There’s been a lot of horseplay in the media in recent years on the concept of truly disgusting professions. The mushroom farmer manure-slinger, zero-gravity vomit quicker-picker-upper and bed-pan disaster beneficiary, etc… The Discovery Channel even has a popular show called “Dirty Jobs” to highlight the visual aspects of these revolting trades.

Recently, NPR conducted a decidedly higher-brow...

After my post on blogging I received a nice bunch of emails from fellow pet bloggers urging me not to pull an Itchmo. Among these well-wishers, fellow pet industry geek Alex Krooglik of Embrace Pet Insurance offered me an analytical glimpse at why I shouldn’t give up:

Though I’m told most bloggers are mad about their stats, I confess to being somewhat oblivious of the traffic that makes its way...

Hot on the heels of my rant on the potential horrors of retractable leashes comes this one on cat carriers.

Granted that cats are hard to catch when they mysteriously surmise it’s vet visit time. A lot of it has to do with the placement of the cat carrier after you’ve decided to hose it down or otherwise clean it up so your vet doesn’t think you’re a horrible owner and a slob to boot. Then...

OK so I didn’t expect my first appearance on TV as a vet to be a national one. International, even, if you consider the broad audience of mixed nationality US Hispanics.

Nope. I expected something sleepy and local where I wouldn’t be up against all that cleavage! (If you’ve ever watched Univision or Telemundo you’ll know what I’m talking about.)

Tomorrow on 7:30 AM EST on Telemundo you too can...

I love love love kitties but my son is highly allergic and predisposed to asthma. The last time I brought a cat home (Helen, for the weekend) his face puffed up and the congestion lasted three days beyond her departure.

But I can’t justify keeping cats out of doors. Not when I know most of my local strays are FIV-positive. Not while I still occasionally take on the neighborhood detail of...

It’s too late after your Cavalier King Spaniel’s chewed through the power cord behind the fridge in your garage. She’s gone. And all those miscellaneous pills, baby toys and cat stool consumed?—not to mention the woodworking gnawed off your favorite chair. You could have avoided that, too.

Sure, a cage muzzle doesn’t scream, “I’m so cute you gotta pet me!” But it can save your butt when the...

Betsy the Border Collie knows more than 300 words. Sure, she’s no Alex-the-African Grey. She won’t be speaking them anytime soon. But she knows them. She can act on them. And she understands them in different contexts, displaying a knack for abstract thinking we’d never before thought possible in animals—not to mention dogs.

So goes National Geographic's March 2008 cover story. It details the...

Part of the fun of being aboard a huge ship with a crew of your colleagues (as I was last week) is the inevitability of meeting someone whose interests and ambitions intersect with your own.

Among my new cohorts was a dual-boarded veterinary specialist in internal medicine and veterinary critical care (talk about an over-achiever!).

Though I’m not fit to lick her shoes—especially when it comes...

(Until I can post again on my own two legs, here's a substitute post as timeless as tastelessness...)

I’m on a roll with the whole castration issue lately. It must be the stress. But here’s a pet peeve worthy of discussion. Well…maybe not, but here goes anyway.

Have you seen those big macho trucks on the road? The ones with oversized tires, Playboy-stenciled mud-flaps and perhaps a windshield...

Yeah, it’s true. Most people have a built-in fear of bugs. For some unlucky souls, however, the fear is far greater than what most of us would consider rational. A significant percentage of the population is afflicted with this problem. Indeed, it’s common enough for the psychiatric community to have come up with a medical term for it: “delusional parasitosis.”

Yesterday’s post on bedbugs...