ohmidog!

 

 On a trip this week to do some book research, I stopped for a visit at the Avery County Humane Society, up in the mountains of western North Carolina, and came across a pup who looked like a miniature version of my dog, Ace.

Ace, as you regulars know, is 130 pounds, a chow-Rottweiler mix (according to a DNA test) who’s so tall I can rest my hand on his back when we go for a walk.

Peanut, one of about 40 dogs at the shelter, was a mini-Ace — same face, same coat, same coloring, same floppy ears, same soulful eyes — but on bassett hound legs.

Seven months old, he was brought into the shelter because his owners lost their home to foreclosure, and had to move in with the in-laws.

The staff at the shelter was kind enough to let me play with him, and snap a few pictures.

The shelter was the cleanest I’ve ever seen — as pristine as the mountains in which it is nestled, and while the director wasn’t there, the youthful staff (none appeared to be over 21) seemed to have things well in hand.

Tempted I was to bring Ace home a little brother, reason won out (we’ve still got that newly arrived cat, after all) and I left Peanut behind, knowing he’s in good hands and hoping he’ll find a good home.

Dixie, a 15-year-old ginger cat who disappeared in 1999, was reunited with its owners, a British couple who thought she had been killed by a car.

The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) said Wednesday that the cat, thin and disheveled, was found less than a half a mile from her home in Birmingham. An RSPCA officer checked the cat’s microchip and she was returned to her owners.

“In 29 years of working for the RSPCA I have never seen anyone so excited and happy,” RSPCA Animal Collection Officer Alan Pittaway said. “It made my day to return Dixie to her owners.”

Alan and Gilly Delaney were “overjoyed” to be reunited with their missing cat after so many years.

“Dixie’s personality, behavior and little mannerisms have not changed at all,” said Gilly Delaney. “We don’t think she has stopped purring since she came back through the door.”