The World's Most Expensive Dog!

Christmas is two days away! What better surprise for your loved one than the gift of the world's most expensive dog?

 How much will it cost you? Watch and find out!

Just in time for Christmas! Dog Sofa! With Memory Foam!

That's right! With memory foam!

My dogs have never needed memory foam, but maybe your dogs are cooler than mine. I'm not even sure what memory foam is, and I'm pretty sure your dog doesn't know, either. But if you have about $500 bucks to spend, this may be the memory-foamed dog couch for you! Imagine the joy on Christmas morning when your pooch runs down and finds the memory foamiest couch he's ever seen!

Can you imagine it? Well, me neither.

Perusing the Amazon listing for this doggie luxury, I also stumbled across a full-size human hot dog costume for only $19.99. That's more my speed, I think.

Freeze Dried Dogs?

Alan Alda's autobiography was titled never Have Your Dog Stuffed. You can buy a copy here, if you like. Or you can ignore his advice and have your dearly departed dog freeze dried.

I didn't make that up.

A website called Perpetual Pet offers "new techniques" that make sure that you "never have to let go." I'll let them explain the process for you:

We at Perpetual Pet know that the loss of a dearly loved pet is a very difficult experience. Through the use of new techniques in freeze dry technology, we can offer a "Loving and Lasting" alternative to burial cremation or traditional taxidermy. Freeze-dry pet preservation creates a lasting memorial and more importantly, preserves your pet in a natural state thereafter, without any alteration in appearance. This allows pet owners to see, touch and hold their pets, and in a sense, "never have to let go." Best of all, freeze-dry pet preservation results in the preservation of your pet's actual, physical body. This is in sharp contrast to the conventional method of taxidermy, in which only the outer hide of the animal typically remains, attached to a plastic form or other type of artificial mounting.

Neat.

Not my cup of tea, actually, but if this sounds nice to you, pricing is apparently done by weight. Hefty dogs cost more to freeze, I guess. Christmas is coming - maybe this is a great gift for the strangest person on your list. 

The real question is: do they do hamsters?

For the Dog Who Has Everything

Christmas is coming, although your dog doesn't know it.

It seems that, growing up, my lovely bride’s family always opened one present on Christmas Eve, something that was strictly verboten in our house. However, Santa Claus always left us pajamas to wear on Christmas morning, even though the need for new pajamas would have made more sense to leave them for us the night before.

So, in a natural tradition-blending compromise, we now open a present from our pets every Christmas Eve - and it's always pajamas.

Every year, our loyal companions give us some nice flannel things, and we never give them anything commensurate in return. We’re not alone – dog owners everywhere give presents that are the canine equivalent of socks or underwear. How many fake, crusty bones or dog dishes do they really need?

So here’s a gift idea for the hard-to-buy-for mutt: the dashing moustache and/or Jaggeresque tongue balls.

That’s right. For only ten bucks, you can buy a safe, non-toxic rubber ball that looks like a moustache or a tongue, so that after you throw the thing and he goes to fetch it, he comes back in disguise! He now has a sweet ‘stache to impress the ladies or a big tongue to sass the hand that feeds him.

It’s the perfect gift for hairy or hairless dogs, which are the only two kinds of dogs yet invented.

A Very Special Halloween Costume

The Internet is a strange, strange place.

As I was writing about Hong Kong Phooey, an ancient cartoon about a dog superhero with a cool theme song, I assumed that I was the only person in the world who remembered or appreciated that show. It only ran for 16 episodes in the mid-Seventies, and given the amount of junk that’s been on television in the intervening years, I assumed that it was largely forgotten.

But the Internet never forgets.

Not only can you find video excerpts from the show itself, you can also buy Hong Kong Phooey merchandise! Granted, no one’s producing new Hong Kong Phooey material, but there’s old stuff out there that people have been hoarding for decades that can be yours if the price is right.

Check this out:



Yes, that’s a Hong Kong Phooey Halloween costume. That’s from the era when groovy Halloween costumes were a paper mask and a plastic jumpsuit, sold in a cardboard box at Toys R Us for under ten bucks.

They don’t make ‘em like they used to, which is a good thing, because I think they may have had asbestos in those.

But, still, even in 2010, you can go online and buy your own online Hong Kong Phooey costume. For only $125. Plus shipping and handling.

Come to think of it, maybe you might want to dress up as a hobo instead.

Dog Statues

Since time immemorial, dogs have provided a cost-effective security system by barking like mad whenever a stranger shows up. But Neiman Marcus has come up with an idea that allows you to have “Stoic hounds… ready to stand guard wherever you should need them” without actually providing any real benefit whatsoever.

Dog statues.

Yes, for only $395, plus $40 shipping and handling, you can have one of these weird-looking statues plopped outside your front door or hanging out on your lawn somewhere.



They have left-facing and right-facing statues, so you can get the set in the picture for just under a thousand bucks. Apparently, the statues are “not susceptible to mold, mildew, or other problems common to natural materials,” so that’s something, I guess.

If you really must have a dog statue, though, I would direct your attention to a much cheaper – and stranger – solution. For $29.99 at Amazon.com, you can get your very own plastic statue of a Pug dog pretending to pee on something.



Three customers have reviewed the statue and given it an average of five stars. “The statue looks so real,” raves Kathryn from Richmond, Virginia, “that when I took a photo and emailed it, my friends thought I had gotten a Pug!!” I think those friends thought a lot more than that, too, but they were too polite to say anything.

There are plenty more options available out there, but, for my money, real dogs are much more satisfying, even if they are susceptible to mold, mildew, or other problems common to natural materials. And they don’t just pretend to pee.

Obnoxious Dog Costumes

Krypto the SuperDog. Beppo the SuperMonkey. Mighty Mouse. Batmite. Gleek. Sure, animals have a long tradition of superheroing, but it’s always been hard to find the right outfit for your Canine Crusader.

Until now.

Amazon.com is now selling superhero costumes for your dog that will guarantee to embarrass them in front of their friends. For only $12.99, you can deck your poor dog out in a Superman outfit, something Superman himself would never do. Krypto the SuperDog only wore a cape, for crying out loud, although you have to wonder how he kept the cape clean after a day of super bone burying.

Look at the picture of the dog they had model this thing. Does he look miserable or what?



Well, if you want to make your own dog equally miserable, click here and buy your own. If you must buy a ridiculous costume for your faithful companion that doesn't deserve that kind of abuse, please don’t get one of these stupid Spiderman outfits. For crying out loud, look at that thing they have on his head.



Thankfully, they’ve marked this junk down so far that you can be confident that very few pet owners have such little respect for their dogs. That renews my faith in truth, justice, and the American way.

What was Batmite, anyway?