FFF?

Since pretty much everyone (including me) thought Wordless Wednesday was a bad idea, I won't be going quiet anytime soon. But my human came up with another idea: Freeze Frame Friday.

Freeze Frame Friday would be dedicated to all the ridiculous things my human's camera catches me doing. Stuff you'd never see because your eyeballs aren't as fast as camera eyeballs. Don't ask me how that works, but crouching pug, hidden dragon was a good example. So is today's picture.

If you look reeeeeeeally close there's a giant molecule of food on my head, right above my nose. I could see it. I could totally smell it. And my human snapped the picture as I was trying to figure out if it's possible to lick something off your own forehead.

Of course my human thought it was all pret-ty funny.

I'm not so sure I like the sound of FFF. Sounds like I'd be signing up for a whole lot of getting laughed at. But I'm totally into it if it'll make people happy. I mean, that's why I'm here, right? To make humans laugh and smile and stuff?

What do you think about FFF?

SNOWING = NOT GOING

So, yesterday my human had some bad news for us. Our long weekend in the mountains has been canceled... on a account of snow.

Weekend in the mountains? Snow? Huh?

ME: I didn't know we were going to the mountains!?!
MY HUMAN: It was going to be a surprise. But now it's snowing.
ME: Like, the cold, white stuff?
MY HUMAN: Yes, snowing the cold white stuff. And snowing means not going.

OK, for the record - I think if a surprise gets canceled, the person in charge of the surprise should just pretend like it never almost happened. I wasn't disappointed about not going to the mountains this weekend until the surprise came along. Or didn't. Or whatever.

Anyway. The snow situation isn't just disappointing - it's also superconfusing. For one, I thought snow was a winter thing and I'm pretty sure it's practically summer. And it's not snowing here, so how on earth does my human know it's snowing in the mountains?

One word, she says: wunderground!

Yeah, I know. That's not a real word. Google says it's a website. My human says it's the best place on the internet to find out about weather. We don't have much weather here, so I forget it happens in other places. Like in the mountains (snow!). Or in NJ where my cousin Sophie lives (wunderground says mostly sunny, 72 degrees, chance of something called thunder?).

We're not getting snow at my house, but it is drizzling. Wunderground says we might get hail and some of that thunder stuff today too.

Kinda curious, is any weather happening where you are??

CROUCHING PUG, HIDDEN DRAGON

I've heard or, uh, seen that some other blogs have something called Wordless Wednesday. I usually have waaay too much to say to be wordless, but thought I'd give it a try.

So here I am, playing a game of catch with my human. At least it started out as "catch", but was more like fetch because catching a ball when you have no snout is kinda hard. No matter how hard I try, the ball usually just bounces off my face and runs away. Like this...

STUFF IN MY EYES (and stuff)

Thanks for being so nice to Dutch while my eye was unsquinting. He doesn't have the best self-esteem, so I think getting to pretend he's me makes him feel better about himself.

Now that I'm back, I've got a whole bunch of stuff to tell you. Like, the cowpie factory is back in business. Yup, the T-1 cow family came back! The black and white mommas, the baby triplets from the video - I saw all of them this weekend (right before my eye got all squinty). It was sooo good to see my cow firends again. And snack on their supertasty pies.

Now this is kinda random, but since we're talking about eyes, check out this close up taken from today's picture. That's my human. In my eyeball. Taking my picture! Is that cool or what? She says dog eyes reflect all sorts of stuff, but pug eyes are super-reflecty because they're so.. puggy.

Click on the pictures to see our eyes giant-sized!

Ok, now back to the other stuff I want to tell you about.

Good news
After a very long vacation, my slacker flat self is FINALLY back. My human still has some emails to answer, but it looks like things in the flat department are finally under control. Phew!! A whole bunch of Flatties just went to the post office to spread the word about recycled dogs across the whole entire planet. And maybe even into space.

