We had a 5 yr old cocker spaniel which we lost to the tainted dog food, and my husband was so upset and depressed, I have not read your book but I am going to purchase it for my husband for Chirstmas, he really loves your show in the evening we only get one hour in St. Louis. I did finally after only 6 weeks find a black cocker spaniel at a pet rescue and he fills the void, but my husband still misses his dog Brady so much, he was our baby as we are both remarried and have no kids between us. But our new Buddy makes us so happy and we see him doing some of the same things Brady did.
Keep up the great work in trying to turn people around in this really messed up world. Have a Merry Christmas and Happy and Safe New Year.

David from MO

Thank you for sharing your story on Sprite. I can’t tell you how much your book affected me. I do Norwegian Elkhound rescue (have 4) and volunteer in a shelter. I just wanted to let you and your family to know that we are thinking of Sprite having lots of fun playing in Rainbow Bridge but we also know you miss him, especially today.

Daphne from VA

Oh Mark when I heard you on the John Gambling show there other day I was stopped in my tracks when you shared – about today – Dec 7th. You see it’s my birthday. When I was about 8 of 9 I woke up to a Happy Birthday – right – wrong – my parents were very concerned – there was an ambluence across the street and it turned out our neighbor died – a complete shock to all. She was a dear friend of my mother’s. At 52 – that is still vivid in my mind on each birthday and now Sprite will be too.

I bought 2 copies of your book about the day it came out – gave one to a close friend but I just can’t get too far on mine. My dogs are both getting up there in age and that time will come all too soon enough and then I will have time to read it but for now I will just spend the time with them making their time with me as happy as I can make it – as happy as they make it for me. I’ll be thinking of you today – Dec 7 – with many memories for so many people for so many different reasons. Today will be hard for you – Sergei, Katie and I will keep you in our prayers. (those dogs are good at prayers I’ve found)

Mark from NY

What a wonderful companion Sprite was! Mark and his family were the angels that saw him through a difficult time in his last years. Sprite loved them very much. I just read the book because it was good therapy for me. You see, misery loves company, but in it we find strength to move forward and count our blessings—how ironic but it is true.

I lost my beautiful and astonishing Mesha Little Bear Mouse almost 2 months ago at 14 years. With pitch black flowing fur, so leggy he had to cross his legs to keep them out of the way, and so intelligent he was that I had to go to obedience training school to keep up with him.

OUTLAW DOG: He was also a victim of canine racism, (he and his type) based on fairy tales and narrow minded people, so despite this setback he became an ambassador to his race to go way beyond what anyone could expect for the average dog. Mesha was a wolfdog, half wolf, half Shiloh Shepherd, a combination that won him a CD obedience title with the highest qualifying scores, agility competition awards, a Canine Good Citizen award, sled pull awards, high jump awards, broad jump awards, and confirmation awards on his movement and appearance. Most of all, we had such a great bond we were a team that couldn’t be separated. I was very proud of Mesha as any dog owner would know the time and work spent with a best friend to perfect a sport and win every time.

A BEAUTIFUL MIND: He went beyond and further, and had a great communication he played out like in schrades, using objects he would retrieve, put it together to form a sentence and motioning what he wanted. For example Mesha wanted a dog treat (cookies) but when I looked on the fridge, we were out, so I told him, “All Gone”. He must have thought I was stupid, so he went to the garbage and retrieved the empty box of treats and laid it at my feet. Then whined in a “hmmm?” noise and pointed his nose at the top of the fridge. He repeated himself. Then he got me to say hummmm? I looked on top of the fridge again and behind the clutter of dog toys, there was a new box of treats that had fallen over.

OLD TRAPPER: Mesha baited his own traps with dog toys he purposely laid in traffic area of the house, and hid behind a coffee table to catch our other dogs running around the corner who would take the bait. Tashie, his daughter was especially a sucker for his games. He would pounce on them when they took the bait. This baffled me. Was he watching Wiley Coyote cartoons on TV and his Acme machines to catch the Roadrunner when I wasn’t home? I found out one of his aunts did this to trap mice, so this probably was an inherited trait.

TEACHER: I tapped Mesha the nose with my finger and took my finger to my eyes for “look” when I needed his attention to learn a new command when he was distracted. (He learned 43 different commands and sometimes doing our routine every day got boring for him). Mesha turned the tables on me after he retired from shows and did it to me. He would wake me from sleep by tapping his cold nose to my nose and saying “Hummm?” and gave that face in my face stare, “Look at me” ..Sometimes he would take me to the Twilight Zone. I knew he expected me to read his thoughts. He practiced this every day to see if I could guess what he was thinking. Electrons of “thought” were bouncing between his brain and mine like the way aliens communicate. It worked. When Mesha asked me a question with “Hummm”? his tone went up at the end like human speech so I knew he was polite enough to ask and not demand. Read the rest of this entry »

When our daughter’s wonderful yellow lab Goldie died, we gave a memorial donation to her church. Father Tom went out and bought and planted himself a yellow dogwood tree on the church grounds. Now when we worship in that place, we see the tree and remember our faithful and loving granddog. Recently our son lost his faithful Alice, a wonderful dog adopted from a shelter. We gave Peter your book to read in memory of Alice. The other night Pete’s 10-year old daughter called long distance to tell us she had taken the book before her parents could read it. She said it was a wonderful book even though it made her cry. Thanks, Mark.

Sarah from IL

This unfortunately will be a bit of an involved story…

Shortly after we were forced to put our beloved 4-year old cat, Klaatu, to sleep February 2004 (when we rescued him he had undetected feline leukemia that ultimately killed him), we decided to adopt again. Klaatu was an Oriental Shorthair and we love the breed’s personality, so we decided to try and get a pair of Oriental Shorthair brothers. They’re difficult to find, but we finally located a woman who had two younger half-brothers. When she arrived at our house it became obvious why she insisted on coming to us; the cats smelled of urine and both were put in the same small carrier for the 2 hour drive to our house. She admitted to having nearly fifty cats, and one of the boys, who she said had a simple eye infection, obviously had a more serious problem with his eye.

The boys were charming, and obviously we couldn’t let them go back with her, so we took them and named them Spinlock and Mutex, in tribute to our computer – geek side (Mutex is the one with the bad eye). They both had pneumonia, but that cleared up quickly and they settled in.

We love our boys and even took them sailing with us on our honeymoon. We have no children together yet, and they became a huge part of our lives. Read the rest of this entry »