An Almost-Emergency Reminder to Keep Pet Disaster Kits Up-to-Date!

This evening I was relaxing in my living room, watching tv and I heard a weird noise. I thought someone was breaking in (it sounded like a window popping), and I looked down to see Cleo beside me to go investigate. There weren’t any intruders but Cleo still was acting strange, and I had a gut feeling that something just wasn’t right. I walked around looking for something that could have made the noise to ease my mind but couldn’t find anything.

Then I walked outside on my porch to get a look around the house, and there it was. White, stinky smoke was flowing over the roof--I went into emergency mode and ran back into the house to try to see where the smoke was coming from. I couldn’t find anything, so I ran around the house and saw that the A/C unit was smoking but not on fire. I ran inside and turned the unit off and went back out to be sure it didn’t catch on fire, all while trying to call boyfriend, landlord and dad to figure out what else to do so it wouldn’t have any power connected and to ease my mind that it wouldn’t randomly catch fire over night (good luck with that one). Luckily, I was home and able to fix the situation without having too much of an incident. (And yes, I should have called 911 instead of everyone else, but I was trying to stop the situation and was alone, so that was a certainly bad move in hindsight!)

So what on earth does this have to do with animals?!

Well, as I was running around the house to find where the smoke was coming from, I was simultaneously planning what I needed to do if, in fact, there was a house fire. The first thing on my list: get the cat carriers out and get the cats to my car. I had already put Bonnie in the back yard, so I could easily grab her leash and get her in the car with the cats. I also have a pet emergency bag with the carriers in my front hall closet, so that would be my next grab. After that, other things that are valuable to me and my boyfriend in the house.

When we think of preparing for emergencies, it’s so easy to think of tornadoes or hurricanes, mass floods or power outages, snowstorms or some other large-scale events that we can see coming. But the main emergencies we should be prepared for are things like today. The disaster kit and plan is pretty much the same, but it just puts in perspective the importance of having those emergency preparedness bags ready to grab at a moment’s notice.

I already have these things for my animals because I’m a volunteer for national animal emergency response teams—my cat crates are built and stacked in the front closet by the door, and the bag with their items are in the same closet. Our dog leashes and halter are also hanging there, so the important animal stuff is all in one spot. That way, I can grab the animals and be out the door in a flash if I had to. (Confession: I don’t have a HUMAN emergency response bag, other than my CERT bag in my car. I’ll have to work on that one soon!) 

I’m probably more prepared than a lot of pet owners in this regard, but the problem is, a lot of my records and some of the food items in the bag haven’t been updated in quite a while.  So today was a good reminder that everyone should have a pet readiness bag (and a human one) AND it should be updated every six months or so. I encourage you to learn from me today and prepare your own bag, or update the one you already have.

My goal for this week: update my pet emergency preparedness bag, hang the fire sticker on the front window (I haven't put a new one up since we moved into the new house), and get a human bag together. It won't take much time, but if something more serious does happen, it will be worth all the money in the world to me to have my pets safe and sound!

There are great resources for what you should have online if you don't have a pet disaster plan yet, or if you need to update yours: HSUS, RedRover, ASPCA.

An Animal-friendly New Year's Resolution!

So last year I resolved to write in my blog at least 1-2 times a month, but I somehow turned that around completely backwards and haven’t written in my blog for months now! Writing for our newsletters at work are the main culprit, but I do want to pick back up again this year (so we will see how it goes!).

I hate outlandish New Year’s resolutions, but I have tried to make a few achievable ones in the past year that I did follow through with… and some that I achieved for the most part or, like my blog, totally ignored because of life and its hectic ways in 2012. It’s over a week into the new year, and I’m just now getting around to making my new, short list of resolutions. One of them to increase my dedication to helping animals in 2013.

My day job is at a no-kill animal rescue, and most of my volunteer work goes to other types of animals rescues. But there are so many other aspects to humane treatment of animals, including the ways in which we eat and the items that we purchase. I have been working to buy more animal-friendly products, meaning that no animals were tested in any part of the process. Many products falsely post on their bottles that “no animals were tested/harmed/etc,” but the truth is, that isn’t always accurate. Many of the products purchase ingredients for their products that have been tested on animals, meaning that the product isn’t truly animal-friendly. The only sure-fire way to know this is to follow the Leaping Bunny standard, and they have their own icon that you can look for. 

I am planning to try to only buy Leaping Bunny approved cleaning products and personal care items this year if I can help it. Money is usually the only reason why I haven’t this year, but in reality, there are increasingly more affordable products that you can buy now. I use Method cleaning products, and they also make dish soap, hand soap, body wash, dishwasher tablets, and more. And the best thing is that they’re all affordable and available at retail stores like Target and Kroger now.

As for other personal care items, it takes a little more digging to find affordable options that my skin likes. I use Mineral Fusion make-up, which is certainly more expensive that your Walgreens make-up brands. But the catch here is that it’s made from minerals, so that nasty bacteria that builds up on other make-up brands within just a couple of months (you’re supported to throw out most make-up after three months) never grows on mineral make-up and makes it ageless! It also has the nice side effect of not irritating your skin because it is truly all natural—my eyes will get irritated with most make-up, but I can wear mineral make-up all day and never have one problem. Most of the Mineral Fusion make-up items will last for a good year or close to it, so you’re actually saving money over time by using it, being nicer to your skin, and not harming any animals in the process!

I have tried a new shampoo and conditioner that’s not technically Leaping Bunny, so I plan to try another kind once this brand runs out. There are some great options now, such as Burt’s Bees, that you can find in Target and grocery stores—they are becoming much easier to find now. The list goes on, but the point is to be more conscious of the products we buy and the ways in which they do harm innocent animals far from our eyes to see. And the really sad part of it all is that most of the ingredients that are used in cleaning and personal care items that are tested on animals have long ago been proven to be safe for humans to use—they are completely unnecessary tests!

So I vow to try my hardest to buy only Leaping Bunny certified cleaning and personal care items this year and beyond, AND to try to get my boyfriend on board. I need to do some research in men’s personal care products to find some to suggest for him. Thankfully, Leaping Bunny continues to improve its website and now phone app so that its much easier to find animal-friendly products quickly. Do me a favor today—download the free phone app (available for iphone and andriod) or visit the website, and pick one item to purchase this year that’s animal friendly and that will be a substitute for a product you use daily that’s not Leaping Bunny certified. Let me know how it goes and whether you decide to join me in changing all of our items over to reduce the number of animals that are harmed unnecessarily due to cruel animal testing!

(My food changes will have to wait for another blog posting!)