Not-so-good-news
Last week, a local animal shelter caught on fire in the middle of the night. A dog living in an apartment above the shelter woke up her human and totally saved the day, but not all of the animals living in the shelter made it out. And now the shelter is closed. As soon as we heard the news, we volunteered to help clean-up and rebuild.

The Berkeley-East Bay Human Society has been helping animals in need since 1927 (!) and will need lots of help to recover from the fire. Donations, volunteers and foster homes are at the top of the need-list. You can read more about the shelter at berkeleyhumane.org. Oh - and watch this news story because it will totally make you leak - in a good way.

* * *

FLATTIE NEWS!
My flat self comes back with a visit to New Jersey where he makes friends with a new (and VERY big & sweet) recycled friend.

Read about it at flatpuglet.com!

BAD EYE DAY

Hi everyone. Puglet hurt his eye running through the grass during our cow hike this weekend. Don't worry, it's nothing serious (the vet said it's just irritated and gave him some drops). He's just not feeling his, quote, "cutest" and asked me to fill in today.

So, uhm. Well. I'm not the greatest public speaker so maybe I should just talk about Puglet? Because of his squinty eye, Puglet didn't make his great agility debut this weekend. He was extremely disappointed by this - especially when he found out some blogger-pugs were at the event.

Honestly? I think it's for the best. I know he's told you all about practicing to be agile, but I've seen these 'practices' and they are nothing like the real thing. Puglet mostly just goofs around on the obstacles and poses for pictures. Maybe now he'll get serious and do some real training in time for his next event... but I doubt it.

Puglet was also really looking forward to today's comeback of Flat Puglet. Our kitchen has been full of Flatties for the past few weeks, and even though I know they're here to do good in the world, they really creep me out. My human has promised they will be all be gone today... until the next invasion.

I'll let Puglet reintroduce the adventures of his flat self when he comes back tomorrow.

Lastly, the great bed-hog debate is over. I now have my own special plug-in blanket and am happy to stay on my warm & toasty side of the bed. I accepted Puglet's semi-sincere apology and extended an equally semi-sincere invitation to share my blanket, should he ever get cold. He never gets cold, so I doubt this will ever happen.

PS. For the record, I'm not the only one who thinks pugs are shaped like loaves of bread.

THE APOLOGY

So, you know how last week I kinda accused brother Dutch of being a giant spotted bed hog? Well, new facts have come to light. And now my human says I have to apologize.

Here's what happened, y'know, the new facts. The big, puffy blanket thing that's usually on the bed was at the cleaners. So my human used a whole bunch of regular blankets to keep us warm. Except one of the blankets wasn't regular - it was a special electric one. When you plug it in, it gets warm. And sleeping on it is like sleeping next to a friend. Even though it's just a blanket.

Well, the electric blanket just happened to land on Dutch's side of the bed. It wasn't very cold out, but my human plugged it in and turned it on. Just because she could. And you know what happened? Dutch didn't move an inch all night. He stayed on the electric blanket, on his side of the bed, the whole entire time.

My human repeated the electric blanket experiment, just in case it was some freak coincidence. And night after night, Dutch slept on the blanket. He didn't smush me like some kinda pug sandwich and my human didn't wake up all sore from being squashed into a pretzel.

Dutch isn't a bed hog after all. He was just... cold. And you can't really get mad at a guy for trying to keep warm, right? Even if they do accuse you of being shaped like a loaf of bread.

So, I apologized. And here I am apologizing again, in public, for the whole internet to read. Mostly because my human said I have to. But also because the electric blanket trick might help some other bed hogs be less... hoggy.

PS: Dutch thinks this apology stuff is pretty funny - me having to admit I was wrong and everything. He can laugh all he wants. He might not be a giant spotted bed hog, but I'm still in charge.

VANISHED

I was all excited to tell you about the crazy naked people... and then the whole poop-in-my-chewnola thing came up... and then came the mountain climbing... so I never got a chance to tell you about the cows!

Or more like the lack of cows.

