Check out our new old blog address!

Follow us to our "new" address! (Moving is a pain, even when you're not really moving...) (Photo card: Avanti)

We have sort of moved. Kind of. Come see us at our real address: www.dogdailynews.com.

This has actually always been our address, and it forwarded to WordPress. But now that we’re no longer forwarding it, and this WordPress blog is no longer being updated, it’s important not to have “wordpress” in our address. So if you’ve favorited us, please be sure to keep following us at our new old address!

We are back up and running!

We moved! And you would never know it!

We’re excited! Our tails are wagging like mad! We have moved our website to our own host. (Ya ya, boring for you, but thrilling for those of us with less exciting lives.) We love WordPress, but there were limitations while they were our host, so with the tremendous help of the staff of EZ Site Move, we were able to make a seamless (to readers) move to BlueHost (a host that gets high marks from everyone we know who uses it).

We can’t say enough good things about EZ Site Move. Brandon, our patient, hardworking tech in Utah, worked with us through all our requests to make the site look exactly as it did on our other host. There’s no way we could have done what he did, even with all four our our master canine minds put together. The process is a bit tricky, and it takes a lot to bring things like photos and formatting over in one piece. If you’re thinking about moving your blog, and you are not a tech genius, it’s worth the investment. (And the investment was nothing compared to the price of sanity.)

This experienced underscored our need for a tech-savvy canine on our staff. If you are one, let us know. The pay is terrible and the benefits nonexistent, unless you count being part of our amazing team and our fantastic website as a benefit. You should. We do.

Video: Adorable teacup pigs — More competition for us dogs?

Could pigs be the next dogs?

As if cats weren’t enough competition. Now we dogs have to worry about cute little pigs elbowing us away from the center stage as man’s best friend. In England, “teacup pigs” are all the rage these days. Even Rupert Grint (Ron Weasley in Harry Potter films) has a couple.

Teacup pigs are miniature pigs, standing only 12 to 16 inches tall and weighing a mere 65 pounds. Click here for a cute Today Show video of the critters. This is a great deal smaller than the potbellied pigs who swept the US by storm a decade ago before people realized they got just way too big.

“It’s about the size of a small spaniel,” breeder Jane Croft explains on Today. “They make fantastic pets. They’re really clean. They’re highly intelligent and just love to be loved. They give so much back to you.”

This is making me all sweaty. I don’t like the looks of this trend. What if it crosses the pond to the US? Could pigs take the place of dogs? I can see those little piggies capitalizing on the success of their less fortunate cousins’ “Pork: The other white meat” campaign. Their ad campaign could simply be “Pigs: The other dogs,” and there goes thousands of years of history of dogs being humans’ favorite companions.

I think I’ll get me a plateful of bacon and try to forget about it.

Video: Dog can read. (Big whoop. I can WRITE!)

Willow, you are cute, and you are smart, but you can't write!

So an admittedly very cute dog named Willow goes on the Today Show and her person holds up three different signs (they say “wave,” “sit up” and “bang!”) and Willow obeys their commands and everyone is all like “OMG that is the world’s smartest dog! OMG! That dog can read!” (With “bang!” she falls over dead.)

Geez. what’s the big deal, folks? I mean, everyone on my staff can not only read, but we can write! (The unfortunate exception is Jasper, who is frightfully bright but vastly illiterate.) What gives? We’ve come to the conclusion that Willow got this attention because 1) She is an elderly lady (age 12) and terribly cute and unique looking 2) She conveniently lives in NYC, where the Today Show is taped, and 3) Her person is a professional trainer who totally knows how to get publicity.

We are not jealous. Heavens no! Us? We couldn’t fly to NYC even if they wanted us to, because we’re saving our money for our trip to Taiwan. But still, a little nod in our direction would have been the right thing to do. Here’s the video of Willow’s feat, should you want to see what Matt Lauer, Meredith Viera, Ann Curry, and Al Roker are all ga-ga about.

Did First Dog go number two on Air Force One?

