Wednesday, March 28, 2007

Wolf balls for China




I'm soaking in my jacuzzi, relaxing and thinking while Mom is running around like a mad woman, trying to find a sanctuary for four wolves. Three days ago, Mom got a call for help from Chi Rescue (the people who saved me) about some abandoned wolves up in the mountains of Tehachepi.
I can't figure out why Mom would get involved with these wild wolfie guys who would eat us like a Snickers Bar in one gulp. I think she felt sorry for them. I'm just letting you know, the wolf story is kind of trashy. The wolves had a mom, a woman in Tehachepi, who had a personal petting zoo, and she died on the toilet. Supposedly, she was found dead with a bashed up head and she was half slumped into a bathtub full of water. Her wolves are not suspects but the family is waiting for a coroner's report to see she died of a heart attack or if someone decided she shouldn't be around anymore.
I just hope the wolves are not coming here. I know they need shelter but I'm not sharing my space on the bed with giant, bloodthirsty wolves. It's bad enough there are coyotes just outside the property, waiting for us to go out at night for our evening pee, looking like tasty morsels.
I'm mad that so many dumb asses like her and Michael Jackson have personal zoos where the animals are stuck in cages and live miserable lives just so these idiots can say they have exotic animals. Now she's dead and these wolfies need to go somewhere fast before they get shot by the son-in-law or killed by animal control. They haven't been for a walk since their mom died in early February. That's sad.

I think people who buy exotic animals are really show-offy, stupid...and mean, especially if they are sitting around bored in prison cages. Wild wolfies should run free or be protected in sanctuaries when crazy hunters are shooting at them. I'm as exotic as they are. Look at me. I'm a hybrid gremlin/alien from another planet/pig-dog. You can get hybrids like me at the pound but don't keep us in a cage, we belong in beds and on couches only. And we eat people food and we need to be talked to and massaged constantly and walked a lot or we will pee on your pillows, OK?

Mom and her friends found a really nice lady, Grace, who does German Shepherd rescue to take them in until they can get fixed for their trip to a wolf sanctuary. Mom is starting a rescue fund so that these wolves get their balls cut off pronto before they make more wolves.
Mom and Dad were talking about the wolves all night in the kitchen (my favorite room in the house).
Dad: "If I'm going to pay for this, I want the Vet to give me the balls. I want them in a jar. I understand that in China, wolf balls are used for medical problems, like writing block. They give you confidence. But in order to really get confidence, you should have to take the balls off a live wolf yourself. "
Dad does have writing block but I don't think wolf balls can help him. Not even wolf balls will cure him of what mom calls "incredible laziness that could only be surpassed by a coma." Besides, Dad's got his facts wrong. Chinese humans use exotic animal winkie parts because of their own insecurity about their OWN saggy, soft, winkies. They eat dogs like me too, in oyster sauce :(
Mom: "What a good idea! Wolf balls in brine! We'll sell them to some crazy misguided Chinese people for their "impotence problem." We'll make enough money to support an entire wolf sanctuary! "
Yeah, those people over there in China are crazy. They think that Rhino horns and tiger and bear balls will help them with their unstiff pecker problems. Hey! If they've got such overcooked noodles for winkies, then why do they have over a billion people in China? It doesn't make any sense. I'm all for making money to save wolves by selling California wolf balls to them. This is a business plan that could work. We get animal control to actually do something other than kill dogs. We get them to neuter dogs, and then label the balls as exotic animal balls and then export them to China for their psycho-winkie trouble! This way, we control the dog overpopulation here in America and support small rescue organizations to put the pound dogs in real beds and on real couches with people who love them!
And if the Chinese importers call us liars for passing California wolf balls for bear balls, well it's only fair, because they keep lying about the "faux fur" on the sweaters they send over here. Some of my best friends end up on sweaters here in the USA--Chinese dogs.

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Saturday, March 10, 2007

Jerusalem Post




JPost.com » Arts & Culture » Entertainment » Article
Jan. 16, 2007 9:56Doggone publicityBy KELLY HARTOG