OK, so last weekend we went to hike with the cows. Y'know, like we pretty much do every weekend? Well. Even though we were there like we always are, the cows were not. No cows. Zero. Anywhere.

The cows had vanished. And they'd taken their pies with them. We found a few crispy, sun-baked cowpies, but they were totally stale and pretty tasteless. Of course we ate them anyway, but still. It wasn't the same.

I'd gotten kinda close to the T-1 cow family, with their goofy matching monogrammed hides and generous servings of fresh pie. I liked playing chase-me with momma T-1. My human liked to oogle over the cute baby T-1s. Dutch is totally afraid of cows so he's just glad they're gone.

When I asked my human where, exactly, my cow friends went she just sighed and said 'greener pastures'. The pastures where we hike are green, so this makes no sense to me. But cow friends, wherever you are, you (and your pies) are will be missed.

BUILT FOR ADVENTURE

In this world, there are two kinds of pugs: couch pugs and sport pugs. And I am definitely the sports model. Not that I don't like taking six hour naps on our couch, but I'm really built for speed.

OK, maybe not speed. How about... adventure?

Anyway. It's been so long since my last adventure, I'm starting to feel more couch-y than sporty. When I mentioned this to my human yesterday, she grabbed the car keys and said OK, Puglet, let's go climb a mountain.

And that's exactly what we did.

The top of Montara Mountain is about 1800 feet above sea level. That's like 1800 pugs tall! And since we parked right next to the ocean, we walked every single pug's worth. The sign said the mountain climb was 3.4 miles each way and something called "rigorous". Whatever that means.

Climbing the mountain took awhile, but wasn't hard or anything. It got sorta hot about halfway to the top because the fog went away and there isn't much shade on Montara Mtn. It was only about 60 degrees out, but I start to melt in direct sun if it's over 59, so my human thought we might have to turn back, defeated.

I really really wanted to make it to the mountain top though, so instead of calling it quits, my human soaked me with water and forced me into the bushes to cool off (thank dog I don't get that poison ivy stuff because I spent half the day standing in it). This crazy keep-pug-cool strategy worked, because I made it to the top without overheating.

I wasn't sure what would happen when we got to the top of Montara Mountain, or how I'd even know when we got there. But when I saw the ocean (lots and lots of ocean, far far away) and a bench - I knew we'd made it.

PS: If you've never climbed a mountain before, there are a few things you should know: the going up part is waaay harder than the going down (I practically ran back to the car and got there before Dutch and my human), you get to eat LOTS of cookies, and someone should remember to bring a real camera and not just a cell phone so you can take nice pictures of the view to show your friends (I won't name names, but..).

FANCY WAY OF SAYING POOP?

So, we're pretty healthy here at my house. My human's idea of a "special treat" is a carrot. Not that carrots are bad. I like carrots. Me and brother Dutch each get a great big fat one everyday. But a pug can't live on carrots alone, right?

OK, to be 100% honest, we get other stuff too. Once a week we get a bully penis or a great big marrow bone. And every now and then - usually when my human wants us to leave her alone - we get something really... special. And by special, I mean junkfood.

Well, last night my human must have needed some alone time because she made a beeline for our junkfood stash and fished out the last bit of junk: a package of Busy Chewnolas. But instead of giving us tasty Chewnolas to snack on, she just stood there, reading the package.

ME: Uhm, what are you doing?
MY HUMAN: Checking the ingredients for propylene glycol.
ME: Uh?
MY HUMAN: It makes your snacks chewy. There was just a thing on TV about it being a common ingredient in dog treats - even though it can kill your liver or something.
ME: Oh. Can I have that Chewnola now?

And you know what she said? No. And not because of the liver-killing glycol stuff. Chewnolas have none of that in them. But they do have something called "animal digest" and that TOTALLY freaked my human out.

Because "animal digest" is just a fancy way of saying poop.

Poop! In my Chewnola? Uhm, Ok. I can live with that. But clearly my human couldn't because she threw the perfectly good Chewnolas in the garbage! Yeah.

