When asked about her favorite story about her cat, Moochie, Nancy Riley of Fairfax said, “I would love to tell you about how I came to have Moochie. It was 1997, I was coming out of my friend’s house, and I came out the door and heard what sounded like a squirrel chattering at me. I then looked up and saw this really small black cat looking up at me. Being a cat person, I automatically went to pet him and he shied away. A man then came out of his house next to me and I asked if this cat belonged to anybody. He said, ‘That’s nobody’s cat. That’s a gutter cat.’ A gutter cat. He let me pet him and as I walked down the sidewalk to my car he was doing figure 8s around my feet. I opened the door to get in my car and he jumped right in. I put him on the ground and was really sorry and said, ‘I’m sorry cat but I can’t take you home, I have two large cats at home that would eat you.’ He jumped right back in my car. I decided because of his determination, I could take him home. My two other cats didn’t end up eating him and our other cat, Alfalfa, became really good buddies with Moochie. He gets his name, Moochie, because he would always steal food from the table and my daughter called him a mooch.”

Walking Bailey down the street on one of the hottest days of the year, Maria said she was walking this dog for her neighbors. “There’s a lot of wonderful things I can say about walking your pet. It is a great way to bond with him or her. Bailey would love to pose for a picture, she always looks good.”

When asked what life is like with her two dogs Jack and Emmitt, Amelia Marosek, student, of Fairfax, said, “My favorite thing about having a pet is when they come in and wake you up in the morning with their tails wagging until you are as excited for the day and ready to go on a walk as they are. I love when they jump up and wake you up in the morning. I miss them when I’m at school because it’s nice to have someone jump up and give you puppy kisses.”

“We used to have this wonderful standard poodle named Red. My younger sister was not a good eater and she would feed the dog peas from her highchair all the time when she was about 4 or 5. It was actually really quite cute,” said Kate Marosek, social worker, of Fairfax. Talking about dog parks, she said, “Dog parks bring a cohesiveness to their community. You get to meet people that aren’t in your neighborhood or from work.” She added, “My husband didn’t know many people in the neighborhood at first and people started to refer to him by our dog’s names.”