as the bloggiest city, Johnson said.

A neighborhood undergoing gentrification is often fertile territory for location-specific blogs, and not only is Brooklyn gentrifying; it's also filled with people who either "write for a living or who want to write for a living," Johnson said.

Blogs are such a new phenomenon that methods for tracking blog activity are still in their early stages, said David Weinberger, a fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School.

And in seeking to pinpoint blogging hotbeds, he added, raw numbers may not tell the whole story; also relevant are the quality of the content and whether blog posts help build a community.

Still, Weinberger said, "I'm proud to live in the bloggiest city in the universe."

By Chris Reidy, Boston Globe staff

Crazy from the HEAT!

Okay - so its been hot and sticky - so people are acting a little off, but Dory has compeletely lost her mind!

There she was just laying there quietly and luckily Mom was cleaning the new camera so she could catch Dory in action!
At first she looks peaceful - then it happens!
Rolling!
Writhing!
SHOWING HER PARTS!
It was a non-stop rollathon!
Feet up! Head twitched about!We thought she would never stop!
We were starting to get scared, but finally it stopped as suddenly as it had begun! Dory seems to have had a case of the Triple H (hazy, hot and humid) Crazies!
Love, Mac

We got mail!

Hi! Mac here, I don't like this blogging stuff much, I much rather be chasing balls or running around out side!

Dory and I wanted to thank the pups over at Jackman Avenue (I'm not sure where that is but I hear they got a mom who cooks for them so I am planning an escape!), anyhow they were very kind and sent us some cool and tasty things. Mom and Dory had a "Girl's Day" yesterday so they opened the box and put together a little video to thank the whole crew over in Pittsburgh!

Dad says to tell you that Mom and Dory are addicted to Windows Movie Maker and he is trying to get them both into a recovery program.

Have a happy day - WOOF - MAC

Labbie Book Choices

We have noticed that some of our friends have provided their readers with a special dog related summer reading list and We wanted to tell you all about ours:


In Seeing Eye by Jack Ellis, the main character, Campbell, is a blind guy who lost his eyes in an accident. He's not handling his blindness well, and is pretty upset at the world. His sister is dating a guy who is doing experimental research involving neural hookups between man and dog that allows a blind human to see through the dog's eyes. He finally consents to the experiment and travels overseas for the surgery. The process works remarkably well, and Campbell and Shadow(his black Lab!) start to bond tightly. But things start getting strange when he starts seeing visions involving kidnapped children. It appears that some psychic connection between Shadow and something else is bleeding through to Campbell, and he's the only person who can possibly track down a recently kidnapped child who is about to be murdered if the killer is not stopped.


The Labrador Retriever, The History... The People... Revisited is by Richard Wolters, author of many dog training books and a friend of my parents. This is a lavishly illustrated book that is just plain a treat for the eyes. It's also well written; slanted toward the working side of the breed, but my family used to field trial with Labs so it is a favorite. Some reviewers feel that the most controversial part of the book deals with Dick Wolter's theory of the history of the Labrador, but the theory is interesting whether or not you buy it, and the photographs and supporting documents of interest to any Lab lover. It's hard not to like a book by a friend of the family.




Zero at the Bone is by Mary Willis Walker. The story is about Texas dog trainer Katherine Driscoll embarks on a perilous quest to unravel family mysteries in Walker's gripping debut. Her mortgage in default, Katherine is devastated by the imminent loss of her house, kennel and beloved retriever. A startling solution presents itself when her father, whom she has not seen in 30 years, writes to say that her big loan will be paid in full in return for a small favor. A fun mystery!




Mad Dogs and Scotsmen by Gerald Hammond. The story starts with poor Cochrane has just retreived his pooch (a Lab named Jove) from quarantine only to have the poor doggie stolen along with his briefcase. Not only that, but the kennel owner's missing car and shotgun make the authorities jumpy. When the events lead to a murder case, as a woman's battered body is found near the burnt car, the kennel owner finds himself embroiled with trouble. Lovely outdoors adventure in Scotland with a clever mystery involving a dog... who could ask for more?



Marley & Me by John Grogan is an unvarnished look at the joys and tribulations of sharing your life with a dog. Grogan's account of his young family's first alfresco dining experience with Marley the yellow lab in tow had me laughing and I laughed and cried my way through the whole book!






Fear Nothing is by Dean Koontz. If you think you've got it tough, meet Christopher Snow, the hero of Dean Koontz's novel. Not only did his parents die under mysterious circumstances, but he's also being stalked by shadowy characters who want Snow to stop trying to find out how they died--or else they'll bump off his remaining loved ones (his supersmart, beer-lapping dog Orson,a goofy labrador retriever; his best surfing buddy Bobby; and his late-night deejay girlfriend Sasha).

Typical Koontz story - great for the beach or a slow snow day!



My final recommendation is for the younger set, readers grades 3-5.

Gooseberry Park is by Cynthia Rylant. When Kona, a Labrador retriever, meets Stumpy, a squirrel in Gooseberry Park, they're best friends at first sight. But after Stumpy’s babies are born, disaster strikes in the form of a violent ice storm. Kona is not a fair-weather friend; he’s worried sick! How will Stumpy and her babies survive? With the help of Murray, a hilarious bat, and Gwendolyn, a wise hermit crab, Kona shows just how true--and heroic--a friend can be.

Nice story for Lab loving kids!

HAPPY READING - Love Dory, Mac and Liza