So you know what I did when she wasn't looking? Of course you do. I fished a Chewnola out of the garbage, hid under a pillow, and tried to eat as much as I could before getting caught. I didn't get very far because Dutch totally narc'd on me, but I don't think the part I ate had any poop in it.

CRAZY NAKED PEOPLE

Yesterday I went to this thing called Bay to Breakers. It's a race from one side of San Francisco (the bay) to the other (the ocean - or, uh, breakers). Bay to Breakers has been happening every year for the past 99 years (!) but this is the first time I've been allowed to participate.

Sort of.

I didn't actually get to be in the race. My human said it'd be hard enough to run from one end of the city to another - she didn't want to worry about having to carry "my chunky pug butt" to the finish line. Carry me?? Who does she think I am, broken Frank? Seriously. Google says Bay to Breakers is a 12k. I don't really know what a "k" is, but if there's only 12 of them, I'm sure I could totally make it.

But I still ended up waiting at the finish line. Dressed up like a lobster. A lobster wearing running shoes. Yeah. I was NOT happy about this at first. I mean, I felt like such a complete dork standing there in a lobster suit. Until all the other dorks - uh, I mean runners - showed up. People were dressed in all sorts of crazy costumes. Flying Elvises. Human port-a-potties. French fries. Penguins. And a ton of other things I couldn't really identify.

Oh - and there were naked people. Lots and lots of crazy naked people.

I know I walk around naked pretty much every day. But I've got fur. People without clothes on are just... naked. And naked people running around in the cold? Yeah. That's not something I ever want to see again.

Anyway. By the time my human to crossed the finish line, I'd learned how to run in my new shoes. It was kinda weird at first, but once I got the hang of them, I felt really... FAST. Sooo fast that I challenged brother Dutch to a race. Of course he said yes to me and my new fast shoes because he always, always wins.

My human made me take off my fast new shoes for the race. She said they gave me an "unfair advantage". I was kinda disappointed, but whatever. As you can see in the photo-finish, the race was close, but my chunky pug butt kicked someone's spotted, uhm, be-hind. Even without my new fast shoes.

THIS NUGGET'S FOR YOU

A certain spotted someone hijacked my blog yesterday so I didn't get a chance to wish my man Stubby a happy birthday. Stubby is 13 now. And that officially makes him the wisest, greenest AND oldest pug on Earth. As far as I know, anyway.

If you've never met Stubby, there's something about him you should know. He LOVES Popeye's fried chicken. It's kinda his thing. Thanks to him, we visited a Popeyes last year to celebrate the day I came to live with my human. And I've been waiting for another Popeye's-worthy superspeical day to come ever since.

Stubby's 13th birthday sounded totally Popeye's worthy to me, but my human didn't see how feeding me fried chicken would celebrate Stubby's big day.

ME: But it's Popeyes!!
MY HUMAN: And?
ME: And, uhm, Stubby loves Popeyes so we should honor him by eating it?
MY HUMAN: Nice try.

It didn't look like Popeyes was going to happen, but then we heard our pug friend Anakin had to have emergency surgery - after he went to Popeyes... to get a birthday surprise for Stubby!

Kind of a long story, but Anakin accidentally ate some chicken legs. With the bones and everything. The vet cut open Anakin's belly and took back the bones, so he's doing OK now. But I don't think he really got a chance to enjoy his Popeyes.

When I told my human we now had Anakin's recovery AND Stubby's big day to celebrate, she totally caved. Half hour later, we were at the Popeyes drive-thru thingy placing an order. My human couldn't remember the name of what we got last time, but she knew it was boneless.

Uhm, we want those things that don't have bones? It's for my dogs, she said.

(the Popeye's person had no idea what she was talking about and probably thought she was a whacko)

You mean... Nuggets? he asked.

Minutes later, we drove away with a box of 6 tasty Nuggets. I had to share with Dutch, so they were gone in about 15 seconds. But before I inhaled my Nuggets, I made three wishes: good health for Anakin, a long happy life for Stubby, and another chance to eat at Popeyes.