Did Bo let go on Air Force One? His lips are sealed. Oh wait, actually, they're sort of wide open. But he's not talking. (AP photo)

Rumors are swirling around Capitol Hill about First Dog Bo Obama. Some say he did the unthinkable: He went number two on Air Force One. “You can imagine the horror on board when they discovered what it had done,” according to a Wall Street Journal source, who was referring to Bo and his alleged bathroom mishap.

A White House press official maintains that the poop story is a crock. But we aren’t so sure. After all, this is a young dog whose habits need some fine tuning. It’s well known that he likes to chew magazines and socks and the president’s sneakers. A dog who does these things might not be ready to use a jet that has no dog bathroom.

If indeed Bo did poop on the presidential jet, I want dibs on it. I will add it to my growing collection that I will either take to Taiwan or hold onto until I talk San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom into its very own pay-for-poo policy. (If you don’t know what I’m talking about, you haven’t been reading Dog Daily News! Check out the previous two posts for the scoop.)

A letter to Mayor Gavin Newsom: Paying for dog poop

If San Francisco's mayor, Gavin Newsom, helps people get paid for dog poop, I predict we'll soon be calling him "Governor Gavin."

(I wrote this today based on the previous story in Dog Daily News. I promised I would post the letter to San Francisco’s mayor when I completed it, so here it is.)

Oct. 7, 2009

To the Honorable Mayor Gavin Newsom,

Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Frank. I am editor and publisher of Dog Daily News (www.dogdailynews.com), based in San Francisco. I am a dog.

It has come to my attention, in the line of duty, that our sister city, Taipei, is implementing a very forward-thinking policy. The city (and perhaps all of Taiwan. I don’t have all the details) is rewarding people for picking up dog droppings. It’s part of an effort to keep the city clean. It is being met with enthusiasm.

People get $100 per kilogram of dog poop. “Wow!” you may be thinking. “That’s even more than the foie gras at my restaurants!” But keep in mind that $100 in Taiwan is $3 US. Still, $3 for about two pounds of dog poop sounds very attractive. Our parks would be the cleanest in the US.

I myself am a small dog, a Jack Russell sort of guy. So scooping my own won’t bring in much cash. But I would be more than happy to go to all the parks where there are lots of orphan poops and bring a wheelbarrow and get rich. (I don’t make much money running a dog news service.)

If you would like to learn more about Taiwan’s pooch poop policy, please see the AFP story at this address: http://bit.ly/19hAf8 . I will be happy to help you implement a similar pay-for-poo policy. The only hangup I can see is if people start thinking they can turn in their own poop for money, pretending it’s from a big dog. But that is too disgusting to contemplate. Let’s let your policy wonks deal with the details.

If you take on this issue, I predict we’ll soon be calling you “Governor Gavin.” It’s that big an issue for those of us who are deeply immersed in the city’s dog culture. If you pay us for dog poop, we’ll help get you to the Governor’s Mansion.

You can contact me through my website if you wish to discuss this further.

Your humble (but loveable) servant,

Frank the Dog

Get paid for your dog’s droppings

This fastidious dog has a good $100 Taiwan dollars worth of poop there

If you happen to be in Taiwan, and your dog happens to poo there, and your dog is big, you will find yourself about $100 richer. (It may be worth noting that $100 in Taiwan is a mere $3 in the U.S.  But still!) Zounds! How cool is that?

It’s part of an effort to keep the environment a little more litter free. Rewards are also being offered for plastic, paper, and Styrofoam cups, according to an AFP story.

We Dog Daily News staffers have been thinking about how we could supplement our non-existent incomes with something that comes so naturally to us. We could fly in the cargo hold to Taipei (it’s cheap, and we don’t have to eat airplane food), and start collecting our excrement as soon as we land. But we now realize that three of us are so small that it would take far too long to get the 1 kg (a little more than 2 pounds) of poop that it takes to earn $3. And Ida, our biggest staffer, is afraid to fly. So there goes our dream.

Still, we think it’s a grand idea. We would like to see San Francisco implement something like this. I know several parks where dogs poo in the bushes and their people pretend it never happened. If the four of us staffers were to spend our lunch break collecting orphan poops, we’d probably earn a total of $100. That’s more than we’ve earned during our entire tenure at Dog Daily News. (Hey, I’m working on getting sponsors. It’s not my fault!)