You can read People or US Weekly magazine or log onto E Online to get the latest scoop on what's happening in Hollywood. But if you want a real insider's take then you should read The Diary of Jinky: Dog of a Hollywood Wife.
Yes, Jinky is indeed a dog - a bat-faced terrier mongrel to be exact - and he's seen it all, right from the moment he was rescued from "death row" by his mother Carole Raphaelle Davis, an actress, singer, and animal activist, living in the Hollywood Hills.
Davis, who got her big break in the 1984 movie The Flamingo Kid with Matt Dillon, is a nice Jewish girl born in London and raised in Scotland, France, Thailand and New York, thanks to her father's career. "I was a CIA brat," Davis says as she, Jinky, and Jinky's "wife" Finley (another rescue terrier) hang out around Davis's pool.
Jinky refers to his "parents'" pool a fair amount in his book. It's the pool into which Davis's husband (Emmy award winning writer Kevin Rooney) once threw his laptop computer and his phone. Apparently, according to Jinky, throwing things into the pool from the upper balconies of the house is a common occurrence with his parents.
This warts and all book shines a light on how preposterous the whole "Hollywood lifestyle" can be. Jinky trains his wet nose on his parents' crazy shenanigans, all the while discussing how much he enjoys living in the lap of luxury; including long soaks in the Jacuzzi and trips to the South of France.
Says Jinky: "All my mom and dad do is complain. My mom used to be somebody, but she doesn't want to remember who that was. She was in movies, on TV, she made records and she was an underwear model. My dad is a writer, or at least he sleeps at the computer a lot...And mom and dad are just the tip of the iceberg. Their friends are all nuttier than they are. But that's Hollywood. A lot of neurotic people and lucky dogs."
And while amusing, the book definitely serves a higher purpose. The entire purpose of the book is to raise awareness of the millions of animals being killed in rescue shelters around the world every day. For most of her adult life, Davis has owned only rescue dogs, and hopes others will avoid puppy mills and pet stores and instead head to their local shelter to adopt.
DAVIS IS the first to admit that her showbiz life was completely meaningless. "All of the pursuits I had as a young woman were incredibly shallow and stupid," says Davis, who is now in her late 40s. An actress and singer who has always been on the fringes of Hollywood, over the years Davis has appeared in many films and TV shows, and has released a number of singing albums. She appeared in 1987's Mannequin and in an episode of Sex and The City, but says that were it not for her shallow excesses in her youth, she'd never have become the activist she is today. Nor is she concerned about sending herself up in the book. "I think in order for this book to work you have to make fun of yourself. I can't just make fun of everyone else," she says.
While Davis says her upbringing was "completely secular", there is one chapter in the book titled: "Rabbi Jinkleberg Quotes the Talmud," in which Jinky says, "The Talmud has a saying that could help a lot of dogs: 'If you save one life it is as if you saved the whole world.'" He then goes on to berate celebrities and others who don't rescue pets from shelters. "It's such a perfect communication," says Davis. "When people say they couldn't possibly adopt a pet from a shelter because they'd want to take them all home, I tell them, you don't have to take them all, you just have to take one. Every life is significant."

Because her mother is French, Davis spent a great deal of time growing up in France, and while her Jewish education was minimal, she says, "I could never walk by a plaque on a wall in my neighborhood in Paris without feeling deeply wounded. The scars of WWII were everywhere." One plaque near her home read "Hundreds of Jews were rounded up on this very spot and deported to Auschwitz with the help of the French citizenry." "I had to walk by that every day," says Davis, "and many others like it. I felt lucky to be born when I was, otherwise I wouldn't be here today."
In fact, it was in France in 2004, while writing a series of articles for the Los Angeles Jewish Journal on anti-Semitism in Europe, that Davis began working on what would eventually become The Diary of Jinky. "It was incredibly depressing, I was writing about anti-Semitic crimes including a woman who was in a caf reading a Hebrew paper who had her nose broken." In order to take a break from all the terrible news she was writing, Davis began a blog about the shallowness of Hollywood, writing it from the point of view of her dog. "That was fun for me," she says, "because it was fluffy and a way to skewer the excesses of Hollywood society." The blog took off, and one thing led to another. Two years later The Diary of Jinky was published.
And while a friend of a friend in the publishing industry helped get the book off the ground, and it has received a glowing review from Jay Leno, Davis says she doesn't think her Hollywood career has helped in the publishing of the book. "I'm D-list," she states matter-of-factly. "My career as an actress is dead. When you're 40 your dead [in this industry]. Over 45 you're a rotting corpse. I've been spit out already."
Davis ponders the Hollywood obsession with youth and beauty briefly. "I'm a much better actress today than when I was making a ton of money in my 20s," she muses. "I didn't know what I was doing then and I have the movies to prove it." But none of that matters to Davis any more. Her real mission in life is to continue promoting awareness for rescue animals, for which homes are always needed.
Having been to Israel many years ago, Davis says she hopes to return. Just as Hurricane Katrina produced so many abandoned pets, she remarks, there must be displaced pets in Israel from this summer's war in Lebanon in need of homes.
In the meantime, her book is already garnering the exact type of feedback she wants. Somebody recently recognized Jinky from his Web site (www.hollywoodjinky.com) and told Davis she began volunteering at a local shelter on the strength of Jinky's tales. "That to me was huge," says Davis. "One stop by Jinky's Web site created an activist." Which, she adds, just goes to prove rescue dogs make the best pets. "After all," she says, "Jinky surpassed all of our wildest dreams by writing a book."

