Men’s Interests

I came across the photo above of a beautiful snow sculpture, and I was fascinated. Turns out it’s called Whirled White Web and it was created by a Minnesota team for the 2003 International Snow Sculpture Championship in Colorado. The USA team placed second.

Here are the first and second place winners of the 2006 contest:

The next competition is January 23 to February 4 in Breckenridge Colorado.

You can see a video of how these snow sculptures are made here:

All this snow got me thinking about snowballs. Did you know you can buy a Sno-Baller?

I learned there are dogs named Snowball.

Snowball is also the name of an apparently alien cat.

It’s the name of a bunny.

And it’s the name of a cat who loves bunnies.

I hope you enjoy this music video of teens in a snowball fight.

Here’s a snowball fight game for you to play.

Snowfight Destroy all the snowmen and avoid the other kids.

You can pick up this book on snowball launchers.

You can even get the kids some books on snowballs.

snow snowball snowballfight snowsculpture snowsculpturecompetition colorado teens books video

from FOX News:

I thought, ‘we’re trapped, we’re absolutely trapped,’” Eve said.

The 160-pound dog that habitually follows her owners around…eventually found the Fertigs and began digging a path in the snow with her teeth and claws underneath the fallen trees, similar to a mineshaft, and barking as if to tell them to follow.

After Shana tunneled all the way to the house…she came back, grabbed the sleeve of Eve’s jacket, and threw the 86-pound woman over her back and neck, which Eve described as “as wide as our kitchen shelf.”

Norman grabbed Eve’s legs, and the dog pulled them through the tunnel, under the trees and through an opening in a fence to the house, at which they arrived around 2 a.m.

“It was the most heroic thing I’ve ever seen in my life,” Eve said. “We opened the door and we just fell in and she laid on top of us and just stayed there and kept us alive … that’s where we laid until the fireman found us.”

There was no electricity and no heat in the house, so Shana acted as a living, breathing generator for the exhausted Fertigs until the local fire department arrived the next morning.

[Firefighters] kept looking at that tunnel and said, ‘we’ve never seen anything like it.’”

Since I’m a big animal-lover and own several pets, I thought I’d show you the reason you should own a pet or two. See some of my pets here and here.

Pets can decrease your:

# Blood pressure
# Cholesterol levels
# Triglyceride levels
# Feelings of loneliness

Pets can increase your:

# Opportunities for exercise and outdoor activities
# Opportunities for socialization

from the CDC

# Pet owners have lower blood pressure. (Friedmann, 1983, Anderson 1992).
# Pet owners have lower triglyceride and cholesterol levels than non-owners (Anderson, 1992).
# Pet owners have fewer minor health problems (Friedmann, 1990, Serpel, 1990).
# Pet owners have better psychological well-being (Serpel, 1990).
# Having a pet may decrease heart attack mortality by 3%. This translates into 30,000 lives saved annually (Friedman, 1980).
# Children’s cognitive development can be enhanced by owning a pet. (Poresky, 1988).
# 70% of families surveyed reported an increase in family happiness and fun subsequent to pet acquisition. (Cain, 1985).
# Children owning pets are more involved in activities such as sports, hobbies, clubs or chores. (Melson, 1990).
# Children exposed to pets during the first year of life have a lower frequency of allergic rhintis and asthma. (Hesselmar, 1999).
# Children who own pets score significantly higher on empathy and prosocial orientation scales than non-owners. (Vidovic, 1999).

# The American Journal of Cardiology reported that male dog owners were significantly less likely to die within one year after a heart attack than those who did not own a dog.
# Friedmann E, Thomas S. Pet ownership, social support, and one-year survival after acute myocardial infarction in the Cardiac Arrhythmia Suppression Trial (CAST). The American Journal of Cardiology. 1995;76:1213-1217.
# Researchers in the UK reported in the January 1999 and January 2001 issues of Seizure on dogs they had trained that could detect seizures 15–45 minutes prior to the episode’s beginning.
# Brown SW, Strong V. The use of seizure-alert dogs. Seizure. 2001;10:39-41
# Strong V, Brown SW, Walker R. Seizure-alert dogs – fact or fiction? Seizure. 1999;8:62-65.
# A brief report in a 1989 issue of the Lancet describes how one dog discovered a cancerous skin tumor on her owner’s leg.
# Williams H, Pembroke A. Sniffer dogs in the melanoma clinic? Lancet. 1989;1(8640):734.

from the Delta Society

pets exoticpets health

What do you think? Real or hoax?

