It's National Dog Day!

The photo atop this entry is of a chow chow named Uli, which is a nickname for his given name of Ulysses. I am featuring Uly here on Blogger at this time, because, according to Holiday Insights, today, August 26th, is National Dog Day. Evidently it this holiday was established "to honor dogs, and to rescue dogs from homelessness and abuse. (And) its an opportunity for us to recognize and appreciate the value and importance of dogs in our lives."

The day was established "to honor dogs for all that they do for us... dogs help us out in countless ways. They are watchdogs for our safety. They lead the blind. Dogs aid in search and rescue, and they seek out bombs and drugs." Holiday Insights points out that "National Dog Day is (a good opportunity) to rescue dogs in need. On occasion, dogs need us to save them from homelessness and abuse." Uli belongs to a friend of mine, FRG,  who adopted him from a family who raises chow chows FRG initially became acquainted with this dog type because his mother had rescued a female chow chow from an abusive situation many years ago. I had the pleasure of traveling with Uli earlier this week and his antics prompted me to do a bit of research on chows. According to Wiki, "The Chow Chow (sometimes simply Chow) is a dog breed originally from northern China where it is referred to as Songshi Quan (Pinyin: sōngshī quǎn 鬆獅犬), which means 'puffy dog lion.'" Wiki also states that "Sigmund Freud had a Chow Chow named Jo-Fi who attended all of his therapy sessions because he felt that dogs had a special sense that allows them to judge a person's character accurately, and admitted he depended on Jo-Fi for an assessment of a patient's mental state." The aforementioned facts re chow chows from Wiki are just two of a number of interesting facts about chow chows. If you are interested in learning more about this dog type, I recommend the Wiki Page that I've referenced. Once again the link to that page can be found by clicking here. Meanwhile, Happy National Dog Day!