Fresh As A Daisy

As of last night, we have a new member of the family: Daisy, a four-month-old golden Labrador retriever (or mix), who's low-key, sweet and--at the risk of stating the obvious--darn cute.

Technically, we adopted Daisy from Florida All Retriever Rescue (FARR), which describes itself as "a non-profit, all volunteer, rescue organization dedicated to saving the lives of unwanted and neglected dogs throughout Florida, with a special focus on retriever breeds."

But I brought Daisy to our home from the home of Lee Courtney and Lauren Beardsley, who were fostering Daisy for FARR. Lee is also known as "Flee," the Music Director at WMNF, the Tampa radio station where I do "Talking Animals" (and a weekly music show).

The Friday of Labor Day Weekend, Flee sent an e-mail to all WMNF programmers that Daisy--then called Ashley--would be available for adoption soon. And he included pictures

The other parts of the description--including good with cats--sounded right up our alley. The next time I was in Tampa, Flee was kind enough to accommodate a visit to his house, so I could meet this pooch.

She was dreamy.

Fast forward to the next Wednesday--that is, yesterday--and I was back at Flee and Lauren's house to pay the FARR adoption fee, get the lowdown on this nice girl, including instructions for her post-spay care, and receive a Daisy briefing before embarking on the three-plus hour drive.

Now, she's met my wife, Colleen, and our son Mike (not quite six)--who both adore Daisy--and she's met our three cats, who don't. Yet...

More of the Daisy Chronicles in the coming days.

Pacelle Discusses Leadership, Legislation--And Vick

We were pleased to host Wayne Pacelle, the President and CEO of The Humane Society of The United States--the country's largest animal protection organization--on the Sept. 9 edition of "Talking Animals," at roughly the five-year mark of his being top dog of HSUS.

With upwards of 11 million members, the HSUS is a elephantine, sprawling entity, and therefore an interview with Pacelle about his organization runs the risk of being quite sprawling, too.

So I partly tried to frame the conversation around the notion of leadership.

Which means we touched on topics ranging from what he views as the three most important hallmarks of his tenure as CEO, to his decision to have HSUS team with Michael Vick for educational efforts on dogfighting--and how that decision (and reaction to it) speaks to the intricacies and challenges of leadership at that level--to the increasing premium he has placed on cultivating and passing legislation as a more profoundly effective way to alter the animal welfare landscape, and more.

It felt like a good, substantive, lively conversation, and the calls and e-mails I've received afterward underscore that impression--including one listener who called the studio mere seconds after we'd finished the broadcast, wondering where she could hear the Pacelle interview again.

Uh, right here.

Writer Siebert Discusses His New Book—Which Was Re-Titled 11th Hour (And I’d Subtitle “Simian Roger & Me”)—And Animals In Crisis

I was greatly privileged to speak on Wednesday’s show with writer Charles Siebert, whose new book is “The Wauchula Woods Accord: Toward A New Understanding Of Animals.”

The book chronicles his extended encounter with a retired circus chimp named Roger at The Center For Great Apes, a chimpanzee sanctuary in Wauchula, FL, but widens out considerably from the personal reportage of that encounter.

But as Charles made clear in our on-air conversation, his time spent with Roger had a profound impact on him (he originally intended to call the book “Humanzee”; it’s probably too late to consider my proposed sub-title: “Simian Roger & Me”), while serving as a jumping off point for addressing what he found at other chimp sanctuaries across the county he traveled to, and musings about scientific research and literature on the man/ape connection, as well as observations and reporting from other pieces he’s written.

Indeed, over the years, Charles Siebert has written a number of New York Times Magazine cover stories about animals and animal issues, most recently his July 13 piece on whales—a sizable portion of which was devoted to the phenomenon of “friendly whales,” the focus of the May 13 “Talking Animals.”

Other celebrated Siebert NYT Magazine cover pieces include an Oct. 2006 article on elephants experiencing something akin to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and, perhaps most disturbingly, as Charles and I discussed, this didn’t apply merely to captive elephants, but ones in the wild, too; and the story on chimps, the reporting of which led to his pivotal meeting with Roger and, ultimately, the new book.

In briefly addressing his career path, he explained that he came to writing about animals from a background as a poet. That makes perfect sense: "The Wauchula Woods Accord" and his Times Magazine pieces reflect the heart of a animal lover and advocate, and the soul of a poet.

Or maybe vice versa.

Blog Sloth Becomes New Animal!

Pictured at the left is a cartoonish depiction of 10-toed sloth.

By which, I mean that it's been nearly five months since my last blog post--for reasons too boring and pitiful to explain, though they largely involve...yes, sloth.

But I am ready to return to regular posting, mindful that the blogosphere is absolutely clamoring for yet another person with lots of fuzzy opinions, and even fuzzier grammar...

Here's Another Reason I'm Glad We Live In This House...

My family (wife Colleen, son Mike) and & I live in Jupiter Farms, a somewhat rural and more than a little equestrian-oriented area of Florida about 20 miles north of West Palm Beach.

We're five minutes from the grocery story, other shopping and restaurants, so it's not all remote, but it feels delightfully remote. Of course, we have friends who live as close as West Palm Beach yet consider driving up here such a major trip that you almost think they should bring their passport.

And there is some serious driving to commute to WMNF, the radio station in Tampa where I broadcast "Talking Animals": It takes three-plus hours to get there, which means on days I do one or more radio shows there, I'm spending more than six hours on the road. (Thank goodness for my Prius!)

But here's an example of just one of the virtues of this house: Thanks to what was happening with California real estate prices when we sold our home there a little over three years ago, we wound up with some spacious digs, including a good-sized house, a nice hunk of land that includes a pond where fish and turtles reside, even a barn; I'm writing this post from my office in the barn.

Over the weekend, my wonderful mother-in-law Liz and her also wonderful Yorkshire Terrier, Monty--an irresistibly sweet, happy guy; we call him the dog who loves too much--were visiting, and while Mike was napping, I took Monty for a walk around our digs, with Colleen and Liz strolling behind us.

All of a sudden, Monty was trying to dart off, straining mightily against his leash. We thought surely he'd spotted one of the many squirrels who live on the property, but when we got a closer look, we saw that it was a raccoon. A gorgeous raccoon, calmly ambling just on the other side of the fence that separates our property from the road.

This raccoon was doing turns like a furry runway model, so we all got a good look at him--he seemed really relaxed as he finally climbed up one of the trees, and settled in. I came back later with a camera, but didn't see any sign of him.

It would've been nice to include a picture of him with this post, but that's OK. The fact that we could see a raccoon on our property (and, at the risk of anthropomorphising, that he seemed quite comfortable being there) was plenty cool.

And yet another reason I love living here.