Pet lovers come from all walks of life – gay, straight, black, white, man, woman, Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Agnostic and Pagan. We all have animals in our lives that make us whole. For many of us they complete us in ways that humans can not. They love us unconditionally and they are there for us in some of our darkest hours, even when our humans have left us.
The major news blogs use cute anumal slide shows as a way to generate traffic because, as it turns out, slide shows of critters make us gay, as in happy 
. Jane McGonigal even suggests [between 15:10-15:50 of her TED talk] that
“…you have the power to provide powerful, positive emotions like curiosity or love, like we feel when we look at baby animals, when you need them most. And here’s the secret from the scientific literature, if you can manage to experience 3 positive emotions for every 1 negative emotion over the course of an hour, day or week, you can dramatically improve your health and your ability to successfully attack any problem you’re facing. This is called the 3 to 1 positive emotion ratio.”
So, in the interest of boosting our curiosity, health and happiness (and thus connectivity to our selves, neighbors and the universe) I would like to assemble images of our pets – a great, unbiased tie that binds us.
You are invited to share a picture of your beloved four legged, feathered, scaly or swimming companion. I will work my fanny off to assemble these into a slideshow to share by the first week of February. Please submit one image that is 72 dpi, fits into a 560 x 317 pixel frame and is no lager than 1mb. I’ll add about 50 of the best submissions to the slide show. If y’all go hog wild maybe I will make a few slide shows!
Click here to submit your pet photos and stories.
About Kimberly Knight
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