I am going to be writing a letter to Mayor Gavin Newsom this evening, urging him to support legislation that pays people for dog poop. He wants to be governor of California, so if he covets the dog vote, he would be smart to listen. I will post my letter later.

Nebraska woman throws dog at cop

No animals were harmed in the making of this photograph. And the person "throwing" the dog is no woman, either.

So some Nebraska  cops investigate a domestic violence call, in which a man accuses his girlfriend of throwing a cell phone at his face. The cops arrive and the girlfriend is holding a small dog. She does what any sensible person trying to convince the police that she didn’t throw an object at a person would do: She throws the dog at one of the cops. The AP reports that “neither the dog nor the officer were injured.” The woman was arrested for suspicion of domestic assault, but she won’t face charges for the dog weapon.

Please help this kindly dog rescuer

Bobby Wright, a dog-loving US Forest Service employee in Southern California, has had more than his share of hard times recently. His home burned down in a wildfire a few years ago. Earlier this year he was attacked and beaten while writing a $5  parking citation.

But nothing compares to the tragedy that befell the 63 year old on Saturday. Another wildfire destroyed his home — and all 20 dogs he had rescued, according to stories in the LA Times and the Press Enterprise.

Bobby, who by all accounts is a kindly and hard-working man, had taken to rescuing poor dogs left behind in the mountains by their people. In the previous fire, he was able to get the dogs out in time. But in this blaze, in the Lytle Creek area of the San Bernardino National Forest, he was busy helping evacuate others. By the time he realized the fire was racing toward his home, it was too late.

“I was tempted to let him go back in there, but the flames were moving so fast, we both would have been killed,” a forest protection officer told the Press-Enterprise. “The flames were swirling like a tornado and sounded like a railroad.”

The dogs perished in their kennels.

Friends say Bobby is relying on his faith to get him through his devastation. It’s all he has left. But you can help. There is actually something you can do to reach out to this good man. According to the LA Times:

Volunteers were organizing to help Wright. Officials said contributions can be made to the Lytle Creek Volunteer Assn. The group is located at the Lytle Creek Ranger Station, 1209 Lytle Creek Road, Lytle Creek, CA 92438. For more information, call (909) 382-2851.

If you can send this man anything, even a card that you are thinking of him and his dogs, we’re pretty sure it would be greatly appreciated. Bobby has given so much to our species. We staffers at Dog Daily News are going to send along something. We hope you will too.

New Nintendo Wii Fit makes dogs plump!

Actress Rachel Leigh Cook and her dog Cooper at the Wii Fit Plus Fitness Club in West Hollywood. Run, Cooper, run! Or soon you may look like the dog in the picture below... (AP Photo/Nintendo, Casey Rodgers)

We dogs already dislike Wii Fit. Why? Because instead of our people taking us for  big long walks, they are jumping up and down in front of their TVs, huffing and puffing and getting fit without having to set foot outside to get some exercise with us. That means they are getting trim and happy while we are getting pudgy and bored.

So along comes Nintendo and really rubs salt in the wound. “Oh, you think you hate Wii Fit now, doggies? Just wait ’til you see the next generation of it!” OK, no one at Nintendo really said that, but they were probably thinking that.

The new Wii Fit is called Wii Fit Plus. (The marketing team was apparently asleep during the product-naming sessions, but that’s beside the point.) Nintendo is promoting Wii Fit Plus as dog-friendly. You can make an avatar for your dog. That’s kind of cute. But it’s the product’s sole other “dog-friendly” aspect that bothers us staffers:

A victim of Wii Fit Plus?

Wii Fit Plus will weigh your dog to monitor his progress. Progress? They should just come right out and say that it measures your dog’s increasing heft as he watches you and your avatar do calisthenics in front of your TV screen instead of taking him for a walk.

Dog Daily News gives this new Wii Fit our very uncoveted one-paw rating. We like the canine avatars. But the rest is just a giant step backward for us dogs, who appreciate just about any step in any direction these days, but would much rather step out the front door with our people in tow.