On Loving Animals...

Well, it's another day of coming to work with a less favorable attitude towards humankind. This attitude was born in the streets of New York, just this morning actually, when the guy behind me at the coffee line thought that his schedule was more urgent than mine. Some people are just impatient and disrespectful of others. If this guy had a bullhook, he would have used it to " guide " me out of his way, very much like how Ringling Bros. Barnum and Bailey Circus guides their elephants to do unnatural and humiliating acts for our entertainment and the circus' profit. Speaking of disrespect, there is yet another video of elephant abuse circulating in the blogosphere. This time, it's in Greece. When will people realize that you can't have a bullhook, and not equate it with beatings? If bullhooks are guiding tools, why does it have a spear point and a sharp hook? You wouldn't consider a bullhook a guiding tool when brought into an elementary school environment....

In today's mailbox, there is a message from PETA about seals and maple syrup. Oh Lord, don't tell me that...that...is that why it's so sticky? Oh no. Well, as it turns out, there really isn't a bit of seal in the syrup, but a whole lot of Canada. You see, Canada produces 85% of the maple syrup in the global market, and the U.S. is her biggest customer. We're talking more of an economic embargo than sweetening Canadian maple syrup with seal blood. So, the next time you need to stock up on maple syrup, make sure it's made in Vermont.

Wayne Pacelle, he needs no introduction. In his blog entry for May 20th, Pacelle talked about working with Michael Vick, now that the animal abuser is set to go free. However, the peculiar thing about Pacelle's post is that he prefaced his point with a long history of his and the HSUS's campaign against animal cruelty. It gave me the impression that he's not yet comfortable with the idea, like he's expecting a tsunami of criticism for even suggesting the idea. You don't have to gear up like a hockey goalie, Wayne. It's not such a bad idea. Well, as a matter of fact, I have previously considered the idea before I read Pacelle's post, and found it to be quite the natural progression from this point on. Vick has paid the price, in time and money, and he is free to rebuild his life. Will he go back to dogfighting? I don't think he is that stupid. All he wants to do now is to regain his former glory and begin to earn mega bucks once more. Has he learned his ...

Sunday came, and I had to decide between supporting a friend who is trying to establish a Sunday chess meet at Ridgewood, NJ or supporting an ideal that I passionately believe in---a meatless society and a lifestyle that can be loosely summed up as vegetarianism. I love chess, and it has been the only game in my life. I just love the concentration and problem-solving aspect of the game. But, it is only a board game and a selfish game at that. Winning in chess makes ME, and only ME, happy. My opponent, he's devastated. The others, they don't give a hoot. So, the choice was not as difficult as it seemed. There is no higher ideal in my life than animal welfare. Yesterday was the second annual Veggie Pride Parade, and approximately 800 people participated. We met at the meat packing district on West 14th street, and marched through Greenwich Village, ending at Union Square. It was heart-warming to see all these people come out for animal welfare which vegetarianism is mostly about....

Deja Vu All Over Again. History does repeat itself. Looking over the news this afternoon, I found it odd that Yahoo would carry a news item that was several months old. Gee, they're really getting lazy up there. But, I was wrong. This morning at around 630am, we had our own version of Chile's heroic and faithful dog rescue right on the Major Deegan . A Yellow Lab/Chow mix was hit by a car near Exit 3, where the Grand Concourse meets the Deegan , and her son ran to the rescue. The dog kept all good-intentioned people away from the injured dog including the police. In the end, the downed mom received the medical attention she needed and the rescuer ran home after dodging the police for several minutes. The Major Deegan is probaby my next least appreciated road in the tristate area, second to the Cross Bronx Expressway, and now I have something good to associate with it. I hope there's a video of this entire incident. The news crews must be trampling over each other for an...

The things people do to animals. I was told by a long-time animal rights activist that it wasn't an exaggeration to say that almost everything you find in a hardware store has been used to cause pain in an animal. I don't find that hard to believe actually. Not too long ago, at the animal control facility where I volunteer at, a mastiff was brought in with both his ears sheared off. No ear flaps, just cavernous holes on both sides of his head. Now, what sick individual would do something like that? A sick individual, that's who! Below is a link to what's happening in Malaysia. Go on, the link doesn't contain photos of dogs being slaughtered. Instead, it contains photos of dogs abandoned on an isolated island. These were stray dogs who lived in a small community whose citizens decided that the best way to deal with them was to ship them over to an isolated island and leave them there for good. Pretty cruel stuff considering that the island is more of a mangrove tha...

Rain. Rain. Today must be the fourth straight day that rain has fallen on New York City. April has come and gone, and so why the showers and no flowers? I can tolerate my raincoat for only one day after which I could be described as the typical New Yorker however unjust that might be. Perhaps having worked in Manhattan for more than thirty years had actually engendered a constant state of grumpiness in me. But, I am giving New yorkers a bad rap. Walking along Fifth Avenue, I noticed that everybody seemed to have a grudge against me. Even the coffee cart guy said something that I took offense to as I passed by. I must be having a bad day. So I ducked into my favorite coffee shop on 38 th and ordered some breakfast. The newspaper is usually free to read with the breakfast. There, the New York Daily News had a headline I couldn't ignore. A cow had, out of an intense desire to live, escaped from the Musa Hala , Inc. slaughterhouse on Beaver Road near 158 th Street in Queens and ra...

Some great news from across the pond. So great you could almost hear the seals bark in joyous symphony. Today, the European Union officially said NO to all products stemming from the cruel Canadian seal hunts that have irrevocably stained that country's reputation. We've heard about this rejection for some time now, but now it has become official. Those seal hunters will just have to find a real job with real skills, like landscaping a frozen tundra. No more hacking away at innocent, sentient beings; no more wading in the warm blood of freshly killed seals. How lucky of them! Not all murderers get a second chance in life. I am sure that in the future these hunters will present themselves as involuntary participants in this most cruel business, just following orders, just earning a living, all those lame excuses. Let's do some math, shall we? According to the Humane Society International , the price of canadian seal fur declined 86% since 2006 to $ 15 per skin, and that'...

I won't make this long. Here is the URL of a petition I wrote urging key faculty members of the University of the Philippines, Diliman, to sanction a self-confessed cat serial killer within its student body. Please read and sign the petition if you agree with it: http://www.thepetitionsite.com/102/Justice-for-Tengteng