ohmidog!

Suspects in a Houston-area home burglary have confessed to choking to death a police dog who was pursuing them, FOX 26 in Houston reported.

Harris County deputies sent K-9 teams into a wooded area Tuesday night in  search of two of the three suspects, but one of the dogs — a five year old German shepherd mix named Bleck — never came back and was later found dead.

One of the suspects who was found in the woods confessed to fatally choking the dog, Fox26 reported. A third supect was found in a car trying to escape from authorities.

Members of the Harris County Sheriff’s Office say a necropsy will be performed on the dog.

 
My first Christmas guest has arrived and, after bumping into everything there is to bump into, has made herself right at home.

Cheyenne, raised to be a guide dog for the blind, never got to fulfill that role. The possibility that she was going to develop hip problems prevented her from going on with her training. The hip problems never came to be, but Cheyenne, now 11, started going blind herself at age 5.

As dogs will do, she has adapted magnificently.

She walks slowly and gingerly, high-stepping when in unfamiliar surroundings. When she bonks her head on something, she backs up and heads in a new direction. Outdoors, when we come to a curb, I, as instructed, say “step,” and she seeks it out with her paw and steps up. 

I have her for the week, while her owners visit family down south, and it has been amazing to watch her as she adjusts to new surroundings. Equally amazing has been watching how gracious my dog Ace has been — sharing the couch (it’s his favorite spot, too); not raising a stink when she walks over, into and even under him; and helping herd her in from the two feet of snow in the backyard when she loses her bearings.

On their first trip to the yard, Ace ran circles around and did that downward dog stance dogs do. Cheyenne just sat there, not knowing Ace was sending the play signal. Since then Ace has caught on, I think, to the fact that she’s blind. He’s extra careful around her, and acting like a big brother.

Cheyenne, who loves carrots and lettuce, will be with me through Christmas, and two more canine house guests are still to arrive. We’ll keep you posted on how it goes. My prediction: The couch is going to get pretty crowded.

(To read all of the “Company for Christmas” series, click here.)

In case you didn’t know, Bob Dylan recorded his first-ever Christmas album this year — featuring mostly traditional favorites, sung mostly traditionally. And then there’s this raucous number: “Must be Santa.”

The album, Dylan’s 47th, is called “Christmas In The Heart.” All of Dylan’s royalties from the album are being donated to Feeding America and other international charities.

“It’s a tragedy that more than 35 million people in this country alone – 12 million of those children – often go to bed hungry and wake up each morning unsure of where their next meal is coming from,” Dylan says on his website. “I join the good people of Feeding America in the hope that our efforts can bring some food security to people in need during this holiday season.”

I’m going to poop on this party.

A dog collar that can open a beer bottle may be mildly funny the first time around, but I’d think the novelty would quickly wear off this novelty — even among frat boys.

On top of the whole dog-as-appliance indignity — among all the noble purposes dog serve, I wouldn’t rank opening your beer too high among them — I would think there could be safety concerns as well.

The Bark4beer website seems to say as much: “Please use with adult supervision as this product is not intended for children. Bark4Beer, L.L.C.. shall not be liable for any special or consequential damages that result from the use of, or the inability to use, the materials on this site …”

If something’s not safe for children, I don’t want my dog wearing it.

The idea for the collar came at a pool party, where two young entrepreneurs were forced to use their dog’s collar to open a beer bottle’s non-twist-off top.

“After months of product testing, we are confident to release our revolutionary invention,” their website says. The inventors add, “Essentially, we can turn your favorite four-legged friend into the ultimate party animal ensuring that there is no shortage of tail at your next party.”

I’ll pass on this one, Santa.

Snoopy was named the top dog in pop culture by the American Kennel Club on Tuesday, as part of its 125th anniversary celebration.

The “Peanuts” comic strip character beat out Reveille, the collie mascot of Texas A&M University, whose surprising showing was likely the result of coordinated campaigning in the Lone Star State.

Nearly 76,000 online voters chose their favorites from a list of pop culture dogs drawn from television, film, literature, sports and art, according to a Reuters report.

