www.MuttShack.org

So this weekend you watched a bit of our behind the scenes work in New Orleans and around the Gulf Coast.  Most likely you were shocked, as we were, at just how bad things really are down there.  So bad that I couldn’t hold my emotions back one day when we returned to our hotel on Canal Street that I had to call my parents, sobbing, just to tell them how much I loved them. 

How can something be THAT bad?  How can one event displace hundreds of thousands of individuals? 

The enormity of the hurricanes this year has been troubling, to say the least.  And our personal experiences (SpeedFreaks) come only from the Katrina ravaged areas, post Rita and way before Wilma was even a thought.

But as the saying goes, God works in mysterious ways.  In soooo much horror, so much bad, there were still a lot of good things to talk about.  People helping people was a brilliant sight.  Fellow Americans donating their time, their only vacation time for the year to help rebuild lives and rescue animals down deep in the trenches.  Businesses making huge compromises in their general work flow to somehow assist in ways they would never have normally.  People sharing sheets & pillows with strangers… people giving up their last drop of water to give to someone more in need.  Just amazing.

While at the Sheraton in New Orleans, after a shocking day of our own, we met some folks on the media floor, who brightened the situation for us.  Now they didn’t have all wonderful stories to tell us, but the end result was just plain good.  Good works done by great people getting phenomenal results.

With all the money that the Humane Society was pledged through donations, they made the call to pull out of New Orleans the beginning of October.  With an estimated 500,000 animals still loose in the toxic city, one of the largest animal charities gave up.  Yep, GONE!

Thank God for MuttShack! 

www.MuttShack.org has gone above and beyond ANY other organization to achieve their goal of finding every last pet, every last homeless animal, every last living being in the city of New Orleans… literally come hell or high water! 

It is against the law to break into someone’s home and considered looting and trespassing.  That aside, the hearts of the MuttShack workers overcame the law… these angels broke into people’s homes, kicked down the doors, broke the last remaining window… they did whatever was necessary if they heard a noise from behind the debris.  A noise such as a wimper of a very tired and emaciated dog, the high pitched meow of a cat desperate for food and love, the last hopeful screech of a bird wanting any being to hear him.

If you were hearing those noises, what would you do?

MuttShack went where the Humane Society refused to go. 

Along their journeys, these people found human bodies not yet recorded by the city.  They pushed through the muck, pushed through the politics, lost their voices in the toxicity of the air in which they worked and continued to find the strength to get up the next day (after only 3 or 4 hours of sleep due to a late night chase to save another dog on the loose) to do it all over again.  All of this by setting up camp in an elementary school next to Lake Ponchartrain that was once flooded… a place with NO power, NO showers and hardly any sense of normal. 

These people are the heroes of the Gulf Coast… New Orleans most particularly in this situation.

Fortunately one covenant does protect them.  That is to protect thy neighbor’s possessions.  But legalities, schmegalities… I would much prefer someone tear down my door if it meant saving an animal!!

Anyway, the lighter side of their stories sure were welcome to our ears after such a day of gloom.  So much so that we decided to check out their set up the next day.

Precisely at the time Major Mike Pagano had introduced himself to us at the Sheraton, this precious lover was rescued.  And we adopted her the next day!

 

 

 

Look at her.  It just baffles me how something so good can come from something so bad.

* If you are able, please do help these folks on the front lines.  They work only via donations and 100% of their money goes to the relief efforts.  They need money for generators (electricity for the triage), money for food & water & medical supplies, money for gas for their cars to go on the rescues, etc, etc, etc.

* Also, feel free to pass along your Thanks to these heroes, www.MuttShack.org  

* And, if you are able to help, they are still in need of veterinarians and animal lovers to help down south, too.

	www.MuttShack.org