PonderEthereal

There is no central registry of service dogs. There is no company or organization or government department that you are required to register your service dog with. That said, it is polite and safe to provide your service dog with some form of public identification.

There are several companies and organizations who offer you an identification kit and ‘registration’ with their company or organization for a few hundred dollars. There are also websites who will sell you customized identification cards for your dog for anywhere from $10 to $20 apiece, with shipping. It’s tempting to think that these offer some sort of validity to the dog and that is what you are purchasing… but it doesn’t and you aren’t.

In fact, you can very easily make your OWN identification for your service dog, make it look exactly like you want it to look, make it say what you want it…

If you are considering your dog a ‘Service Dog in Training’, before you start any training, you will need to find a reliable way to log the training you do. If your dog’s status is ever called into question, having this log will prove the training regimen. Each time you do training, note the date and time and what you worked on.

Before your dog can learn more complex tasks, s/he needs the basics; sit, down, stay, come, walk on a leash, socialization with people and dogs and being accustomed to daily life outside the home (cars, noises etc). These basic tasks will facilitate success in later training. I recommend following the AKC Canine Good Citizenship testing guidelines for basic obedience as these were created to define a dog who is ‘well behaved’ and well socialized.

As for HOW you train your dog, there are as many philosophies as there are trainers.…

You want : all or some of your top level categories to be separate ‘parts’ of your site and to be unique from each other. OR… your site displays it’s posts on separate domains or sub domains and needs each site to be unique.

Solution : Using wordpress templates, you can give each ‘part’ of your site an entirely unique look, feel and functionality.

1. First, go into your wordpress admin and refine your categories by adding descriptions to each, polishing the category names and matching the slug to the name. Name your top level categories the name that you want to name that ‘part’ of your site.
2. Next make your permalink structure intuitive by making it domain/category/subcategory/etc/post name
3. In your template directory, create a custom header, sidebar and footer file for each ‘part of your site’. This doesn’t have to be done for each and every category… only the ‘parts’ of the site…

Previously : Deciding if a Service Dog is a Good Fit - And How

Different dog breeds have different temperaments and different dogs have different personalities. The dog you choose will be your constant companion for the next seven to ten years, at least. If you keep him or her as a companion after his/her service is over, even longer.

1) Now that you’ve got the list of tasks you need a dog for, do a once over disqualification or prequalification of particular types of dogs. Does anything in particular stick out about the task list that might speak to particular requirements in the dog? For instance, if this dog will continuously herd an autistic child back to home turf, a herding breed might be a good fit. If this dog will perform smelling tasks, a hound or other tracking dog might be a good fit. Sometimes it’s just common sense. If you…

This recipe can be made with the stuff that you should have in your bath time toolbox.

One packet of powdered milk
1/4 bottle of rose glycerine
2 cups of epsom salt

Pour it all into the warm water and dissolve. Soak 20 minutes, refreshing the water with hot water if needed.

Usually, if a service trains your dog, they purchase and provide you with a vest (as well they should, for the amount they charge!). I am training my own service dog. I could purchase a vest - but why spend money on one if I don’t have to? So I made it myself.

The total cost of this DIY Service dog vest project is under $10. I’m not very good at sewing and did it by hand and it took me two hours. Someone who is good at sewing or uses a machine could cut the time considerably as well as the cost, as you are likely to have needles and such already. The outcome is a very professional looking vest.

This process is written for the smart (in retrospect, it’s written like an engineer might write a cooking recipe) but sewing inept. :) My recommendations and estimates are for an 85…

You must have a diagnosed disability to use a service dog. Once that is established, the first, maybe obvious step, in this whole process is deciding whether or not a service dog is a good fit. You can do that by giving some thought to what a service dog is capable of and whether that would make an improvement to your quality of life.

Do you Qualify For a Service Animal?

To use a service animal legally, you must have a diagnosed disability. The Justice Department has this to say about qualifying disabilities under the ADA :

To be protected by the ADA, one must have a disability or have a relationship or association with an individual with a disability. An individual with a disability is defined by the ADA as a person who has a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more major life activities, a person who…

So you’ve got your neopets account and you want to buy cool stuff only to find out that you don’t have enough neopoints. Contrary to popular belief, although there are some borderline things you can do like create multiple accounts, there are no L33t C#3@+z (elite cheats) or hacks that work with neopets. That said, there are some great ways to gain more rather than fewer neopoints and see your np balance grow. Here’s 9 of them.

1. Open a shop. Keep it small until you have the items to fill up a bigger one.
   Every time you earn or win an item that your pets can’t use, add it to your shop.
2. Buy from other users and resell at higher prices in your shop. Use the shop wizard to find items in other people’s shops. The catch is, you have to have the exact item name to really get a good search result so…

I’ve seen a lot of flowerpot cave ideas and although I like the idea of using flower pots, I’d prefer something that looks a little more natural and blends in. Here’s how to take the flowerpot cave idea a little further and make it actually look nice.

You need :
A few cups of your gravel
A plain terracotta flower pot
a hammer and flat head screwdriver
aquarium adhesive
sandpaper

1) Use the flat head screwdriver sort of like a chisel by placing it where you want your crack to happen. Tap strong and sharp on the end of the screwdriver handle with the hammer, making a crack. Make a second or third crack, depending upon what you want the entrance to be like. Alternately or even in addition to that entrance, tap gently around drainage holes to enlarge them.

2) Sand down all the broken edges so that they are smooth. This will keep fish from injuring…

Previously : New Cichlid Tank 4) Setting up the Tank

Your fish tank is the world for your fish. Unlike other pets, a fish’s water is responsible for it’s air supply, food and is entirely responsible for it’s health. Just like other organisms, fish require specific living conditions such as a specific ph, temperature and water hardness. To figure this stuff out, it requires a little bit of study and to cycle the tank requires some extra watching and time.

Cycling and It’s Victim… er.. Volunteer… er… Draftee?

Cycling a tank refers to the beginning of an aquariums life cycle when healthy bacteria are becoming established. This healthy bacteria will break down waste so that it doesn’t become toxic to the fish. In order to get the bacteria you need, you can buy an over the counter product - but these often do not perform, perform poorly or when they DO perform do…