Dear Friends,

I am a very sad and disillusioned dog this month.  All I can say to all those dog and cat food company executive weasels who sat on the news that they were selling deadly food until hundreds of my dog and cat friends who ate those foods got sick or even died is YOUR MOMMA IS SURE ASHAMED OF YOU!!!  Actually, I would like to say a lot more to those lying weasels, but my Mom said it would not be professional.  Well, she's the professional and I'm the dog, is what I think!  But she says I am sort of professional-by-association and that she won't let me near the computer keyboard unless I put a strict limit on the number of "lying, scum-sucking, bottom-feeding weasels" comments.  But I bet she agrees with me, because she says I can say it up to 10 times!

Did you know that many more pets have gotten sick and even died from eating those bad foods than the Menu Foods company in Canada says?  It is true!  Menu Foods is the company that makes so many different foods for pet food companies here in the States, and those bottom-feeding weasels at Menu says that not very many pets got sick or died.  I say "liar, liar, pants on fire!", and I say so with authority because I, your dedicated Lizzie, have been helping my Mom a lot lately.  She has been working very late at night all week trying to find out stuff about these bad foods to help keep our Knollwood pets safe.  My Mom spends a lot of time on a computer place called "VIN," which is short for Veterinary Information Network, which has been tracking what is happening with the bad foods. 

The top guy working on the pet food recall at VIN is Dr. Paul Pion, and he is the same guy who figured out, years ago, that cats needed a thing in their diets called "taurine" or else they could go blind.  (Mom actually saw him present this data many years ago at an Internal medicine meeting when he was very young and nervous.)  Well, now he's an important guy and he probably isn't at all nervous about tracking down these lying scum-sucking weasels, and making them tell the truth about their products.  Dr. Pion is asking every single veterinarian in the country to track any pets who have gotten sick or died eating bad foods and treats.  So those of us dedicated pets who keep our Mom and Dad-veterinarians company late at night while they work to figure who is lying to them know that there are already many hundreds more sick or dying pets than the pet food companies claim.

I expect you already know that the Hill's weasels stopped sending their Prescription m/d food to vets days before they admitted that there was a problem with it, and they even told our Head Nurse Jenny when she called last week that there was just a "shortage," and that's why we didn't get any in our order.

Then, we got a letter from Hill’s that was sent to all veterinarians admitting the problem but "reminding" them that m/d only accounts for a small fraction of a percentage of all veterinary food sales, so we didn't have to feel too "impacted."  Well, bless my cute furry little butt, but if it was YOUR cat eating the m/d who got sick, now that would be 100% impacted, wouldn't it?????????  So I guess I have to revise my Hill’s title from "weasels" to "cold-hearted, scum-sucking, bottom-feeding, your-momma-is-ashamed-of-you-weasels," don't you think?

Anyway, all of us at Knollwood were completely offended by that letter, so I helped Jenny and my Mom immediately check all our prescription foods and we confirmed that it was only the m/d food that even has wheat gluten in it. So if you are eating another prescription food, we all think it is safe.  But my Mom is going to keep checking, and I am going to keep sitting up late with her, and together she and I and all the thousands of veterinarians on VIN will figure this out and do our best to make these executives weasels tell us the truth and be accountable.

There are so many recalls that have come out in just the past few weeks, and I am very worried that you may be eating some of them for breakfast, or lunch, or even for a snack. My dear cat and dog friends, if you have been eating any of the foods on the original recall list, please STOP right away.  If you go to the websites our Webmistress Kelly has listed on our home page, you can find a full list of what you have to be careful about eating.  She also has some ideas on where you can go to get safe, wholesome food, and how to find balanced and complete recipes to make it.  Don't trust the "Menu" people or any of the companies who bought the bad wheat gluten (at least most vets think that it was bad wheat gluten that was the problem, but only time will tell).  I think that if those weasels at Doctors Foster & Smith, Natural Balance, Hill’s, Ol’ Roy, Blue Buffalo, Purina, Alpo, and the many other companies that were selling bad foods and treats to us took so long to tell us the truth, we have to be careful about what they say now.  I suggest you have your Mom and Dad check the websites Kelly listed for the FDA or the AVMA instead of a specific company's website.

Is your Mom or Dad old enough to remember the old Arlo Guthrie song about President Nixon and Watergate?  I know about it, because my Mom still listens to Arlo sometimes, so I have to listen, too.  Arlo sang about how the President claimed he didn't know about electronic eavesdropping on the Democrats - "You claimed you didn't know that the cats with the bugs were there...", and he went on to sing:

 "But that just isn't the point, man - that's the wrong, wrong, way to go; If you didn't know about THAT one, then what else don't you know?"

And I guess, as a dog worried about all my friends out there who ate and maybe still are eating bad contaminated foods, I think about that song and I wonder what else the weasels who claimed to know nothing until recently still don't know about what they buy to put into their pet foods?  As a simple dog, I sure don't know all the answers.  I am just glad my Mom feeds us good foods to keep us safe.  If you read her April column you will see how she has been feeding us, and maybe you can try to bug your owners (use your favorite trick to show disdain for what they are feeding you) and make them feed you better.

OHHH...you don't properly know how to show disdain? Let me give you a few pointers - most of them work on soft-hearted Moms and Dads. Here's how we do it at home:

I curl my lips and shudder just a little bit to show how bad the food is, if I don't like it. And I gag a little, too.  Emmett makes pawing motions over the food, like he is burying it in his litter box. (I gotta admit, this is a good one!)  Xena eats it anyway but then throws it up in a lot of spots that are hard to clean.  She also sits on my Mom's pillow and makes those terrible cat "horking" noises like she is going to throw up some more. (Is there a special school that cats go to, to learn these great tricks?) Sofia flips the food bowl over and shoves it around the kitchen with the food still in it.

Back to a final more serious idea - if you were eating any of those bad foods, and if you are starting to feel bad inside, or if you are drinking more water, or feeling like you need to pee a lot more, or even if you feel fine but are just worried about your kidneys - don't wait and worry.  PLEASE tell your people to call the hospital and ask Chani or Michelle to make an appointment for you with the first available Doctor to give you a good all-over exam and to take a blood sample to test your kidneys.  If you can squeeze out a little urine ahead of time so your people can bring it along to the appointment, that would be a very good idea, too.  (Mom says to say that our Doctors can tell a lot more from looking at the urine and the blood together than by just looking at one or the other.)  And, if you are sick and we are working together to make you better, please let us know about you on the Intentions page of our website and we will all work together in this way to help you feel better, too - Mom says that medical science has shown that this way of healing can be very powerful, too.

This will be a very busy month for Mom and me and Dr. Papacek, as we try to get to the bottom of this very big problem.  Please know that I am thinking good thoughts to all of you and that I will keep Mom going late at night until we have good answers for you.

LIZZIE