Flippy - Comfoooosed, bilkoool comfoosed. This is begining to remind me of those days where you would, with very good intentions of course, say something and be thrilled by it but confuse the heck out of me! But, hey, those were the days. (Thapap's nostalgic mood seems to have rubbed off on me ... LOL!!)

Himalayandude - That was quite a bold prank. I'd have liked to see him face his friend in person afterwards ... he he. I am sure he wouldn't have wanted us to see that video - LOL!! Nice one though - thanks for sharing and lightening up the mood.

Rythm - Dhyappa! Hope all is well with you. BTW, what's up with the "ji", huh? :) It makes me feel so important like Kishunji, Ganeshman ji ... (or maybe Sardar ji - LOL!)

Megalomaniac - Welcome aboard should you decide to stay :) Surgoen General's warning: this place can be addictive and cause damage to your concentration powers at work or school if used in excess ... he he Enjoy your stay here.

Loote ji (ha ha ha) ... was going on? I read a story that your species now has lawyers. Check out the article at the end of the post.

Rocky "ji" - Sup, dude ji?

Brig Ma'am/ Lovely Lady/ Lemon/Avani/Thapap/Maverick/NPL2US/Camo/HiDai/Juggy Msc/ Flipu BSc, OPT ( )/Cleo/ and anyone else I may have missed - Good nite and see you folks around.

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Source :

Lawyer for the dog
Inside the booming field of animal law, in which animals have their own interests -- and their own lawyers.

IN RECENT YEARS, Dr. Amy Marder, a veterinarian practicing in Lexington, has found herself called upon to decide which human "parent" a pet prefers.

Pet custody disputes have become an increasingly common fixture in divorce cases and Marder, an animal behavior specialist, has consulted in several. To do a proper evaluation, she likes to spend at least an hour and a half with the couple and the pet. She asks the owners a barrage of questions: which of the two spends more time with the animal, who plays with it more, who feeds it. She asks about the pet's upbringing, its temperament, how much it exercises.

Marder frowns on so-called "calling contests," a method used by lawyers in some custody cases, in which the owners stand at opposite ends of a room and call the pet to see which way it will go. She prefers to observe the animal's body language as it interacts with its owners. She looks at whether it sits closer to one or the other, and how it reacts when each pets it.

At the end of the session, Marder makes her recommendation, based not only on who she thinks would take better care of the pet, but whom she has decided the pet has a stronger bond with - the same sort of considerations that would go into deciding a child-custody case. Sometimes she recommends joint custody, but only if she thinks the animal can handle it.

"Some animals think it's terrific to go live in two homes," she says. "Others have separation anxiety and splitting time would only make it worse."

A decade ago, the idea that a divorce would involve "custody" of a pet, much less that the decision would factor in the pet's own predilections, would have been dismissed by most lawyers as absurd. Pets were property, and not very valuable property at that, to be balanced against all of the other stuff that is split up in a divorce - nobody, after all, talks about joint custody of an armoire.

But recent years have seen an intensifying effort on the part of animal rights activists, legislators, prosecutors, and legal scholars to change the way the law treats animals.
The result has been the beginning of a qualitative shift - not merely the stiffening of animal cruelty laws, though in most states that has happened, but changes that are turning animals into legal beings with their own interests, and, in a few cases, their own enforceable preferences. Thirty-nine states and the District of Columbia now allow pet owners to endow pet trusts, the kind of legislation that made it possible for New York hotel billionaire Leona Helmsley to bequeath $12 million to her dog, Trouble. In some states, veterinarians are now required to report suspicions of animal abuse in the same way pediatricians have to report child abuse. Courts are starting to take seriously the claim that pet owners are entitled to compensation for pain and suffering in cases involving the death of an animal. And, in a Tennessee case this spring, a court appointed a legal guardian to represent the interests of a dog in a custody dispute.

Read more here