A walk in the park -- as well as a swim, a couple of runs and some campaigning

Lily with Dusty and Luna
Lily with Dusty and Luna as the hounds cool down from a couple of open runs
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We enjoyed our first taste of gorgeous Florida non-summer today, and Dusty took advantage. She and I drove to Coral Gables this morning to hook up with Dawn and her girls for a romp at Chapman Field Park.

Dusty had a blast. Dawn, Lily and Rosie led Dusty, Luna and I to the off-leash dog park, and found one of the two enclosures unused. The two hounds took advantage of the open space and took off for three or four runs together. It was a beautiful sight watching those two running free.


But that wasn't the highlight for Dusty. On the walk back to the cars, Lily grabbed Luna and Dusty and took them for a wade in the nearby river. Luna owned that little cove. She's been there before, and she loves it. She went for a dip in the cool water with no hesitation. But it was a first for Dusty. She's never been in a body of water, so she was a little hesitant. She dipped her toes in and checked it out, but I'm not too sure if she enjoyed it or not. See for yourself:


Rosie and Luna
Luna and Rosie rest up.
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It was quite the eventful day for my girl, and she was gassed. We got back to the cars, and both hounds jumped into their bed-equipped rides and went down for a long rest. After a cooldown, Dawn and the girls led us over to the nearby Palmetto Bay Panera Bread, where we hung out at one of the outdoor tables and chatted with several passers-by who stopped to admire the hounds. Lily took the opportunity to discuss voting Yes On 13 with everyone who stopped to talk. She got a good response from everyone. Hopefully, she encouraged an extra vote or two on the proposition.

All the girls and I plan to get together again one Sunday morning in the next week or two, probably somewhere in Broward next time. Let me or Dawn know if you and your hound(s) would like to join us.

Location: Chapman Field Park, 13601 Deering Bay Dr, Coral Gables, FL 33158, USA

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Highlights

About Dusty and me (Part 2)

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W hen a racing greyhound suffers an injury, like Barts Moondust did in a race in Miami last August, her handlers generally drop her into a kennel for a couple of days to see if the injury heals on its own. If it doesn't, the owner retires the dog and in most cases leaves it up to the handlers to dispose of her. Dusty at Friends of Greyhounds, August 2016 ---------- Her injury was really bad -- obviously enough that her owner gave up on her immediately. I don't know the chain of events between Aug. 13, when she hobbled through her last race, and Aug. 15, when a Friends of Greyhounds blog post says she landed in the FOG kennel in Sunrise, FL. I had been volunteering at FOG for just a few weeks at that point. I reported for duty one day after Aug. 15, and Michelle pointed out the new arrival -- a young, gorgeous shiny black dog in the end kennel with a blue soft cast covering the lower part of her right hind leg past the hock and down to her toes. Michelle told me she ha
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We're back!

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Hi, all. Dusty and I are back. Let the blogging resume. We went radio silent three months ago after delivering Sly to her foster family. Dusty and I looked up at that point and realized that our buddies at Friends of Greyhounds had decided to close their kennels to new dogs and our favorite gathering haunts would no longer be available to us. Dusty hasn't gotten the hang of doing a proper selfie. ---------- So we decided to take a blogging break, at least for awhile. We did make the mistake of letting our domain expire, which is why you could no longer find the website if you went looking for it. But the domain was still ours to claim, which we did yesterday, about three days before it expired completely. As many of you know, an amendment to the Florida Constitution to ban greyhound racing will be on the ballot in November. Most everyone fully expects it to pass, and racing kennels are starting to move out of the state in anticipation of the shutdown. If it does happen,
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A new Twitter greyhound friend

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Novara relaxing at home ---------- I was half-watching something on Frank's TV on Thursday night when I picked up my Android phone and began scrolling through the replies to a @RoguePOTUSStaff Twitter thread about TrumpCare. Random Tweeter posed a procedural question about what might happen in the Senate, and I just happened to know the answer. So I replied to Random Tweeter's question and continued on. A few minutes later, I got a notification that Random Tweeter replied to my reply twice, so I had a look. His first reply was a followup TrumpCare question, and I replied again. But his second reply was completely unexpected and took my tweeting into a whole new direction for the next hour. Random Tweeter checked out my profile and tweeted me a compliment on my cover photo of Dusty. He mentioned that he also has a rescue greyhound and tweeted me a photo of her. So Random Tweeter (he asked me not to reveal his Twitter handle) and I veered off into a tweet-versation abo
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Speedy's brand new world

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Lily shot this photo of Dusty, Speedy and Luna. ---------- Speedy officially has been initiated. The 8-year-old Macau import hasn't yet moved into his permanent home with Dusty and me. But he got a taste this morning of what his new life is going to be. Dawn and her girls drove up this morning to meet us for a leash-walk outing at Plantation Heritage Park and got a chance to see Speedy take in all kinds of new sights and sounds and smells. Lily and Rosie chilling with the hounds in a shelter area at the park ---------- Speedy's having quite an awakening. Dusty and I got him out three times last week for a stroll around the block in Friends of Greyhounds' neighborhood in Sunrise. He remained in constant attention, total focus, during those walks. Dusty and I got quite a workout trying to contain him -- he pulled on that leash with everything he had to get to the next place as soon as he could. He wheezed and coughed practically the entire time -- the the ma
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