IN MY DEFENSE

Hi everybody, Dutch here. You know I don't usually have much to say, but after what Pug wrote about our "sleeping arrangements", I feel like I need to defend myself.

First, let me make one thing clear: I love the little guy, I do. Pug is the best little brother on Earth. But he can be a bit of a... tyrant? And so Pug won't have to run off to ask Google, the word tyrant derives from the Latin tyrannus, meaning "illegitimate ruler". In classical politics, a tyrant is someone who has taken power by his or her own means as opposed to hereditary or constitutional power.

I was here first. I am bigger, stronger and smart enough to know the Latin origins of a word without running to Google. But who's in charge around here? Puglet.

And usually, this is fine with me. Pug can have the good spot on the couch. He can hog the camera and the internet all he wants. He can even play with my toys (except maybe my Henrietta rubber chicken). But when he starts talking smack and calling me a spotted-bed-hog? That's when I have to put my paw down and remind the little shrimp that *I* was here first and could squash him like a bug if I really wanted to.

Not that I ever would. But I could.

So, while it may be true that I take up slightly more bed than Pug, it is only because I am not shaped like a loaf of bread. When you have long legs, and an actual neck, snout and a tail, they have to go somewhere.

SLEEPING ARRANGEMENTS

OK, a few things. One: today's photo is pretty bad because my human took it with her phone before the sun was awake. Two: the pink sheets? Not my idea. And three: I usually don't "spoon" with brother Dutch. I swear. It must have been a set up. Y'know, to make us look cute or something.

Anyway. The way we sleep usually goes something like this: Dutch the-spotted-bed-hog gets 3/4 of the whole entire bed, my human gets the other 1/4 and I get whatever's left over. This usually means getting smushed in the middle like some kind of pug sandwich, so most of the time I find a spot at the foot of the bed, or on the empty pillow next to my human's head.

There's been some talk about getting a bigger bed, but the one we have is already huge. Besides, the problems isn't the bed. It's Dutch. If he slept like a normal dog, there'd be plenty of room for everyone.

My human has even threatened to make us sleep ON THE FLOOR (!). This only happens after she wakes up sore (and grumpy) from being smushed into a pretzel by the bed hog. I'm pretty sure she'd never make us sleep ON THE FLOOR? But still.

Wondering: what are the sleeping arrangements in your house? Has anyone ever spent the night ON THE FLOOR and lived to tell about it???

PUGS IN SPAAAAAACE

The other day I heard my human laughing hysterically at something on the computer. This happens sometimes so I didn't think much of it. Until she looked at me and said (still laughing) Pugs in Spaaaaaaace!!!

Uh, OK.

I thought maybe all the recent Flattie making had made her a bit nutso. But then she pointed at the computer and there it was: a pug. in space. Well maybe not really in space? But definitely dressed up like a spaceman. And totally up in the sky. With stars and stuff. And a giant floating dog biscuit.

I don't know why the space pug made my human laugh so hard - I think it's the coolest thing I've ever seen. And seeing it made me want to go to space too. It said right on the picture that pugs will be in space on May 15, 1-4pm. That's THIS weekend!! I told my human that we absolutely have to go. We MUST.

But she explained that Pugs in Space isn't really pugs going to space. It's the "theme" for this year's Pugagpalooza in Virginia.

ME: Pugapawhatta??

MY HUMAN: Pugapalooza. It's a fund raiser. For pug rescue. Your flat self will be there!

ME: Oh. Why can't I go too?

MY HUMAN: Because it's in Virginia and we live in California - about 3,000 miles too far away.

When I asked why we don't we have Pugapawhattas here, she didn't have an answer. I mean, we have a pug rescue and lots of pugs in need. Shouldn't we have something like that too? I asked Google about it and found out that LOTS of places have Pug Fests and Pug Parties and Pug-o-Ramas. But not us.

Do you have a Pugapawhatta-type thingy where you live?? And is anyone here going to be a pug in space this weekend???