Snoopy was the creation of Charles Schulz, who died in 2000. “Peanuts,” appeared in 2,600 newspapers in 21 languages. Its daily readership was believed to be the most of any comic strip in history.

Amazingly Lassie, Marley, Benji, Rin Tin Tin and Bo Obama (who came in 42nd) didn’t make the top 10.  Of those who did, only three were actually dogs; three more were cartoon dogs,  two were songs, one was a toy and one was a painting.

The rest of the AKC’s top 10 were:

3. Scooby Doo

4. Eddie from the TV show “Frasier”

5. Pound Puppy toys

6. Painting “Dogs Playing Poker”

7. Song “How Much is that Doggie in the Window”

8. Georgetown’s Jack the Bulldog

9. The song “Who Let the Dogs Out”

10. Brian Griffin from the animated TV show Family Guy

The first case of a dog contracting swine flu has been confirmed by veterinarians in White Plains, N.Y.

The H1N1 influenza was found in a 13-year-old mixed-breed male who is now recovering, according to the Los Angeles Times.

The virus has previously been been found in other pets, including several cats and ferrets, all of which are suspected to have contracted the disease from their owners or handlers.

These incidents “are not a reason to be concerned,” said Dr. Anne Schuchat, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases. “A rare occurrence in other species is not a problem.”

The symptoms of flu in pets are the same as they are in humans: fever, lethargy, runny nose, lack of appetite, coughing and sneezing.

Stray voltage has zapped another dog in New York, but the 7-year-old mixed breed named Princess appears to have survived the shock.

Matthew Voto, 80, of Brooklyn said his dog was shocked by the stray current as a friend walked her along a sidewalk on Union Avenue Monday morning. The dog yelped and started to bleed from the mouth, Voto told the New York Daily News.

Con Ed sent a crew of workers to the building yesterday and  found that the building’s owner had installed electrical equipment that caused a “burnout” of a connector inside a basement circuit breaker.  Due to the burnout, readings of 60 volts and 110 volts were recorded near the sidewalk where Princess was zapped.

Con Ed said the weekend storm may have helped bring about the situation because water and salt conduct electricity.

To learn more about the stray voltage phenomenon, which has claimed both dog and human lives, visit Streetzaps.com.

Here’s the next video in our Christmas countdown — an imaginative performance by a silent high school choir of “monks.”

Celebrities and their pets are the subject of a new photo book by David Woo, a Texas photographer who says Steve Miller and his three dogs proved the most difficult image to capture.

Woo, a photographer for the Dallas Morning News, includes 91 celebritities — most of them with Texas connections — in the book, ”Top Dogs and Their Pets.”

Other subjects include Owen Wilson, Joe Cocker, Robert Wagner, Cesar Millan, Lisa Loeb, James Baker, Dr. Phil and Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger, the pilot propelled to fame by his emergency landing in the Hudson River, according to the Houston Chronicle.  All the photos are black and white, shot against a white background.

Woo said he spent four days at the home of his friend Miller, whose dogs — Lady, Daisy and Maisey — wouldn’t sit still.

Proceeds from Top Dogs and Their Pets go to the Cesar and Ilusion Millan Foundation.

(For more dog book news and reviews, visit our Good Dog Reads page.)

Two brothers died while trying to rescue their dog from an icy Northern California lake.

The men were identified by the Shasta County Coroner’s office as Noel Smith, 38, of Burney, and Nathan Smith, 32, of Citrus Heights, according to the Record Searchlight in Redding.

Three men — all believed to be brothers, possibly on a fishing trip — went into the water after their dog fell through the ice, which was about three inches thick, at the Big Lake boat launch in McArthur. One managed to swim back to shore, but is suffering severe hypothermia.

Paramedics were unable to revive the other two, who had been submerged for several minutes under the icy water as firefighters and volunteers searched for them in a duck hunter’s boat.

Rescuers located the two men and performed CPR, but were unable to revive them.

The dog survived and was later found on shore.