Dog of the Day: Herbie the Meta-Pomeranian

I have a little announcement: over the next few days I’m going to be adding more designs to the Dogs of SF store! In fact, I’ve already started, although there’s more (and better) in store. Thus far, I’ve added an iPoodle tote bag, and an entirely new shirt design:

Schnauzers Gonna Schnauze T-Shirt

If you have a schnauzer, you know exactly what this means.

Please note that the color is just a display color: you can change the color of the tee shirt when yo go to order one… although some combinations probably won’t work out terribly well. Also, please stay tuned, as I expect to have another two or three designs, including one from notorious local artist Lisa Sindorf, in the next few days.

And, for today’s post: I met Herbie down in the touristy area near the Hyde Street Pier last weekend. (For those of you not in the know, that’s between Ghirardelli Square and Fisherman’s Wharf.) It seems that mom made a rather unusual request of one of the local portrait artists. What do you think? Did he capture the spirit of Herbie?

Teeny Tiny Tricolor Pomeranian

Herbie is a little bitty ball of fluff and prance.

Charcoal Drawing of a Pomeranian

Okay, that’s pretty cute. Kudos to a versatile portrait artist.

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Caturday Supplement: Hyde Street Kitteh

I was at the sea music festival at the Hyde Street Pier last Saturday, since Autumn was playing there. (For those of you who don’t know, the Hyde Street Pier is also known as the San Francisco National Maritime Historical Park, and has the distinction of being the smallest National Park in the United States.) And I ran across a kitty, rampaging through the park! Oh the felinity!

And, unlike the majority of wild cats I’ve run into in San Francisco, this one immediately came over and demanded attention.

Brown and Black Cat With Black Head and White Socks

I have never seen a cat with coloration like that before. It’s super-pretty, although it does remind me of my grandparents’ coffee table from when I was a kid.

Brown cat with Black Head and Tail and White Socks

He had some notches on his ears, but seemed pretty healthy over all.

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Dog of the Day: Max the 7-Month-Old Husky

Max gets my vote as ‘most handsome dog of the week’. In fact, one of the pictures here (I suspect you can guess which one) is in the running for the DoSF calendar, which I am back to actively working on. (Man, cleaning up pictures for printing is a giant pain in the butt, especially when you have inconvenient things like arms, leashes, and, ah, other stuff to try and edit out.)

Grey Siberian Husky with Heterochromia

A 7-month-old husky is apparently a giant bundle of mischief.

Grey Siberian Husky with Heterochromia

He certainly looks the part.

Grey Siberian Husky with Heterochromia

I’m not entirely enamored of the cropping (wish i had more above and below him) but I like everything else about it. August, maybe.

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Dog of the Day: Doki Doki the Beagle

‘Doki’ is apparently the sound the heart makes in Japanese. So Doki Doki is pretty much named ‘thumpthump’. Which seems quite appropriate for a beagle with a very active tail.

Dancing Lilac/Khaki Beagle

Someone is an awesome dancer!

Dancing Lilac/Khaki Beagle

Look at those moves! I would give my left forepaw to be able to dance like that.

Lilac/Khaki Beagle

Oop, someone noticed me.

Dubious Lilac/Khaki Beagle

He looks absolutely unimpressed, doesn’t he?

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Dog of the Day: Grayson the 6-Month-Old Weimaraner

Grayson sure looks full-grown to me.

6-Month-Old Weimaraner

Pup’s a little browner than most Weimaraners that I’ve seen. Also: check out the goofy eye-roll.

6-Month-Old Weimaraner

Aww. Puppydog eyes.

6-Month-Old Weimaraner

This is a dog who knows where it itches, and isn’t afraid to let you know too.

6-Month-Old Weimaraner

The dog of a thousand faces…

6-Month-Old Weimaraner

…few of them as goofy as this one. (Also: ack! I just noticed that there’s a pole sprouting from Grayson and now I can’t un-see it!)

6-Month-Old Weimaraner Nose

Perspective is a silly thing.

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Dog of the Day: Verne the Basset Hound/Brittany Spaniel

Help me out here: for reasons I do not fully understand, I feel like Verne is wearing footie pajamas. Can anyone figure out why?

Brittany Spaniel/Basset Hound Mix with Brittany Spaniel Face and Basset Hound Body

I believe that this dog is goofy enough to hold his head up in the company of corgi-mixes in the ‘all-time world’s most goofy dog’ competition.

