SNT Guest Blogger

Good Morning to my mom's blog followers.

My name is Eddie's Frosty St. Nicholas, but you can call me Nick. I'm a 4-year old Golden Retriever and if you know about us Goldens, you'll know that we're usually too busy having fun to do anything else but this issue demands that I speak! (woof)

Everyone is concerned about this Swine Flu thingy and since no one else has spoken up for us dogs yet, the mantle has fallen on me and I'll gladly wear it. Wait! Mantle?? That isn't that thing they tie around your neck when you get your haircuts and they make you all nice smelly, is it? 'Cause if it is, I will NOT wear the mantle 'cause I hate those things! It makes me look like a sissy to all my posse .. I'd rather just have my collar with jingles on it, if it's alright with you! (oh .. that's called a neckerchief .. dumb sissy name .. OK, one mantle wearing dog right now I'll be then!)

First there was Mad Cow disease and all you humans got all upset about that. Those cows weren't mad .. they were just dizzy. Well, maybe some got mad when they fell down a bunch of times, but my mom falls down all the time and SHE doesn't get mad! (dad says she has low blood sugar/low blood pressure and should know better than to jump up out of her chair, but I think she watches me and I jump up all the time and I don't fall down! )

Now all you humans talk about is Swine Flu.

Have you ever seen a pig sneeze? Have you ever seen a pig with a thermometer? I don't think so! Swines do not get the flu!! Even when there was all that uproar about that about Bird Flu and that the birds all got it from the pigs .. have you ever seen a bird and pig talking together and sneezing and shaking hands without that goop you humans put all over your hands? I think not!

Pandemic .. shamdemic! It's People Flu and that's that!!!

If you want to talk about potential pandemics .. have you seen the amount of squirrels around lately? Now there's an epidemic!

First there were just those little chippymunks .. the cats should have kept those under control, but apparently those fuzzy mices mom gives them that smell so funky are distracting them. And those suckers are quick .. have you seen how fast they run? Once big brown squirrels were all we had .. now there are black squirrels. And then some of them stayed out in the sun too long and bleached out to grey, so you see those all over the place now too. And don't get me started on those ground squirrels .. I think those are the result of the big brown squirrels and the chippymunks getting together. I don't know for sure, 'cause that would be a result of S.E.X, and dad says I don't know anything about that 'cause I'm neutered (whatever that means!)

I digress (quickly licking self)

Those squirrels are everywhere ... whenever you look out of those see-thru doors .. there they are! Trying to take over the NW corner of Oakland County and it would appear, it's all up to me to control them in my yard .. no talk on the big grey box about squirrel pandemics .. not yet anyway!I try! I really do! I can almost climb the apple tree when they run up there, and if that oak tree was lower, I could try to climb it too. (I really don't mean to run into it from time to time, I just run so fast I can't help it!)

Mom and dad DID put in a 'squirrel dispenser' for me a few years back, but they don't keep it filled like they do the bird feeders. If you chase the squirrels just right, they'll run up the bird feeder and hide under that big black thingy. Then .. when you peek under the black thingy thing, and if you bump it upwards with your nose .. sometimes a squirrel falls out!! It's really cool .. but they SHOULD keep it filled more often for me.

OK .. Big Chocolate Lab is at the see-thru door and I have to go sniff him and then we have to run around and pee on things. Important Stuff (woof woof)

So .. dogs of stitcher's unite .. together we can fight off this squirrel pandemic!