Here is a current video on Timmy. Timmy will return to the University of Cincinnati FETCH Lab this month to get his hearing aid!

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Hot off the press!

At UC, dogs now hear this! | Community Press & Recorder | CommunityPress.com

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The momma and I wanted to share the above article with you. It’s about a very special dog, Timmy. Timmy is a service dog for his owner, Neal A. Young who has narcolepsy. And, Timmy is a therapy dog who worked at Ground Zero and continues to work in hospitals, nursing homes and disaster sites. In fact, Timmy was the only therapy dog at Ground Zero and his work helped to console firefighters and volunteers.

“When people were coming out of the pit and they saw him waiting for them, that might be the only time they would crack a smile all day,” Young said. “People weren’t talking to the counselors or the social workers, but they’d reach out to Timmy, and then the counselors had a way in to make that connection.”

Timmy has recently developed hearing loss. Hearing is very important for dogs, especially working dogs, and bilateral hearing is important for sound localization.

Listening to: Timmy! by Lords of the Underworld

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A battery of diagnostic testing at the University of Cincinnati’s FETCH-Lab (Facility for Education and Testing of Canine Hearing and Laboratory for Animal Bioacoustics) determined that Timmy has bilateral hearing loss, although his left ear is less impaired than his right. Fortunately, Timmy is an excellent candidate for hearing aids. Molds were made from both of Timmy’s ear canals to prepare hearing aids. However, hearing aids are expensive and Timmy’s owner is disabled. They need to raise money to pay for the aids. It would be great if you (yes, you!)  can help with a donation! If so, please go to

Young’s Funny Farm Donations & Gifts

or send a check to

Young’s Funny Farm

764 Knob Mountain Road

Berwick PA 18603-5853

Please mark check “Timmy hearing”

To learn more about Timmy and Neal A. Young (and see a LOT of wonderful photos!) please visit Young’s Funny Farm.

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So, the momma took a quiz on dogster.com to see what breed of dog she would be in another life. Interestingly, she turned out to be a Jack Russell Terrier!

What’s even more interesting, is that I took the same quiz and turned out to be a Labrador Retriever! Something’s wrong here. I don’t even like playing with tennis balls (I prefer intellectually challenging toys!). I know, one of my best friends is a Lab (Wolfie). But, I think even he would disagree with the conclusion of dogster’s quiz!

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Here is a list of our least popular posts (many are understandable):

• Bad speeling and grammar all over the internets- Just a list of spelling and grammatical errors we see all too often on the web.
• I’m a bad boy!- Oooh! The momma was angry at me that day! P.S. I repeated this exact episode at Sam’s house! (heh-heh! I get away with so much!)
• Happy St Patrick’s Day!- Somewhat corny list of what the momma did on St. Patrick’s Day 2008
• Counting down….- Ummm, yeah….not worth revisiting…..
• Don’t say good-bye, Joe- I think the momma was on something strange that day….
• Let me borrow that top- Now this one is definitely worth a gander. It’s a comedy/music video by Liam Kyle Sullivan. Actually, all of his videos are hilarious!
• Back with a vengeance- This title isn’t informative of the content. Basically, it’s a list/video of common poisonous plants that pets like to chew on.
• Still working night and day….- Part of series of posts about an angry/sad/funny story that happened to the momma and me (and the cats) recently.
• Getting worse…much worse, indeed!- Part of the same series. If interested, it’s probably best to start from the beginning: Trouble brewing…-
• Thirteen on the momma’s desk- Just a list of crap on the momma’s desk. Part of the NaBloPoMo list series. Maybe we’ll try that again in February (the shortest month!)
• Insight out- A few videos (or links to videos) with insight to stroke, autism, and a sweet video of an Alzheimer disease patient.
• Twin news- Just spreading the good news about OTC’s newborn twins!

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One of the therapies used for the momma’s papa after his stroke is called functional electrical stimulation. It was used to “exercise” the muscles of facial expression on the left side of his face.

French neurologist, Guillaume Duchenne, most notably credited for the discovery of the hereditary muscular dystrophy – Duchenne’s muscular dystrophy, used electrical stimulation on live subjects to study facial expressions. He discovered that genuine smiles from true happiness are formed by muscles of the mouth and muscles of the cheeks and eyes, forming crow’s feet, hence the term “Duchenne smile”.

Duchenne stimulating muscles of facial expression with electricity.

Plate from Mécanisme de la Physionomie Humaine (1862) demonstrates various expressions from Duchenne's electrical stimulation studies.

At any rate, the momma’s papa has been walking a bit each day now. When he makes it out the door of his inpatient rehab, he will be going home! Hopefully that will happen in the next few weeks!

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