Brittany Spaniel/Basset Hound Mix with Brittany Head and Basset Body

Look at the legs. They almost look like they have extra joints.

Brittany Spaniel/Basset Hound Mix with Brittany Spaniel Face and Basset Hound Body

I hope he didn’t mind my giggling at him. He looks kind of hurt in this picture.

Brittany Spaniel/Basset Hound Mix with Brittany Head and Basset Body

Perfect boopable nose. Boop!

Brittany Spaniel/Basset Hound Mix with Brittany Head and Basset Body

A little dose of puppydog eyes, too.

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Dog of the Day: Lucy (AKA Lulu) the Fortunate Shar Pei

She doesn’t look terribly fortunate, does she? Well, she is. ’cause she had a mom who noticed that her eyelids were inverting, which often causes blindness in wrinkly dogs like shar peis. So she got a little bit of plastic surgery, and a week or so with the cone of shame. And I’ve seen her a half dozen times since then, at least, and she’s got the cone off and is happy again.

White Shar Pei in Cone of Shame

Lulu is about a year old in these pictures.

White Shar Pei in Elizabethan Collar

Mom giving her a rawhide chew. She took it quite daintily…

White Shar Pei who Dropped a Treat Into Her Cone of Shame

Yes, she managed to drop the chew onto the inside of her cone. Oops.

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Dog of the Day: Franklin the Wire-Haired Portuguese Podengo Pequeno

And, just in time to prove that even after a thousand posts there are still plenty of breeds I haven’t seen yet, there’s this guy. According to Wikipeida, Podengos are Portuguese dogs that come in three distinct sizes. The large ones were bred for hunting boar and deer, and the medium and small ones for rabbit hunting.

(Sorry if the pictures aren’t quite up to my usual admittedly flexible standards: I ran into this guy in a store, but I can’t resist putting him up just to increase my rare breed tally!)

Yellow Portuguese Podengo Pequeno

The breed standard is apparently 8-13 pounds for the pequeno. He looks a bit bigger than that, but not even close to the 30+ pounds of the medium-sized version.

Yellow Wire-Haired Portuguese Podengo Pequeno

Seems like a very alert breed.

Yellow Wire-Haired Portuguese Podengo Pequeno

The second and third pictures were taken with a high enough shutter speed that I had to lighten the heck out of them. More or less the only way to get non-blurry pictures of him… he moved around a lot.

Yellow Wire-Haired Portuguese Podengo Pequeno

Seems like he only slowed down to sniff, to scratch, or to sleep. And I didn’t get any sleeping pics.

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Statueday Supplement: H. D. Buttercup’s Dog Art

Three things to quickly get out of the way. First: woohoo! This is my thousandth post! I’d like to thank all of you for paying attention enough to convince me to continue.

Second: I sent out emails to all of the photo contest winners (and the one person who lost by one point, which is close enough for me), but I only got two emails back. Out of five. So do the rest of you really not want your t-shirt (or tote bag or neckerchief?) Or did your email program think my email was spam? Or are you having trouble deciding? Talk to me!

Third: just a mini-doggie-event: it seems that next Wednesday, celebrating the ‘dog days of summer’, Baker and Banker (a Pacific Heights bakery/restaurant) is giving away a free freshly-baked doggie treat with every human treat. Having stopped there recently for pastries, I can tell you that their human confections, at least, are yummy.

And finally, the post: I took some pictures of the oddments at H. D. Buttercup’s, not long after they opened in the space formerly occupied by the late, unlamented Limn, down near the train station. Goofy.

Shih Tzu Statue

The range of different dog art at HD Buttercup is impressive. From this…

Fuzzy Dog Statue

…all the way to this…

Wickerwork Dog Statue

…with a detour somewhere in the middle to this.

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Dog of the Day: German Shepherd/Australian Shepherd Mix

The dog walker who was walking this fine fellow had an awful lot of dogs on his leashes. Fortunately I was there to give this pup the attention he was due.

German Shepherd/Australian Shepherd Mix

Look at the fluff on that tail.

German Shepherd/Australian Shepherd Mix With Partly Floppy Ears And Black Saddle Coloration And Fluffy Tail

The happy is strong with this one.

German Shepherd/Australian Shepherd Mix

I dunno, maybe he’s a lab or golden retriever mix? He’s definitely got the ‘happy’ for it.

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