HAPPY FLOWER DAY?

So, yesterday was another one of those human special-days. The flower store by our house was packed with people, so I thought it must be Flower Day or something. But when I asked my human about it, she kinda laughed and explained that flowers are part of the celebration, but not the reason for it.

What a surprise! Another special-day that seems like it's about one thing (like, say, Santa Claus), but is really about something else entirely (like Jesus' birthday). Why do humans always make the simplest things sooo confusing??

Anyway.

It turns out yesterday's special-day is one we all should celebrate: Mother's Day. Because we all have mothers, right? Uh, right. Except I haven't seen my mother since I was 5 months old. I mean, how can I celebrate someone I hardly know and will probably never see again?? I'm sure I totally loved my mom, but she kinda stopped being my mom when my human came along.

I've never heard of a special-day to celebrate our humans, have you? So I think we should pick a day and make Human's Day an official dog holiday. It'll be just like Mother's Day, but for our people. And we can celebrate it by eating some kind of tasty snack instead of buying a bunch of silly flowers.

Whaddya think??

GIANT FUR SAUSAGES!

Y'know how I asked everyone to donate their unwanted fur to help soak up oil in the Gulf? Well, I thought you might want to see how fur goes from being stuff our humans can't stand, to something really useful. I mean, the whole shedding-to-help-the-Gulf idea sounded a little crazy to me. Good, but kinda crazy.

Well. Yesterday I got a text from my man Stubby about a "Boom BBQ to help The Gulf" right here in San Francisco. Have to admit I had no idea what a 'boom' was when I got Stubby's message. But the BBQ part sounded great, so I talked my human into going.

It turns out "booms" are tubes of fur/hair that soak up spilled oil and keep it from spreading. Before our spare fur can do its thing to save the planet, it needs to be stuffed into a tube. Kinda like a great big sausage - only made of fur/hair and recycled panty hoses.

I didn't get to eat any BBQ, but it was really cool to see boxes of spare fur & hair get turned into Gulf-saving fur sausages. There was even a Pug standing by, in case of a sudden fur shortage (hi Triton!).

We're picking up bags of fur from our local groomer later today and me & Dutch have been shedding overtime to make our donation really count. If you have fur (or hair) to spare and would like to help clean up oil in The Gulf, please visit matteroftrust.org for info on how to donate your extra fluff.

FLATNESS

I know it's been, like, ages since my flat self has been around. And we're sad & sorry about that. Except maybe Dutch - he's kinda freaked out by Flat Puglet.

Well. The good news is that Flattie is finally ready to make a comeback. Our kitchen has been like a Flattie factory the past few days! After much printing, cutting and flattenting, my human (the Flattie-making machine) is *finally* done making a fresh batch of Flatties! A small herd of 23 Flat Puglets are finally ready to leave the nest.

Thanks to all the Green Pug publicity (I think?) we have 10 new Flat Puglet sponsors and added 67(!) hosts to the waiting list. Yippie!!

The bad news is there are still A LOT of Flatties from the first batch who are missing in action. Because we now have waaay more waiting hosts than flatties in action, me and Dutch coughed up (uh, I mean donated) some more cookie money to make another bunch of Flat Puglets to send out. So if you've been sitting on a Flattie for awhile, pleeeease do somethign with him soon!

The other bad news is my human has about 10 Flattie visits to add to the website. Between my Green self, my Flat self, my Daily self and whatever else she does all day - things just got a little swamped. But - now that the latest batch of Flatties are finished, she can get back to adding your visits to the website.

So, if you've sent in pictures, please don't think we've forgotten about you!!! We haven't and I can't wait to show everyone what my flat self did in your town :)

Oh yeah, and one more bit of good news. Even though Green Pug totally got in the way of Flat Puglet's mission, he did bring like 10,000 people to the Flat Puglet website. And helped save the planet at the same time!

NOT COMPATIBLE?

