With Shark Week wrapping up, the fam and I, avid Shark Week enthusiasts, have been engaging in some pretty deep conversations about animals, wild and domestic. At one point, dog racing came up. Videos were summoned. Awe was expressed. “They’re so dang fast!” our 13-year-old said. Then my wife pulled back.
“If dog racing is anything like horse racing,” she said, “I don’t know if I’m fully on board with it.”
The sticking point: “Loser” horses are often killed. Does the same thing happen to “loser” dogs?
The thought was enough for us to shelve the dog-racing videos and swear off the “sport” permanently. Horses are great — and so are cats and turtles and every other domesticated creature — but dogs? Come on. They’re walking, barking, licking, playing, pooping angels come to save us from our ignorance and stupidity. And self-centeredness. Dogs are the best of us. We simply do not deserve them. I love my wife, I love my child, I love my mom and pizza and sleeping in, but my love for my 4-year-old mini-Aussie Comet is the purest form of love I’ve ever experienced. When she dies, she will take what’s left of my ragged soul with her. Forever.
Loving a dog, or any pet really, allows us to give ourselves 100% to another being. There’s no fear of rejection, no judgment, just pure, unadulterated love, mostly in the form of giving: giving hugs, giving pets, giving kisses, giving play, giving time. Pet-love is the most perfect kind of love because it is unconditional both ways. That our good boys and good girls don’t live as long as we do on average is a cruel cosmic joke. Not enough time with them is apparently the price we pay for perfection, the price we pay for our too-short time with love perfected.
A quick Google search reveals that dog racing is slowly dying out across the country. Good. Let’s celebrate pets just being pets and animals just being themselves. Enter: our third annual Creature Comforts issue. On pg. 6, we dive deep into the Fort Worth Zoo’s gharial conversation efforts, while pg. 24 involves regular contributor and local musician Steve Steward trying to answer the question: Do animals dig live music? Pg. 27 is an exploratory feature on pet amenities at local apartment complexes, and on pg. 14, we remember some of the animals we’ve loved and lost over the past year. All that and more inside, so come on in. Pets welcome. — Anthony Mariani, Editor
What’s inside the Creature Comforts 2025 special issue? Glad you asked.
About the Cover // Living Local
From the pink elephant parties of the past to current cappy cuddles, animal menageries aren’t what they used to be (thankfully). But petting cute creatures is still a popular activity. For the cover of this, the third annual Creature Comforts special issue, we hope you enjoy the artistic take on a 1955 image of Jayne Mansfield and her Pekinese dog, Powder Puff, who was transformed into one of our nation’s current obsessions: capybaras. We’ll get to the cappys soon. But why Jane? And why now? Glad you asked. Read more about Jane Mansfield and a cappy adventure at Dunham Farm here.
Crocodile Rock // Gharial Conservation at FW Zoo
Ripples barely move across the water as giant crocodilians glide effortlessly just beneath the surface. Like ghosts from a prehistoric age, the gharials are graceful, unsettling, and sneaky. Despite their size — males can grow to 16 feet long and weigh 1,500 pounds — they move with impressive stealth. Unlike some apex predators, gharials are not fast, flashy, or loud. I found them intimidating simply because they seem to be very observant and have a long snout filled with over 100 razor-sharp teeth. From a protected training area at the Fort Worth Zoo, I recently watched the gharials arrive in eerie precision. Read more here.
Evolving Together // Becoming Jane at FWMSH
Up now at the Fort Worth Museum of Science and History thru Sep 1, Becoming Jane: The Evolution of Dr. Jane Goodall follows the scientist’s journey from inquisitive girl dreaming of studying animals in Africa to her groundbreaking fieldwork in Gombe, Tanzania, and up to today — the 91-year-old remains a tireless activist, mentor, and advocate for, simply, a better world than the one we’re living in now. (We can only go up.) Read more here.
Presidential Pets // Furry Friends in the White House
Not every state has a presidential library. Luckily, we have one right here in North Texas. If you visit the George W. Bush Presidential Center in Dallas, you’ll be able to view artifacts representing the Bush family pets. It turns out, cats, dogs, and many other species have had a presence in most presidential administrations. While on a recent research trip to Boston, I was able to see a special exhibit that provided insight into doghouses and White Houses. Love for animals cuts across party lines, and that’s one of the themes of a new exhibit at Boston’s John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum. Presidential Pets tells the stories of the animal companions kept by chief executives from George Washington on. Read more here.
