Top Ten Safe Travel Tips For Your Pet

It's been about 11 days of heat and high humidity here in New England...yucky, sticky and hard to breathe unless I am happily splashing in the waves at my favorite beach, which sadly, hasn't happened since the summer of 2008....Sad, I know. Living here in "The Ocean State," there is a slew of beautiful beaches...big waves, no waves, undertow, no undertow...One only needs to ask, "Do I want to tan or do I want to play and ride the waves like a kid again? Do I want to bring lunch or grab some clamcakes and chowdah?"

You decide...I will pass again this year and go for another bathing suit hunt next March...

I didn't go to the beach. No, instead I went to visit my friend, Kori at the laundromat this afternoon. You may remember her from the blog post of the pet-friendly laundromat in Warren, RI. Just scroll down, you'll find it here somewhere. We chatted and laughed over a quick snack of bagels and cream cheese...certainly snacks that will maintain my waist in "bathing suit shape."

As Kori went back to her washing, drying and folding, I sat on my beachbody butt and browsed through the Travel Issue 2010 of The Animal Print Magazine. Turning the page, I found the *Top Ten Safe Car Travel Tips With Your Pet. Number Seven on the list made me laugh because I remembered something my Scully Boy did the first Spring he was with me...Spring of 2000.

Ah yes...I remember it well...

Scully and I had taken my mother to the dentist. It was a lovely, sunny spring day. Accustomed to sitting on my left arm and looking out the window, young Scully fell asleep...I was enjoying peace and contentment as he dozed. Birds were singing. The sky was blue. It was the perfect morning.

All of a sudden Scully barked and JUMPED OUT THE WINDOW of the car! That tiny dog FLEW like a hawk and was under bushes and briars and dense overgrowth in a nearby field..a small, dense field of overgrowth... He went UNDER the briars that his mama had to run through,scratching her legs, face and arms to find him...matching the color of the not-yet green brush, every time I reached to grab him, his prey led him just beyond my reach. I could hear him barking and scurrying toward the busy, main street. Fear was beginning to overtake me as I desperately tried not to imagine the worst. The good news was that I might be able to get him before he made it to the street. The bad news was that he had a really, really good headstart.

Luckily, I did eventually catch the rascal but...my heart stopped at least ten times in what was probably less than ten minutes...Please follow this link to The Animal Print Magazine and click on the current issue.
When it loads, click for Full screen mode...then roll over the pages until see Top Ten...and then you can zoom in to read it. Sounds like homework but it's fun and makes me feel like I actually have a clue!

Enjoy the list and think of cute, little Scully...giving me a run for my money...the first of many!



*Courtesy of the ASPCA www.aspca.org