Book Review: All My Patients Kick and Bite (vet memoir, humor, MidWest)

All My Patients Kick and Bite: More Favorite Stories from a Vet’s Practice*, Jeff Wells, DVM (St. Martins Press, 243 pages, 2011, $24.99) (Prequel - All My Patients Have Tails: Stories from a Vet’s Practice, 2009)

Move Over, James Herriot!

Do you love vet memoirs like I do?

All My Patients was so heartwarming and entertaining that, after reading it in one day (the mark of a good book), I had to go out and purchase Dr. Wells’ previous memoir, All My Patients Have Tales: Favorite Stories form a Vet’s Practice** which may even be better (with 36 short chapters).

Twenty-four stories about a few dogs and fewer cats, but more about horses and cows and llamas and alpacas and even more about the human characters who belong to the animals - what vets really think about them but are too polite to say -add to the making of a dedicated veterinarian with a mixed practice in a small town in the Rockies. Well-balanced as to species to say the least!

Gently written by a gentle veterinarian, All My Patients will give you insight into a truly dedicated veterinarian who patiently and humorously suffers some of his clients and staff in order to improve the lives of his patients, the animals. Dr. Wells also writes a seasonal view of the Colorado Rockies and its gorgeous fall foliage, but more often, working solo to the light of truck headlights in a snow that is falling horizontally, trying to save a new calf - alone.

Snowstorm after Snowstorm?

Yes, snowstorms do figure hugely in these memoirs, especially at night, on a holiday, during a complicated birth in the Colorado Rockies but Dr. Wells also manages to convey to the reader how fortunate he is to be able to do the work he does. After all, how many of us receive heartfelt gratitude on a daily basis - from caring owners and even more caring kids. How many of us have the opportunity to see a patient recover quickly from a difficult birthing process or low blood sugar? How many of us seem to spend most of our time chasing the patient before we can catch him to examine him (especially as a newly practicing vet in front of skeptical, amused humans)?

What Vets Really Think About Their Clients

Most of the hilarious moments were shared only between vet and vet staff or between the vet and himself (and us). I’m sure the names have been changed to protect the guilty! We smile gently at the myriad of porcupine quills removed from the same trio of dogs twice in one day. Yes, they were Jack Russell terriers who finally got the best of their porcupine!

The Birth and Education of a Vet

Anyone interested in becoming a vet (or wishing they had become one) will enjoy the background of growing up on a hobby-farm in Iowa and starting a practice in South Dakota before moving to Colorado and eventually specializing in equines with just enough anecdotes about education, about why Dr. Wells became a vet, and about his family, to make this a longitudinal reading rather than just a collection of cute stories that go nowhere.

If you liked Dr. Nick Trout’s Tell Me Where It Hurts: A Day of Humor, Healing and Hope in My Life as an Animal Surgeon, you will love All My Patients. It may take a few chapters to fall in love with All My Patients: if you find this is so, just skip ahead to a chapter that sounds more intriguing and you will be caught up in one great tale after another.

 I give Dr. Wells five bones to chew on!

Tomorrow: The prequel
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*First reviewed in 2012.
**Purchased and mistakenly gave away!

EverythingDogBlog: Passing on Good Information

From Puppy to Dog

How old is my puppy before we call her a dog?

Saint Moose and Puppy Seymour

According to Dogster (April/May 2015), a puppy is a puppy until he reaches reproductive maturity and becomes a junior who is still growing. When he stops growing, he will become an adult. We use the term, mature, for an adult until he reaches about the last 25% of his expected lifespan which depends on breed (small breeds tend to live longer). He becomes a senior from maturity to his expected life expectancy and then he is termed geriatric. (AAHA)

Clear as Mud? Look at This.

Term	Age
Puppy	Until pup reaches reproductive maturity
Junior	Reproductively mature but still growing
Adult	Growth has stopped
Mature Adult	Until dog reaches the last 25% of his expected life span, which differs from breed to breed
Senior	Until his expected life span is reached
Geriatric	A dog who exceeds his expected life expectancy

(photo credit: SBrown)

DVD Review (not dogs): Eye of the Dolphin (Bahamas, dolphin, teenaged girl)

Eye of the Dolphin (2006/2008, DVD, 103 minutes, Quantum Entertainment)

Boy meets girl, . . . .

Boy meets, girl. Boy loses girl. Boy gets girl back again - the theme of many many books and especially movies for teens and adults.

For children, the theme may be something like this: Kid has a problem with his or her parents (or another kid or a teacher or a murder or some other problem). Often it is the parents who ‘just don’t get it.’ A crisis occurs and the kid solves the problem and teaches the parents a lesson so they change for the better.

Eye of the Dolphin

Such is the story behind Eye of the Dolphin. A troubled teen-age girl is sent to live with the father she never met before, in the islands of the Bahamas. Father (named Hawk) is not aware he has a daughter but he is also about to have his dolphin research station shut down by the local government due to lack of funding.

The Dilemma

Can the girl and her marine biologist researcher father reconcile with the help of the dolphins and can the dolphins be saved in turn? How does the troubled teen turn around her life and that of so many others while appearing onscreen in a different outfit in each scene?

“She found her voice in the ocean. . . and within herself.”

Not a bad movie. Not bad at all. Good lessons and great scenery (geological, human, and houses). The fabulous Katherine Ross is the grandmother who delivers the teen to Father after Mother’s death.

Sequel: Beneath the Blue/Way of the Dolphin

Movie Review: Santa's Dog or Hercules Saves Christmas (yellow lab or lovely friendly talkative pit bull, orphan boy)

Santa’s Dog? Or Hercules Saves Christmas? (DVD, NAMP - Gaiam Studio, 2011 or 2012, 80 minutes)

No, Not the Wrong Movie – Or Was it?

When Blockbusters downsized drastically, I purchased a few DVDs (mostly dog movies) from their remaining stock. One DVD case was titled Santa’s Dog (with a yellow Lab) and the DVD itself had the Santa’s Dog sticker on it but the DVD turned out to be Hercules Saves Christmas (with not-a-yellow-Lab).

Huh?

Of course, I wondered what was going on when a beautiful pit bull appeared early on, on screen, and became the star in nearly every scene. I thought that perhaps the yellow lab on the DVD case and label would be a present to a little boy from Santa and the end so I continued to watch with my usual critical eye.

Not a bad movie at all, with a lovely friendly pit bull. Replacing the DVD into the jewel case after the movie was over, I finally read the words on the DVD case about the story. As they say, truth is stranger than fiction – the words fit the movie I had just reviewed – Hercules Saves Christmas but the dog shown on the front and back was the yellow lab.

Enough of this Mystery and on to the Movie

Munchkin elves help Santa determine who is on the Nice list and who is on the Naughty list. One lucky orphan boy is given the chance to move from Naughty to Nice if he can convince a specific grumpy ol’ man (actually, a grumpy young man – after all this is a movie) to embrace the Christmas spirit. Our little orphan tries to transfer with the help of Santa’s dog, Hercules, who speaks without using his mouth (but his red collar lights up with his words). Of course, Hercules is invisible to all but the little boy.

The munchkins have their own quirks and foibles, and manage to mess things up in their own delightful ways as Hercules’ magical powers seem to be fading. If they fade entirely, he turns into just a mortal dog, not a dog who can speak.

The Race is on!

Who will win the race before Christmas – the good guys (boy and dog) or the bad elves who left Santa’s employ to do evil in the world?

Characters

This holiday story is spectacular with the acting talents of both Claus’ and with Hercules the dog. Sally, the love interest, is delightful but Mackenzie Phillips steals the show!

Does the boy fulfill his mission to do good? Does Hercules remain an elf-dog or become a real family pet? Does the grumpy man marry his girlfriend? Does the little orphan boy get adopted? For the answers to these and other questions, watch this family flick! Kids will love the dog and the suspense while parents will stay tuned for the fast-paced banter.

PS – I found four different DVD cover photos on the Internet, one with a yellow lab like the one I purchased. The others are versions of the real movie dog but why wasn’t Hercules smiling? Perhaps he is camera-shy?

Ah, the Mystery is Solved!

It seems that some time between 2011 and 2012, the title changed from Hercules Saves Christmas to Santa’s Dog (or what it the other way around?) but some of the original cover photos remained. Ah, the mystery is solved!

Will the real dog please stand up? Or, I’ll have to ask my son to review this review to make sure I have everything right, like dog, title, photo. . . .

Movie Review: Golden Winter (pups, Christmas, loyalty, slapstick criminals)

Golden Winter: Homeless for the Holidays (Warner Bros., DVD, 2012, 89 minutes)

Gang of Five, Litter of Five

A gang of five ‘bad’ boys, a litter of five golden pups taking off on the popularity of the litter of golden pups in Snow Buddies, Treasure Buddies, Space Buddies, and the other Buddy movies.

This is another litter of lovely little golden retrievers: four males and one female named Snoozer, Jumper, Rory, Scarf and Tinkle, and their canine mom Lady plus a couple of cattle dog guard dogs and even a dog-riding guard Chihuahua.

But perhaps Golden Winter should be called Golden Christmas since it is all about the holiday. An abandoned house, an abandoned litter, a too wealthy family, a dog adoption, a busy mom and dad who learn to slow down and smell the flowers, thanks to their son, our hero. And Santa and elves, and a tree and presents, and soccer.

The holiday theme of learning about loyalty and what is really important, family, whether human or canine or human and canine. . . .

A Twist a Minute

Not eerie eyes but eerie teeth. Golden Winter fortunately had excellent dog trainers and the dogs’ words match their actions and even their mouth movements; however, when they talk, their teeth look like shark teeth or senior citizen teeth. (When not speaking, the canine teeth seem to be regular puppy teeth.) This may gross out some little girls but the boys will love it along with a few excellent characters, plot twists and ‘saves.’

However, . . . .

The best part is the trailer, unless you are a little boy or someone who simply loves golden pups!

Movie Review: The Dog who Saved the Holidays (yellow labs, pup, Christmas, family)

The Dog Who Saved the Holidays (Anchor Bay Studio, DVD, 2012, 87 minutes)

What could be better at Christmas than a family and a dog (or two) or, better yet, a movie about a family and a dog or two.

The Dog Who Saved the Holidays is a sequel* to The Dog Who Saved Christmas (2009) and The Dog Who Saved Christmas Vacation (starring the voice of Paris Hilton as a poodle)(2010).

Home Alone for the Holidays

The original, The Dog Who Saved Christmas, is a take-off of Home Alone but with a delightfully smart and sometimes naughty yellow lab, Zeus, in place of the boy. The Dog Who Saved the Holidays again features the lovable Bannister family from Connecticut, this time visiting a wealthy aunt in California who gives the family an early Christmas present – a yellow lab puppy, Eve, who manages to steal the thunder from our hero Zeus who is blamed for everything the puppy does. Zeus decides to leave but the movie happens before he has the chance to.

Bumbling Burglars

Each movie also features Ted and Stewey, a bumbling pair of burglar wanna-be’s if ever there was. Slapstick humor abounds for boys watching the series who will also dissect the mistakes, puppy love satisfies the girls and women, and men will savor the fact that the whole family is together watching a movie. The Bannisters are delightfully inept, from father and mother to the two kids, a girl and a boy.

Lab lovers everywhere will be glued to the screen.

Quasi Spoiler Alert: For those viewers who don’t like talking dogs, this movie has them though it is their thoughts that are verbalized: their mouths do not move. And often, the dogs’ actions and words are less than synchronous. Nevertheless, it is a delightful family flick.

Over and Over Again

I’ve seen this movie twice and liked it better the second time. At that rate, I should give it five stars in 2016. And all my respect goes to the lab, a former rescue dog and female, who plays Zeus in all three movies. Michael Gross, Jack Scalia and Shelley Long also have roles in this canine flick.

*A sequel to The Dog Who Saved Christmas, The Dog Who Saved Christmas Vacation aired on ABCFamily in 2010. The Dog Who Saved Halloween was released directly to DVD in 2011; The Dog Who Saved the Holidays, in 2012; The Dog Who Saved Easter, in 2104; and The Dog Who Saved Summer, in 2015.

Book Review: Death in Show (dog walker, Manhattan, dog show, poison)

Death in Show: A Dog Walker Mystery, by Judi McCoy (New American Library/Penguin, 2010, 326 pages, $6.99)

A Short Review of a Long Book

Ah, mysteries. And about a dog walker to boot! How entrancing. Seemingly right up my alley.

An Enjoyable Read, If. . . .

If you like little dogs who are often carried. If you like designer dogs like a yorkiepoos. If you like Manhattan. If your little dog wears a coat in inclement weather. If you like walking a bunch of dogs together (only in New York or on TV!) – generally from the same high-rise apartment building. If you like dog names like Rudy and Lulu (dogs) and people names like Flora and Ellie. If you believe someone can make a good living walking dogs in New York City.

However, . . . .

I am a big dog person. I like pure-bred dogs as well as All-American dogs (mutts). I generally walk one dog at a time. I do adore mysteries, however, and Death in Show is about a huge dog show in New York City but one in which Best in Group is won by a new amateur handler in her first show. I also couldn’t imagine walking dogs starting at 8 am. What time do their people go to work – 4 am? Some, certainly, are the idle riche who employ housekeepers for their apartments or penthouses and pay others, including dog walkers, to take care of their dogs.

And, to boot, our dog walker, Ellie, talks to dogs and they talk back to her! She is called a dog psychic in one book. What the dogs say is in italics so you can differentiate human words from canine words, thank goodness. Even with that, I sometimes was lost in the translation.

Death in Show is number three in the dog walker mystery series. Other titles include Fashion Faux Paw, Begging for Trouble, Till Death Do Us Bark , Heir of the Dog, and Hounding the Pavement – cute and clever titles. Clever also is a frequent play on words in Death in Show, however, a bit contrived.

A Little Romance

Although not a romance novel, Death in Show stars a budding relationship between our Ellie DogWalker and her Sam, an NYPD detective, in an on-again, off-again relationship. He saves her in the nick of time and also tries to protect her by keeping her out of the thick of things but still, our Ellie solves the murder, of course.

McCoy has written six dog walker mysteries, but I think one is enough for me. Anyone want the copy I purchased?