A cat, Mimi, nurses what its owner Cassia Aparecida de Souza claims are Mimi’s own offsprings born with dog traits last Friday, three months after mating with a neighbour’s dog, in the southern Brazilian city of Passo Fundo, Rio Grande do Sul state, November 15, 2006. A geneticist from the Passo Fundo University plans to take blood samples from the animals to verify the claim by Cassia and her husband Rogerio that the puppies are part of Mimi’s litter of six, of which the three that were born with cat features died soon after birth, leaving the surviving three dog-like offsprings. REUTERS/Edison Vara (BRAZIL)

Photo and story from Yahoo News.

When I read on Harpers Index that one in four British Veterinarians have treated at least one drunk dog, I decided to look further into the subject of drunk animals. Enjoy these videos:

I liked the hamsters. How about you? Have you ever seen a drunk animal?

I heard about a family nearby that was giving away baby bearded dragon lizards. Knowing my teen daughter would want one I started researching them online. Bearded dragons are quite easy to care for, about the same as tree frogs. The hardest part is keeping enough live crickets onhand. They’re very docile, making them great pets for older children. The only thing you have to watch out for is germs. You must wash your hands after you handle them.

I found some reptile tanks for sale at a very good price on Craigslist, arranged for us to see them and the lizards, and loaded my daughter and her friend in the car. I bought both tanks since the price was so good, and ended up putting my aquatic turtle in one. After a quick trip to Petco (where they sell older bearded dragons for $59 each) and a few quick calls to the lizard owners, we were set with our supplies and headed to see the babies.

Bearded dragons can grow to over 20 inches in length. The babies we looked at were only one to six days old and very tiny. They were about 3 inches long and thin. We saw the parents and learned more about their care. We were in love. We decided to bring two babies home.

Until the babies are three to six months old they can’t live in sand. They can ingest it and get sick. We covered the floor of their tank in rabbit food like the previous owners recommended. We included a heating lamp with ultra violent rays that’s set to stay on 14 hours a day and a hollow half-log they can hide under and climb on. We dip their heads in the water dish everyday, something you have to do until they figure out they need to drink on their own. They eat live baby crickets and Romaine lettuce. One of the lizards was scared of the crickets at first, but he’s now chasing and eating them like he should.

I never imagined I’d have a red-eared slider and bearded dragons in my home, with my dogs, cats, parrots and fish, but I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised. When I was a little girl I used to pretend I had a pet store, and dreamed of owning one when I grew up.

About a year ago my son was driving out in the country near Alamo, California, when he spotted a turtle alongside the road. He stopped, because it’s not every day he sees a turtle nearly the size of a dinner plate. He looked around and didn’t see any houses nearby, nor did he see any ponds or places for a turtle to “hang out.” Concerned for it’s safety being so close to traffic, and knowing how much I love animals, he brought it to me.

After a quick internet search I learned it was a red-eared slider, an aquatic turtle, probably an adult, and most-likely male. It’s a good thing my son picked it up, because these turtles are not native to California, and in fact, releasing them into the wild is illegal. My son named him Lima after a baseball player.

I learned that Lima likes to eat strawberries and watermelon, and that he doesn’t like to eat minnows. We caught some minnows at a local park thinking they’d be a great snack for Lima. We were wrong; they’ve become his buddies. I also feed him turtle pellets, like dog food but smaller, and a variety of other fruits and vegetables.

For the first year Lima stayed outside, in a 3×3x3 wire cage on the ground, with a shallow “pond” (tub) of water and a basking rock. I’m sure he would have been happier with access to the entire backyard, but I have dogs and I didn’t want him in any danger. Recently I brought Lima inside and put him in a tank with about 30 gallons of water and a stack of rocks he can climb when he wants to dry off. It makes me happy to see him swimming in more water. I’m sure he’s happier too. Yes, we brought his minnow buddies along.

Seeing how Lima got along with the minnows, I figured I’d add more interest to the tank by buying two goldfish and an albino catfish. Turns out it’s not that Lima enjoys the company of minnows. It’s just that he has more refined tastebuds. I can’t find the goldfish or catfish anywhere.