You're probably wondering where all the ridiculously cute pictures from my weekend with Frank are. Well, we didn't really get a chance to take any. Because we kinda broke Frank.

Not broke, like broke in half. But more like broken, as in no longer functioning.

On the first night, things were going great. As planned, we played non-stop for hours. And there's really no way to explain how two pugs play, so here's a video of me and Frank getting puggy:



The next day we headed over the bridge to where the cows live. I was all excited to take Frank on our cow hike, but when we got there, my human said we wouldn't be hiking because Frank and hiking "are not compatible". So, we just played in the creek and snacked on grass while my human read a book. It wasn't as much fun as hiking, but we still had a good time.

I had no idea what "not compatible with hiking" meant - until Frank refused to walk and my human had to carry him back to the car. Even though we only had to walk, like, half a mile!

After the carrying came the puking. Apparently poor Frank isn't compatible with grass eating either. Because he puked. A LOT. And the puking made him feel so sick HE DIDN'T EAT. Can you believe that?? A pug skipping dinner? And then breakfast the next day? I didn't think such a thing was possible.

Luckily, Frank's people were only gone for a few days because the not-eating thing totally freaked us out. We met up with them at PugSunday and poor Frank spent the whole time curled up on my human's lap. He's feeling better now (after getting one last puke out on his dad's computer keyboard) and I can't wait until my human goes away next month because I'm going to stay at Frank's house!

I'VE BEEN COLLAGED!

Remember awhile ago when I told you about the artist Sam Price? The one who turns little bits of paper into dogs? Well, yesterday I got the best surprise ever: an email from Sam with a picture of ME attached to it. A picture of me, as a collage.

Yup. Sam took hundreds of recycled magazine clippings, added a whole bunch of artisticness, and created a one-of-a-kind, handmade collage of yours truly. He said a picture of me "spoke to him in a unique way" and that my personality "makes an artist's job an easy one". Is that the biggest compliment you've ever heard, or what?

The picture that inspired Sam to collage me.

I have no idea how Sam is able to turn old magazines into a pug, but seeing his work really makes me wish I had thumbs. You can see more of Sam's work (and envy his thumbs even more) at his website, www.mydogcollage.com.

CALLING ALL SHEDDERS!

Unless you live under a rock, you've probably heard something about the giant oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico. Y'know, the one that's spewing tons of nasty black stuff into the ocean? Nasty black stuff that's going to hurt all the birds and fishes and turtles who call the ocean home.

If you've never met oil before, let me tell you - the stuff is nasty with a capital N. We had an oil leak here in San Francisco once when a boat crashed into a bridge. It was a tiny leak compared to what's happening in the Gulf, but it caused some serious problems. I wasn't around yet, but brother Dutch told me all about the globs of oil that washed up on our beaches, stuck to his fur and made him feel really sick when he tied to lick it off.

Dutch was lucky. My human scrubbed him with Dawn to remove the oil and they didn't go back to the beach until the oil was gone. But what about all the ocean creatures who live in and around the Gulf? They can't just go home and take a bath, then not go to the beach for awhile.

I feel very sad for the ocean creatures.

But my man Stubby - the greenest pug on the planet - came up with a way to do more than just feel sad about the oil spill. We can put our crazy shedding abilities to good use and donate our fur to help soak up the oil. Yup - you heard me. That stuff our humans vacuum up, lint-roll off, and curse at can help save The Gulf!

Dutch's fur alone could probably soak up the entire oil spill (all that stuff on the floor is his fluff) but just in case it's not enough, we're asking anyone with fur to spare to donate it. We asked our local groomers to send in their fur and are asking my human's hair lady, Courtney, to send in her salon's spare hair.

TO LEARN MORE & DONATE YOUR UNWANTED FUR
Visit matteroftrust.org. Please ask your local groomers & human hair people to donate too. Hair weighs practically nothing so it doesn't cost much to mail and it's only going to be swept up and thrown away anyway. I mean, why throw away something than can help save birds, fishes, or turtles?

Here's a video that explains the whole deal: