A Tale Of Two Perfect Puppies.

Meet Sparrow. 

She's suave....

Hello there...

She's playful..

I'm gonna put a hurting on this stuffie.

Adorable...

Pphhhhhttt...

Oh so loving..

Rub the belly! More!

And did we mention she's missing an eye?

We get it. There was a point there between the third pic and the fourth pic of this delightful, ridiculously bright little muffin where some people's reaction went from 'what a little cutie' to 'oh no, the poor thing, what happened to her?'.

And we all need to back it up little bit. Throw the old brain in reverse. 

C'mon guys... get with it. 

We're going to tell you a little secret about Sparrow: 

There's absolutely nothing wrong with her.  

In fact, she's pretty far ahead of the curve. At only ten weeks old she's absolutely rockin' pee-pad training, dog-cat relationships and being-left-alone-without-screaming-her-brains-out. The worst thing you can say about her is that she insists on sleeping in the bed which is a little unnerving as she's just a wee thing. Her lack of an eye hasn't stopped her from figuring out how to jailbreak her puppy pen to sneak into bed with her foster mom*. 

 If all we see is a missing eye, we might be the one with the vision problem.

And then there's Woody. 

He too is adorable...

All my sides are my cute side. 

A bit of a wiggly little goof...

This is my yell-y face. 

And does a great smug-chihuahua face...

Don't I, though?

And oh yeah...

Oh boy. 

This happens sometimes..

Bloop!

He falls down. He also gets tremors when he's excited and runs a little funny but it doesn't stop him from running after the cat (bloop!) , after the other dogs (bloop!) and for a snack (bloop!)**. 

You probably can guess what we're going to say here, too:

There's absolutely nothing wrong with Woody. 

He got a little injury to his noggin' when he was younger. He's a bright little dude, he just wound up clumsy. And he has no idea he's clumsy. He's just having a good old time. 

If you're going to ask this question:

But what happened to the poor things? 

We might give you this look:

Oh boy.

Because it's the absolute least interesting thing about either of these puppies. We're not saying bad things don't happen, we're just saying that neither Woody nor Sparrow should be defined by the worst thing that happened to them. Nobody should. Woody and Sparrow don't know (and frankly don't care) that they're a bit different than other pups. They're just playing with toys and trying to get this whole housebreaking thing down.

Maybe we can all learn from that. 

Meanwhile both of these little nuggets are looking for good homes. Interested? Email canine.foster@hssv.org

* Who is her foster mom? Think Bridget, our favorite and most awesome Queen Sucker!

** Our staff is beyond awesome. Woody's foster mom is Scrub Wearing Human Tornado Head Vet Tech Candice. 

Beautiful Blockhead Babes From The South Invade!

They came to party.

They're not here for a long time, they're here for a good time.

I'm Amber, I'm 2 and I love people who throw the ball!

And of course to find a home. They're Beautiful Blockhead Babes...

I'm Kara, I'm also 2 and people tell me my eyes are my most striking feature!

And they know how to get down.

I'm Luna and I'm a lap hog and fetch addict whose ALWAYS up for a good time.

And how to work the camera with their big boxy heads and big doe eyes...

I'm Marigold and I'd down for anything - head cones, Go-Pros, play dates!

When one of our buddy shelters down south found themselves with a bevvy of beautiful blockheads that were getting overlooked, they gave us a holler. These ladies were great with other dogs, loved people, loved kids and were always down for a hike or a big dog party. Could we help? Thanks to our Doggy Day Out program we've seen a lot of our great big dogs getting adopted faster. Yes, yes we could help! The first four babes, Luna Candy Cane, Amber, Kara and Marigold took the transfer bus up north where they've been digging on our dog park and outings with volunteers. Luna Candy Cane got snapped up in a hot minute. Marigold had to wear the Cone Of Joy for a while but she's doing way better now. They're all ready for new homes. 

Errrrp. 'Scuse me. You forgot something.

Ooop, sorry about that. It appears we forgot the boys. They came from a different buddy shelter but are equally as awesome. Blazer, a snuggly little pocket pibble also joined the par-tay. As did Winston, a laid back meat-head whose cheeks are a little bit too big for his absurdly smooshy face.

Smooshy! So much smoosh! Must smoosh them!

It's almost Valentine's Day and if you're look for a big boxy boo of your dreams, you need to stop what you're doing and come in right now. We promise drools, snuggles, snores and years of adventuring. As the wise Katy Perry once said, "California Girls, they're undeniable..."

Excuse me! Hello?

Okay, don't give us the sad face, Blazer. We mean California boys, too. 

How A Baseball Sized Furball Turned Us All Into Hamster Paparazzi

So this is absurd.

We get a lot of hamsters. They're cute. As shelter workers, we see a lot of cute. It's not that we get immune to it, it's just that we're connoisseurs of cute. Particularly with pocket pets, most of which are pretty stinkin' adorbs. So when we got a bunch of hammies in from a fellow shelter no one was too excited. Everyone was happy they were safe and on their way to a great life but no one outside of the relevant departments was running over to meet them.

But then, then there was Topper.

Don't underestimate. He. Is. CAPTIVATING.

As far as hamsters go, Topper wasn't winning America's Next Top Hamster modelling contests. His fur was a bit patchy. He had been housed with his siblings for a while (Big. Mistake.) and they had attacked him, leaving a lot of little scabs on him. Part of his ear was missing. Compared to his picture perfect siblings...

Ear-eating sibling.

Little Topper was lagging pretty far behind on the cute-o-meter.

While he went through medical treatment, his cage was set up on Transfer Coordinator Candy's desk, on a high traffic inter-office corridor. This isn't unusual - our staff areas tend to have a lot of office foster critters hanging about. What was unusual, though, was that Topper was the first hamster in the history of HSSV to know how to work it.

For a wee little threadbare creature, he knew how to put on a show. Instead of hiding in his little hut, he was always out at the front of the bars, soliciting attention and dangling from the top of his cage. He'd hop into any hand offered to him and didn't fear passing dogs at all. A fastidious housekeeper, he'd take offered treats and deposit them politely into his food bowl for later. It got to the point where any time you walked down the corridor you'd see a crowd gathered around his cage.

Vet staff and intake crew take a break to oooh over Topper.

The most popular phrase in the shelter became "I'm not really a hamster person but..." and would be finished with a description of some adorable thing Topper had done. He had gotten his butt stuck halfway out of his (now upgraded) little wicker hamster hut. He had shoved 16 little barley snacks in his mouth. He met staff member Laura's dog and did this...

I'm not a hamster dog but Topper....

And while out driving his little car around (because yes, he has a little car) he met Patty's dog, Little.

Good God, hooman - he IS captivating. 

And was totally fearless.

As his sibs got adopted, little Topper stayed on Candy's desk getting treated for his wounds and winning the hearts of even our amazing facilities guys who were busted spending some time watching 'Topper TV'. No one was immune to Topper's charms. He was the Dwayne 'The Rock" Johnson of HSSV.

Which left Laura, Foster and Animal Care Manager, only option.

We had to hire him.

So here's the bad news: You cannot adopt Topper.

The good news? He will be taking a new position as Official Hamster and Education Assistant (he'll make occasional visits to our summer camp and education programs to teach kids about pocket pets). He'll be working from home (as his new home is in Laura and Patty's office) and continue to commute around the office in his little red car with the paparazzi following him.

More good news? BOTH of our Petco Neighborhood Adoption Centers are open again and have hammies. While we can't guarantee all hammies are as amazing as Topper, The Most Charismatic Hamster In The Universe, they are pretty adorable. And if you're not a hammie person, the NAC's also have cats, buns and other pocket pets. So stop by. Or check out our adoptables here. 

In the meantime you should probably just watch him drive his little car around some more.