PAWS recipient Kristi, with her beloved dogs, Rocky and Kory

Hi, Dogsters! Well, it’s been a pretty personal couple of days on the blog. Yesterday I told you about the hate mail I received for saying in a USA Today article that some people consider dogs their kids. You wrote in wonderful support, and shared your experiences, even if your dog isn’t your child.

Then we powwowed about the poor homeless man’s service dog, a Boxer who people say didn’t have a mean bone in her body. She was shot to death by a California Highway Patrol officer, and there was a good conversation and a few virtual Kleenex boxes passed around.

Today I’m bringing you a video I put together of my human child, Laura, and her good friend Jenny helping me with our annual holiday “stocking” delivery for PAWS (Pets Are Wonderful Support) in San Francisco. The video features a courageous woman whose dogs were saved by her and are also her saviors as she battles HIV for her 25th year. (The disease was a “gift” from her ex-husband, who has died. You’ll hear her mention her ex, so I thought I’d explain his significance.) If not for PAWS, Kristi probably could not afford to keep her pets around, and she doesn’t know how she would survive without them.

One of Kristi’s dogs has such an incredible story he was kept in a tiny chicken wire cage in Korea for four years before being rescued by Muttville and adopted by her that we are going to do a separate video on him soon from all the footage we got. He’s Korey, the one you’ll see running about in a noticeably lopsided fashion at the end of the video. But once in her arms, he looks like he’s meant to be there. (He’s the one with the longer hair, sitting closest to her in the interview.)

I put the video together for the blog because I wanted to share one way we try to help out during the holiday season. PAWS is one of my tippy-top animal charities, and I like to do what I can to support them. How about you, Dogsters? I know many of you are knee-deep in animal welfare work. Now’s the time to leave a comment about what you do, and for which organization. It will be a great way for everyone to see what other Dogsters are involved with. And if you’re not doing anything yet, consider helping your favorite nonprofit this season and next year. Budgets are suffering, and these places really need your help.

I hope you like the video. For a word person like me, it was a good challenge to tell a story like this. (BTW, nice marks on the lens at times, eh? They’re from the camera getting dinged up while doing research very near some helicopter action for my upcoming book on military dogs. I didn’t realize it was so bad until I saw this video!)

For those of you still bearing with me, here’s some news: This video will be part of a fun giveaway we’ve announced on the blog. Watch the video, click the previous link to find out what to do, and you may be getting a holiday doggy sweater just in time for Christmas!