out with fruit baskets, in with wag pacs!

Maximo, Lulu and I received our first Wag Pac in the mail recently, and this short clip shows us discovering the treats and toys inside. Wag Pacs, created by Dogtime, are delivered to your door on a subscription basis, and should be available for order by Christmas.

A one month subscription is $29 per box, 3 months for $24, and the best deal of all is a 6 month subscription for $19 per box. An excellent way to surprise and treat your loved ones, both canine and human! In addition to enjoying your dogs' delight, a percentage of the cost of of your Wag Pac subscriptions go to a local animal shelter of your choosing. We chose for our donation to go to Animal Talk of King County.

Enjoy the film, my ridiculous dog voice, and the wagging tails of Maximo and Lulu as they investigate their Wag Pac!

My tribute to National Handwriting Day. May the desire to make marks upon surfaces (reference the caves of lascaux) never be extinguished.

Wednesday, November 14th

Saturated in rare November sunshine. We worship you, and all your glories!

Walkies: Shilshole Bay Marina. Looping around Golden Gardens, we said HELLO! to a colony of ducks overwintering on Golden Gardens' Freshwater Pond.

The Pond turtles, like old Russians, bare midriffs exposed and bare arms outstretched on benches of the Local Park, absorbing precious Vitamin D. The turtles, too, make the most of the moment.

As the sun fell, in a brilliant pink ball, we admired its glorious descent into another world where it is not darkness, but day.

monday color study: fall's first flush

Clouds and rain made all the colors of fall's first flush that much more luminous during today's wet Discovery Park walk.

Each bilateral leaf is a full color Rorschach, each side a mirror of the other but with organic variation. One could gaze at them for hours!

But we are all soaking and the dogs care not for leaf gazing, so home we go, a few select leaves in my sodden pocket.

my summer vacation

The chihuahuas and I were guests at the Arnim/Hucks estate on John's Island. No roads or running water in a cabin, hand built by Bill Hucks and his family within a grove of Madrona trees and a sea of native grasses.

This is a shot of my notebook, my muses (Maximo & Lulu), and Haro Straight (to the left). I went swimming in Haro Straight. Was that ever refreshing! After fifteen minutes I lost the ability to use my limbs. Coming ashore, I fell back into the water, my legs were so uselesss! I staggered up onto the rocky shore and Dana, and her daughter Kate, buried me under the rocks, hot from a day in the sun. The cold in my limbs surrendered to the sun's residual heat.

What is heaven on earth but moments, and minutes, such as these?

king of the wild frontier

Maximo got into another fight with a raccoon. This time, the wounds looked like nail punctures in his meaty thigh. Maximo is fine now (four medications and ten days later), but as the wounds heal, he wants to lick them! In reality, he doesn't wear a coon skin cap, but a cape covering his itchy haunch.

I could draw Maximo wearing the cape, but the difference between being drawn wearing a cape and a coon skin cap* is significant, given the cape is really a wrinkled napkin.

Lulu is as obsessed with the spot where Maximo vs. Raccoon 2012 took place as Maximo is with the spot on his thigh where the fight left its marks. She runs to the spot and barks at the memory, tirelessly telling off that nasty wild beastie.

Maximo was so lucky (again!) as a raccoon could so easily kill him. Maximo! King of the wild frontier! Let's hope it stays that way.

*The animal who inspired the coon skin cap drawing still roams free. Beware all domestic animals on night patrol! The danger is real!

PICKLE by kimberly baker

Kim Baker, author of Pickle, The (Formerly) Anonymous PRANK CLUB of Fountain Point Middle School, had a book launch party at Secret Garden Books last night.

Pickle is about a boy, Ben, and his team of motley pranksters, who come together at their middle school under the auspices of a pickle making club, their creative cover for a focus on pranks, and in so doing, get to know themselves, and each other.

Put it on your reading list. It's FUNNY! And FUN! And guaranteed to encourage and inspire the prankster in all of us.

The illustration (at left, by me!) is of a limited selection of hors d'ouvres (aka bizarre treats and unmentionable eats) Kim and her Posse created for the book launch. The pickled (of course!) quail egg escabeche with jalapenos was my personal favorite.

