One veterinarian’s musings
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Is Animal Research Necessary?
Here is something I wrote some time ago and posted on my Linked In page.
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Why Have A Cat?
[the following 578 words were submitted for consideration of inclusion in the Wolf River Veterinary Clinic’s newsletter] “I have lived with 5 Zen Masters, all of them cats.”–Eckhart Tolle Preamble: What is an ailurophobe? An ailurophobe is someone who hates or fears cats. An AP-Petside.com poll conducted in 2009 (1) revealed that 15% of the adults […]
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Am I a “Dry-Cleaner for Fur Coats”?
This weekend, a veterinarian friend (Dr. Bob), asked me; Pete, are we nothing but dry-cleaners for fur coats? According to a 2017 article titled The Annual Cost Of Pet Ownership: Can You Afford A Furry Friend?, the total first-year cost of owning a dog is $1,270. For a cat, it’s $1,070. So a pet can […]
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Living Things and Dead Things
Today, I’m musing about the difference between living things and dead things. I wonder if I have been somehow transformed? I can see that I’m now looking at everything in my life through a new set of lenses. I’m using a new measuring stick. I am asking myself “Is what is alive or is it […]
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“Good Death”
Today, I’m musing about euthanasia, a word that means “good death”. As I drove away from the home in Waupaca wherein I had just euthanized a 13-year-old, 13-pound, lovable, much-loved, black, curly-haired dog with intestinal cancer, I thought to myself, “What a privilege it was for me to have assisted that dog through that sacred passage from life […]
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The limitations of words and numbers
Today, I’m musing about written words and numbers. From our molecules and cells on up, we are more similar than we are different from animals. Written words and numbers set us apart from any other living creature on this planet. I have concluded this is a human gift and a human curse. The fruits of […]
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Seeds and Stem Cells
Today, I’m musing about seeds and stem cells. As I declared last week: ‘Animals are not machines or computers!’ There are two attributes that animals have that machines or computers do not have: 1) animals are endowed with a capacity to heal themselves and 2) animals can reproduce. I’m wondering if our knowledge of plants […]
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Healing the American Animal
Today, I’m musing about how to heal the American Animal. Yes, it has been a long time since I have penned a “One Veterinarian’s Musings” column. While I have not been physically sick, I have had “writer’s block”. I just looked for this condition in the bible of mental health aliments, the Diagnostic and Statistical […]
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Lincoln and Darwin
Today, I’m musing about Lincoln and Darwin. I am a huge fan of both men. Both were born on the day I started putting this musing to paper, February 12th. Both of these heroes of mine were born in the year 1809, 203 years ago. We citizens of Wisconsin—citizens of the United States of America—are […]
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Imprinting
Today, I’m musing about imprinting. The cat on my shoulder in the picture is Bassui. Cutting-edge science—what we now know about cloning—says that there will never be another Bassui. Research shows that genes alone don’t determine who a given animal is, how it is formed, or how it behaves. I say what many say about […]