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The New York Post




Oh boy, the New York Post is talking about my book! And I'm going to be at the big adoption fair in Johnny Carson Park in Burbank on March 18th!

Hope to see you there!

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Pampered Puppy article


Photo of Carole Davis and Jinky by Maximilian Canepa







Hollywood Dog Tales



A chat with Carole Davis, actress and author of The Diary of Jinkyby Scott Rose



The Diary of Jinkyby Carole Daviswww.amazon.com




Have you ever wondered what would happen if you trained your dog to keep a diary? A charming chien narrates The Diary of Jinky: Dog of a Hollywood Wife, and a literary star is born. Author Carole Raphaelle Davis happens to also be the charismatic actress who brought Amalita Amalfi to life on Sex in the City. She and her husband Kevin Rooney adopted Jinky from Chihuahua Rescue (www.chihuahuarescue.com). With all the love Jinky brought into their lives, Carole wanted to give voice to poor pooches in dire circumstances.




The book is more fun than a barrel of rawhide bones. Jinky delivers a K-9's point-of-view on Hollywood, New York City, France and other cosmopolitan favorites. He's got a leg up on any gossip columnist you'd care to name. Aware that his bite has potential to be worse than his bark, he anguishes over the possibility that he could have to sink his teeth into Kim Basinger. When a Chinese Crested comes to visit, Jinky says: "He looks like a cross between Michael Jackson and Andy Warhol." An accompanying photo shows how right he is. While on the Riviera, he ruminates his past on death row in a shelter: "Right now, I could wag my tail so hard it would knock the whole world over." You'll wish you had a tail you could wag while reading this book. Davis aimed to write a story that would be hip, heartwarming, entertaining and on message about saving dogs in danger; she hit the bull's-eye.




I caught up with her as she had just wrapped an episode of TV's Scrubs and was preparing for a little sojourn in Nice. Read what she has to say about her animal companions' high jinks.




How did JINKY get his name?






My husband Kevin (Rooney) gave him his name. It was a character on the Dennis Miller show, where Kevin was the head writer at the time—a character that was supposed to be a guest who would never appear. He was a fruit bat and his agent would call in and say Jinky the fruit bat isn't going to make it tonight. As soon as we saw Jinky in his cage at Chihuahua Rescue, Kevin said 'Look! He looks like a fruit bat!' We took him home that day.




What is your best guess as to Jinky's heritage?






I think he's a real mutt. Probably Chihuahua, Shih Tzu and Jack Russel terrier, so we call him a Jack Shit Hua.




In narrating the book, Jinky says "These Hollywood people never stop plugging, pushing, and clawing to appear on TV." Is that also true of Hollywood dogs? Has Jinky been on TV?






Sure, Jinky hangs around Hollywood sets all the time. And because we are in this silly business, he meets all the Hollywood players. He's the only honest guy in Hollywood; he hates phonies. He goes to all the pitch meetings, especially lately, because we're pitching Diary of Jinky as a TV show. He thinks show biz is a load of cat poop but he'll allow us to exploit him as long as it helps raise awareness of his old cell mates, the dogs who are stuck at the pound and who are going to die unless someone steps up and adopts them pronto. If David Letterman happened to invite him to the Late Show to help get the word out, Jinky would stoop to do some stupid pet tricks.



The Diary of Jinky seems so original; did you have any specific literary inspirations?






Yes. The book was inspired by one of my favorite writers, Colette. She wrote a book about her dog and her cat talking to each other called Dialogues de Bêtes. In English it's called Barks and Purrs. It was hilarious, having a smart ass French bulldog talking to a grumpy old cat about how their mistress, the writer, is behaving around the house. I read it as a child and it stuck with me.
What are Jinky's favorite foods?




He likes anything that has a good sauce on it. He'll eat a raw onion [Ed. note - Not that we'd ever recommend such a thing! Remember, folks, onions are not recommended for our canine buddies.] if you drown it in sauce. He loves going to restaurants and in the book, he talks about the 'stupid laws in America' that prevent him from enjoying restaurant food. In Nice, France, where we live half the year, he gets to go to all the restaurants and the waiters bring him delicious bowls of tasty people food. He just doesn't get why he's not allowed in the restaurants here. He doesn't spread any of the airborne diseases, like TB or horrible flu viruses like people do! And his feet don't bring in any different dirt than people's shoes do.
Dog love is very much a part of Euro-culture. You go into any world class museum and look at the grand masters of European paintings of the 19th, 18th 17th, all the way to 14th century and you'll find adorable dogs on couches, on beds, on tables, all curled up on the silken robes of the royal laps of Europe. Every lady had a lap dog and every gentleman had a big hound. They all slept in bed with their people. I grew up in France and Italy and the dogs and cats were used like hot water bottles. When you're in a 300 year old stone house with no central heating, believe me, you need a dog. It's better than a husband—it's warmer and it's faithful.

