The good guys thread

[kuhio98]

'Miracle' puppy born in Aurora, surprising veterinarian who thought it had not survived

AURORA, Colo. - For nearly 45 minutes veterinarians thought a puppy was stillborn and tried to tend to the mother, when suddenly the new life began to move and cry.

Aurora Animal Shelter veterinarian Nicole Bartley wrote on the City of Aurora's Facebook page that she was preparing to spay three other dogs on Monday, when the dog in emergency labor was brought to the shelter's front desk. She determined that the unborn puppy was too large to fit through the mother's birth canal and rushed the dog into surgery for an emergency C-section.

"It was obvious the puppy had been stuck for a long time. There was a lot of infection and very little chance for the puppy," Bartley wrote. "However, we always try to save puppies and kittens born by C-section and the veterinary technicians went to work, but the puppy never breathed, never moved."

With the puppy unmoving, the veterinarian and technicians turned their attention back to the mother.

After nearly three-quarters of an hour of work, they were starting to wake the mother when they heard the newborn begin to cry from inside the blanket in which it was wrapped.

"It should not have been possible for that puppy to be alive that much later when we couldn't get it to respond right away," Bartley wrote.

Because of the miraculous circumstances surrounding the birth, the new puppy was named "Miracle."

Bartley also announced that the puppy and mother will be going into foster care.

[kuhio98]

California Community Replaces Stolen Gifts for Soldier's Family

A California community has taken a holiday heartbreak and turned it into a touching Christmas story.

Residents of Lodi, Calif., joined together to replace Christmas gifts and other items stolen from the home of an active-duty soldier just before he returned from Afghanistan.

Cpl. Christopher Petrossian was getting ready to surprise his wife, Cheryl, and their two daughters at the Sacramento airport last week when he received a call informing him that their home had been robbed. About $5,000 worth of items, including their gifts and electronic equipment, were taken, ABC News reports.

Officer Eric Bradley was one of the police officers to respond to the break in, and when Bradley discovered that the burglarized home belonged to a soldier and his family, he encouraged his fellow police department employees to donate money and gift cards to the Petrossians.

Bradley, himself a veteran of the first Gulf War, started a movement of giving that stretched beyond the Lodi police department and out into the community.

"I think they were able to buy a good, substantial portion of the items they lost," Lodi Police Sgt. Doug Chinn told ABCNews.com. "And we have even more gift cards and electronic items to give to them."

"It's going to be nice to deliver them and see their faces," he said.

[kuhio98]

Vt. Community Breaks National Blood Drive Record

A Vermont community has broken the national record for the most amount of blood collected on a single day.

Organizers of Rutland’s annual Gift-of-Life Marathon say they collected 2,337 pints of blood on Tuesday, beating the old national record of 1,968 set by Manchester, New Hampshire.

Rutland now holds three of the top four spots on the list of the 10 biggest blood drives in U.S. history.

"This is such a statement by the greater Rutland community," said co-organizer Steve Costello from Green Mountain Power. "To outdo every single city and town in America is really mind-boggling."

More than 2,000 people had signed up for the event. They had numerous blood collection sites setup across the community.

[kuhio98]

Ski Crash Survivor Credits Dog With Saving His Life

ENGLEWOOD, Colo. – Leonard Somers knows exactly why dogs are considered man’s best friend. The Grand County resident credits his dog Juneau with saving his life after a ski accident.

Somers, of Tabernash, was backcountry skiing near Berthoud Pass at the beginning of November with his 5-year-old Siberian husky keeping him company.

“That area where I skied, I had probably skied 50 times,” Somers said Monday.

But that day was different. On his way down the mountain, he hit a rock and crashed into a ravine.
His neck hit a tree trunk, causing a severe spinal injury. Somers was buried in the snow.

“I went to get up and realized I couldn’t move,” he said.

For 20 or 30 minutes, Juneau lay on top of him to keep him but when the pair heard voices in the distance, her behavior changed.

“She actually ran off and they had a dog with them,” Somers said. “She somehow or another brought the dog back to me.”

That dog’s family followed as well and found Somers and got help to get him off the mountain.
Somers said Juneau not only saved his life that day but also in the ones that followed.

“When I first woke up, I wasn’t sure if I was happy to be alive or not,” he said.
But with Juneau at his side, he has persevered through physical therapy at Craig Hospital.
“It helps me remain hopeful that I’ll walk out of here or someday I will walk again.”

Juneau had no special training at the time of the accident. Now she’s a certified service dog, even joining Somers for his rehabilitation treatments at Craig.

