Lenny Bruce is a singing dog

Lenny Bruce Peltier is a dog who lives in a cabin at Grimes Creek, outside Boise, Idaho. He doesn't go on the road to sing with his traveling lady guardian/owner. Lenny Bruce sings at home.

Lenny Bruce knows more about American folk and roots music than just about any dog alive. His lady is travelin' folk legend Rosalie Sorrels, who turned 75 this year and is one of the first ladies of American folk song. His guardian lady is so impawtant that UC Santa Cruz set up a Rosalie Sorrels Archive in recognition of her contributions to American culture as a songwriter, singer, and storyteller.

Ms. Sorrels is a favorite at Kate Wolf Memorial Music Festival and a former resident of Marin and Sonoma counties. Many roots music lovers know that she was friends for 55 years with the late singer/songwriter Utah Phillips.

Dog-ma told me Rosalie Sorrels was in Petaluma on July 12. She sang Phillips' song "Starlight on the Rails" — the opener to her tribute album, "Strangers in Another Country: The Songs of Bruce 'Utah' Phillips," due out August 5, 2008, on indie Red House Records.

In an NPR interview, Rosalie Sorrels described her music as "a way to take sorrow and turn it into a thing you can hold in your hand and throw away." She has also said, "People create folksongs because they need them to get along with life and the stuff it throws at you."

Life has thrown a lot of interesting people her way. Many of them in turn find their way into the wonderful storytelling that's a trademark of the Sorrels performance. There are Utah Phillips and Kate Wolf, of course. Other names in a long, long list include Hunter S. Thompson, Ken Kesey, Malvina Reynolds, Jack Kerouac, Phil Ochs, and Kate and Anna McGarrigle.

Storytelling is fundamental to folk music 'cuz it is music that has been passed down largely by oral tradition. Listening to all these stories and songs is how Lenny Bruce Peltier got so smart.

Mama cat adopts panda cub

This is the ahhh and awe animal rescue story of the year. An Amsterdam zookeeper's tabby cat has adopted a Red Panda cub. Tabby is letting the baby panda nurse alongside her own four kittens. The cub and her sibling, who didn't make it, were rejected by their mother. The surviving cub is still smaller than the kittens, who were born three days before her.

When little panda grows up, she will be slightly larger than a domestic cat, but will have a mostly herbivorous diet, consisting mainly of bamboo. Her species, also known as the Firefox, is native to Southeast Asia and is endangered. Unlike the Giant Panda, she is not a bear.

She will have a long, striped tail like a raccoon and a beautiful reddish coat. She will not be a very vocal animal, aside from some whistling and twittering sounds. If she were not an Amsterdam Artis Zoo panda, she would live in a wild territory, probably alone, and become a skillful acrobat dwelling in trees.

I hope little panda will not find herself having an identity crisis because she's being brought up as a Felis catus. To make matters more confusing, people might identify her with a popular Web browser (Firefox), or with a social networking service (twitter).



Purrsonally, I think a baby panda is very cute.

Fetching hairstyle

Many humans find my reverse mohawk fetching. To name two, there's Kyrana, a vet tech at Coddingtown Veterinary Clinic, and Jill, the hair stylist at Kids Cuts in Rohnert Park. Then there are the people who stare at me funny when I'm out walking. They've never seen a dog with his back shaved?

When the temperature hits triple-digits, dogs and humans alike look enviously at me.

My rev mo is THE cool cut for hot wine country summer — an instant classic that should be in every trendsetting groomer's repertoire. You don't have to remove as much hair as I had to for my back surgery though.

If you're spending a lot of time outdoors looking cool, be safe and use pet sunblock. Yes, you dogs need sunscreen to protect sensitive skin if you're going to be out in the sun jogging, playing, sailing, and stuff. Just don't tell me you're stuck in the sun 'cuz you're riding in the back of a pickup!

The Mohawk hairstyle comes from the practice by long-haired Mohawk Nation warriors of cutting their hair when they went off to war. They left just a narrow strip about three-fingers' wide down the middle of the scalp from their forehead to the nape of their neck.

There are many mohawk spinoffs, like the fauxhawk. You humans can ask for mo spins at a salon like Hairdoo Voodoo in the Lower Haight, San Francisco. This salon gets top paw on Yelp. I want to go see Margaret, the owner, 'cuz they say she's "a genius and goddess of all things follicle."

I wish the health laws didn't keep me from having my rev mo edginess redone in a people place.

Kennedy without Splash

U.S. Senator Edward Kennedy returned to Congress on July 9th without his dogs, Sunny and Splash. Sen. Kennedy was determined to be present to vote "Aye" on a healthcare bill to block a 10% cut in Medicare payments to doctors.

Sunny and Splash must miss wandering around Capitol Hill as much as the senator does. Whether you love Sen. Kennedy or not, two things are clearly loved by the senator: his Portuguese Water Dogs and his congressional work.

People who remember the JFK era probably watched the broadcast of Sen. Kennedy's July 9th Capitol appearance with some emotion. His niece "little" Caroline was accompanying him. In 1963, people say, TV networks around the world showed young Caroline accompanying her mother, the late Jackie O, to her father's funeral services.

All of the third-generation Kennedys are gone now except Sen. Ted and sister Eunice Kennedy Shriver, who in 1968 founded Special Olympics. Earlier this year, Congress honored her by renaming NICHD the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health & Human Development.

I guess these two humans have always liked kids and dogs. As Sen. Kennedy told the Washingtonian in 2006, "Splash sat through the markup for the 'No Child Left Behind Bill'." Sunny and Splash got to attend many important congressional meetings when they weren't sleeping under the senator's desk.

Nowadays Sunny and Splash just hang out in Cape Cod waiting for legislative action. At least they got in a little sailing the day their senator came home from the hospital.

I wonder whether Splash is working on another book like the children's book he wrote with Senator Kennedy. He called it My Senator and Me: A Dog's-Eye View of Washington, D.C. I heard he could use a few paw tips about storytelling, but he means well. As does Ted Kennedy, I spoze.

Best vet surgeon

I just went to my third post-op checkup with surgeon Russ Gurevitch, DVM. I actually get excited just thinking about going to Petaluma to see Dr. Gurevitch. And everybody else in the clinic, too. They're so nice to me.
Dr. Gurevitch asked me to walk around outside while he observed my gait and how my back is healing. He also checked my leg reflexes. He's pleased with my progress and says that I will improve even more. Dog-ma is beyond relieved.

I met a big nice dog in Dr. G's waiting room who's had three of her legs operated on for cruciate ligament repairs and ATT (anterior tibial translation) and I'm not sure what else. She's doing just great. We were so excited talk to each other we forgot to exchange names.

Last time I went to see Dr. G, he had to remove surgical staples from the 9-inch incision in my back (which you can see in the photo). I was a big chicken at first and didn't believe dog-ma when she said "This won't hurt!" Well, I said "I'll bite first and listen later."

Luckily, Dr. G has a way of communicating. He just wins me over, even without the milkbones he gives me.

I always end up sitting quietly 'cuz Dr. G's so doggone understanding and persuasive. He's not only the best orthopedic veterinary surgeon in the North Bay, he's also a dog whisperer!