Screen // Creature Features
Few things are more comforting for me at the end of a hard day than watching a crowd of panicked humans screaming and running for their lives from a massive, monstrous threat. Of course, a small bit of my comfort comes from the natural feeling of schadenfreude, which acts like a sinfully delicious, ethereal dessert on my juicy brain. Sometimes I’ll mentally put the face of someone who irked me that day in the crowd, usually politicians. It’s just nice to pretend that Ted Cruz can express emotion. However, it’s not the crowd that fires up my ventromedial prefrontal cortex. It’s the thought of what’s behind the crowd making them run and scream like fleshy banshees. There’s no shortage of classic cinema in this category. Read about some of them here.
Night & Day // The Great Indoors
While often associated with images of dogs panting in the heat, the term “dog days of summer” actually originates from ancient astronomy, specifically the star Sirius, also known as the Dog Star. Here in Texas, that heat is no joke, y’all. If you invite me to any upcoming outdoor events, there had better be a swimming pool. Otherwise, I’ll be indoors beating the heat and working on the to-do list below. As an animal-loving person with an aquarium, turtles (both land and water), a cat named Hank, and an inordinate amount of dinosaur toys in my home decor, I assure you that these are all creature-oriented ideas. Read more here.
Eats & Drinks // Ate Days of Doggo Dinners & Drinks
My boy Benny is an older pup now, so we don’t go out together as often as we used to. Recently, we decided to have some at-home adventures by getting takeout from a couple of spots with dedicated “dog menus.” We spent the day ordering out, then enjoyed our doggie bags in the comfort of our home while watching Animal Planet and contemplating naps. Here are some great spots with either dedicated dog menus or dog-friendly patios for you to sit, stay, or go.
Music // Bark at the Moon
A couple of years ago, a now-12-year-old kid in Houston named Yuvi Agarwal noticed how Bozo, his family’s golden doodle, calmed down whenever he played his keyboard. Yuvi, who has played piano since he was 4, did some research and learned that music can reduce stress hormones in animals, allowing them to chill out and connect with humans more easily. It occurred to him that music would be beneficial to homeless animals in shelters, and soon after, he and his parents launched Wild Tunes, a nonprofit that pairs volunteer musicians with shelters looking to ease the experience of their animals. Thus far, Wild Tunes has coordinated with shelters here in Texas — Houston, Fort Bend, and Kerrville, to name a few, with Fort Worth as a potential future site. Read more here.
In Memoriam // Creatures We Have Loved & Lost
We think of our pets as family, so when one of them passes away, the grief is real. In last year’s Creature Comforts edition, the our story “Best Family Members” included just such a loss: “Faithful friend and lover of all people, especially children, Jessie the Cowgirl came to Senior Account Executive Stacey Hammons’ family by a series of very fortunate and well-timed events, and because of her, a network of people came together and have saved more than 200 other dogs since! Jessie crossed the Rainbow Bridge far too soon, leaving a dog-shaped hole in her family’s heart.” Saying goodbye to our four- or two-legged loved ones is never easy. Read about some we’ve lost this year here.
Classifieds // Pet Amenities Lure Renters
“Happiness is a warm puppy,” said the late Peanuts cartoonist Charles Schulz. The flipside — what makes a warm puppy happy — is today being addressed by Fort Worth apartment complexes. Many are rolling out an increasingly extensive roster of pet amenities. Not just dog parks but pet washes, agility courses, and even doggy daycare and dog walking are among pet-focused pluses you can find at some local properties these days. Read more here.
Classifieds // What Animals are in Your Cards?
Astrologically speaking, what creatures are in your cards? With this being our Creature Comforts edition, we wondered what animals might alternatively represent the signs of the Zodiac. A quick search led to Reddit user Lunar Lamp Light. They did not disappoint. Read about it here.
The End
Did you miss your chance to pick up Creature Comforts 2025 in the stands? No worries. We’ve got you covered. To see this annual issue in a flipbook, head-to-tail (ie, cover-to-cover) format, click here.