In the book, Jinky mocks humans for using umbrellas. Does this mean he would never wear a raincoat?

Jinky makes fun of people about umbrellas because they carry around these silly things in the rain, which he says feels so good on your face. But in the shower, they spend thousands of dollars on fancy fake rain shower heads. In there, they sing and like fake rain. No, he doesn't like raincoats; he loves water and goes in the Jacuzzi everyday. I do force him to wear crazy mommy/doggy matching outfits that I knit. He puts up with it. You can see him in his silly outfits on his website at http://www.hollywoodjinky.com/. I'm designing a line of hand-knitted clothes for the fashionably grumpy dog.


What animal rights matters most weigh on Jinky?



Jinky is concerned for the well-being of all creatures, especially companion animals that are abused in the bio-medical research industry. Since the passing of a really ugly bill in Congress, the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act, we aren't allowed to expose the industry. Basically, the government has succeeded in shackling animal rights activists and environmental activists by labeling them terrorists if they expose the horror that is going on behind closed doors. Jinky also speaks out against zoos and Sea World types of marine prisons. He thinks animals don't belong in exhibits; they belong in their natural habitats or in sanctuaries when they need protection from poachers. He says that zoos are just prisons for animals.
As for exotic birds that get separated from their families in the Amazon; Jinky thinks it's mean to keep birds in cages. What kind of fun is it to sit in a jail cell that's only as big as your wings can reach, when you could be soaring in the sky and pooping on the heads of people that would put you in a cage?
But the thing that really makes Jinky mad is the plight of those like him. He was beaten up, abandoned, and homeless at the pound, with hours to live. There are millions of dogs killed in the shelter system, many of them puppy mill dogs bred for pet shops. They get dumped at the pound and no one comes to get them out. They die waiting for a loving home. This is a fixable problem. We can fix it today. So he thinks people should adopt until the shelters are empty. Jinky wants people to make the ethical choice.


How have Jinky's relations with Finley been since the book's publication?





Nothing has changed. Finley, his wife, is the boss of the house. He's strictly a 'yes dear' kind of husband. She's the love of his life, and he truly adores her. No matter how famous Jinky becomes, Finn orders him around, and he remains loyal and faithful. Unlike a lot of Hollywood jerks, he isn't going to dump his wife for a younger, hotter bitch.






In the book, he writes of sophisticated food. Has Jinky had caviar?



Yes, he's tried it, and he doesn't like it. You know the scene in Big where Tom Hanks spits out caviar? That's how Jinky is. My best friend in Paris had an Iranian boyfriend who used to bring her pounds of Beluga. He'd load up the fridge and we'd stuff ourselves but Jinky would spit it out like it was poison. I think he thinks it's awful that they have all those fish abortions in Iran. I like to imagine what he thinks, politically.
On the other hand, Jinky absolutely loves truffles. We were in the Vaucluse region of France last summer, where they have the best truffles. It was so satisfying to watch Jinky enjoy truffles after he had been beaten up and dumped like garbage at the pound by jerks. There he was, eating truffles at the table at Crillon-le-Brave in Provence! We wish we knew who the jerks that dumped Jinky are, so we could send them postcards, just to show them he has a better life than they do!
Not that Jinky has forgotten where he came from. Every time we visit a shelter, he flips out. He knows what it is. He can smell the fear.



Jinky develops a taste for fine beverages in the course of the book. What would be his current wine picks?



Jinky loves sweet wines. He goes bonkers for a good Pineau des Charentes. He'll stick his snout right into my glass. They call him Drinky Jinky.




What is Jinky's preferred form of exercise?


Shopping! No, he prefers canyons and parks; but my favorite canyon for hiking is the one at 57th and Madison in New York. But I can't stand these "No dogs" people. If a store doesn't want Jinky, I don't want to shop in it. I've actually been places where I've picked out a whole wardrobe but had a shop girl say "I'm sorry, no dogs allowed here." So I tell her, "They let you in!" and then I leave without buying anything. There is no dearth of shops - including Bloomies and Saks - that welcome dogs.With that said, I am not unduly extravagant in my shopping. Whenever I drool over a pair of Jimmy Choos, I think that with what they cost, I could save nine dogs! Then I go to the sale rack.


Is Jinky a political animal?



On his blog, hollywooddog.blogspot.com, Jinky comments on lots of issues, but he is bi-partisan.
Luckily, there are lots of great, dog-loving people on the face of the earth. The more we get the message out, the closer we come to our goal of a no-kill world.



See the article on Pampered Puppy at :


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