[kuhio98]

Florida Orphan Who Begged for Love Is Spending Holidays with Adoptive Family

It's shaping up to be a very merry Christmas for Davion Only, the 15-year-old orphan who stepped before a Florida church congregation in October with a heartfelt plea: to find a family to adopt him.

Only's appearance, which captivated a far-reaching audience, sparked more than 10,000 responses from around the world.

Now comes word of his personal progress. Only has moved from his group foster home to spend Christmas with a prospective adoptive family, reports the U.K.'s Daily Mail.

This marks a likely happy ending for Only, who has spent his entire life moving from foster home to foster home after his mother, who spent time in prison, was forced to give him up. She has since died.

In frustration, the teen asked his case worker if he could speak to the 300-member St. Mark Missionary Baptist Church in St. Petersburg, Fla., where his emotional plea shined a light on the plight of children like himself, desperate for love and seeking adoptive families.

"I'll take anyone. Old or young, dad or mom, black, white, purple. I don't care," he told the church. "I know God hasn't given up on me. So I'm not giving up, either."

Thousands who later read his story reached out to his adoption agency to inquire about him. Only also has done his best to help other children like him, traveling to Tallahassee to speak to Florida governor Rick Snyder and members of his cabinet about adoption, reported the Tampa Bay Times, which first wrote about Davion's story.

"Even though I am going through an adoption process right now," Only told a packed meeting of lawmakers, "I still hope that other kids in foster care get the benefit that I am going to have to be adopted and to have somewhere to call home and to have a bed to call theirs."

His biological aunt said she and other relatives who are unable to adopt him are supportive of his new life, with Doris Barnes telling the Daily Mail, "I just want him to be happy and loved and to be with someone who is going to do the best for his future."

[cassiesmom]

Some Meals-on-Wheels Programs Feed Pets, Too
(source: AARP via Good News Network)

By Sue Manning, The Associated Press

LOS ANGELES (AP) — If Meals on Wheels didn’t deliver donated dog food, Sherry Scott of San Diego says her golden retriever Tootie would be eating the pasta, riblets and veggie wraps meant for her. But thanks to partnerships between the program for low-income seniors and pet groups across the country, fewer people and pets are going hungry.

After Meals on Wheels volunteers noticed a growing number of clients giving their food away to their furry friends, they started working with shelters and other pet groups to add free pet food to their meal deliveries. Those programs, relying on donations and volunteers, have continued to grow in popularity as seniors began eating better, staying healthier and worrying less about feeding their pets, one group said.

Meals on Wheels is just one organization serving people who are poor, disabled or elderly, but it has a vast reach. It has teamed up with independently run pet partners in several states, but how many isn’t known, said Jenny Bertolette, spokeswoman for Meals on Wheels Association of America in Alexandria, Va.

Partner pet groups will solicit, pick up, pack and get the animal chow to Meals on Wheels or another agency that donates food, volunteers said. Agencies also take pet food to nursing homes, senior centers or community centers.

[kuhio98]

Star of Wonder, Star of Light
The large star of Christmas lights that he almost didn't mount in his yard proved to be a beacon of hope.
By Dale Briggs, North Bloomfield, Ohio

"Maybe we should skip putting up the lights this year,” I told my kids over breakfast.

“No way!” Janna said.

“You have to put up the lights!” said Alysha.

Easy for them to say. They weren’t the ones stringing 8,000 lights around our yard, and along the border of our seven-foot-tall Christmas star. We had a nice-sized property next to a state-owned game reserve.

The lights did look stunning amid the backdrop of all that nature. That star could almost light the way to Bethlehem it was so big. But putting the lights up was exhausting and the electricity bill in January was out of sight.

My wife, Becky, smiled over at me from the stove. I couldn’t let the kids down. So out I went, braving the cold.

I was dragging at work the next day, and the guys at the firehouse where I volunteered knew what I’d been up to. “Now all you have to do is take them down!” they joked.

The lights were a comforting sight when I drove up to the house that evening. In the dark woods, the temperature had plummeted to five degrees, and we were in for a subzero night. As I got out of the car I saw Becky talking to two hunters on the front porch.

“You fellas lose your way?” I asked. They looked shaken up.

“We thought we wouldn’t make it out there,” one of the men said. They’d wandered around lost for the better part of the day and knew they wouldn’t survive the night without protection from the elements.

“Then we saw it,” the other man said. “A glow in the east.”

The two of them lifted their eyes to the giant star in my yard. “Your star saved our lives.”

The kids were right about putting up the lights. Especially that Christmas star, a guide we can all follow.