I took three rubber roaches home and am excited to use them in a prank. This morning, I saw them on the table, where I left them last night, and had a split second freak out before I remembered they were rubber!

My question is: what is the difference between a prank and a con?

the aspens have eyes

will the real yoda please stand up.

Funny how things happen.While walking around Woodland Park, M, L & I found a Yoda sticker in the Zoo's west parking lot. I picked it up and put it (grimy as it was) in my jacket pocket. We walked through the Zoo's new entrance and a tiny snowbank begged to be the platform for Lulu's best (yet) Yoda impersonation. The sticker is not superimposed!

snowstorm

Nik and her dogs are caught in a snowstorm, lost, but only for a little while. Soon they will run up against a wall and follow it to the front door of a cabin wherein fire and food awaits, tended by the winter wise lady who lives there with a young deer she saved from a certain death at the side of its starved and frozen mother.

kick ass

One of my favorite movies is Kick Ass, about an ordinary adolescent who wants to do good. He fabricates a costume,  broaching the safety of his bedroom (where fantasies run rife) to fight crime where he finds it.

In this film, our hero doesn't have superpowers. He can't cling to the sides of buildings or destroy his opponents with superhuman prowess. His only "super power" is his desire for justice. His own ass is kicked many times over by run of the mill thugs before he encounters his nemesis, and rises to the occasion (quite literally, because, come on, if you don't have super powers you totally need the latest in technology). Right (with technological might) prevails and the world is safer for it.

eukanuba chihuahua dog food review

Maximo, Lulu and I were asked by Dogtime.com to review the dog food Eukanuba Chihuahua. Maximo and Lulu ate enthusiastically every time I fed them Eukanuba Chihuahua, and every time they also interrupted their eating to drink quite a bit of water. The food makes them thirsty!

Enthusiasm in eating is something we all look for when feeding our animals, but this should go together with a critical reading of the ingredients. Let's look at the top three ingredients in Eukanuba Chihuahua.

The first ingredient is Chicken. The second ingredient is Chicken By-Product Meal, which could include anything from entrails to beaks. The third ingredient is Corn, which has a high glycemic index, meaning that when metabolized, it raises blood sugar levels. Used as cheap filler in foods for animals and humans, corn products are implicated in rising rates of diabetes in the United States. 

Maximo and Lulu give Eukanuba Chihuahua Two Paws Up, but I am a label reader and cannot endorse this product while two of the top three ingredients are of questionable quality (such as animal by-products) and cheap fillers (such as corn).  

Thanks go to Eukanuba for the opportunity to review their new product, and to the Dog Food Advisor, the dog food watch dog!

color palette: blue sky & blushing tree

Every morning I sit in front of a large window through which I watch hummingbirds fight over their feeder, clouds stretching across the sky, and the coral bark maple (planted by me, ten years ago) responding in full color, to the season.

Today, the maple looks like Jacob's Coat of many colors. Yellow-green leaves blush as any tree might before stripped of its mantle. The sky is blue, a solemn promise that the chilling nights are but a hiccup before spring asserts itself again. The red in this palette reflects begonias blooming in pots on the stoop.

Oh, October!

strong swimmer

In three seconds Nik will open her eyes, grip the scruffs of the dogs' necks in one hand and with the other swim to the surface and safety. Nik is a strong swimmer, but even so, she struggles to keep them all from drowning in the warm, indifferent sea.

march 13

how lucky we are
sitting here,
listening
to birds fold their wings
to the fountain,
ever renewing itself,
over traffic
planes, cars, trains,
to voices on the wind,
while sky unfolds
her cloudy robes,
striking me dumb
with her inner splendor, now
she is the inside of an oyster shell,
the inside of a pearl.

lulu in the sky with diamonds

walking forward looking back

This is a full color version of one in a series of nine line drawings I created for my SCBWI LA portfolio.

sketch of the day: 07.14.11

how i'm going to make my millions: dog socks!

Order yours by calling 1-800-DOG-SOCK today!

(FYI! Before you get over excited, as I know dog socks are a niche market begging to be filled, these socks were borrowed from a human baby and are not really dog socks at all! )