Simba Dog

Yesterday was my fourth birthday. Rather than the usual birthday party with fake birthday cake and a rubber bone, Mom & Dad took Nalla and me on a vacation to the Garden of the Gods in Colorado Springs. It was a long drive down there. We had to stop half way because Nalla looked like she was going to toss her kibble. She got out and walked around a while and felt better.

Simba and Nalla Climbing a Mountain

When we got to Garden of the Gods we had a picnic and ate our food outside just like animals do. Then we went hiking, rock climbing and mountain climbing. That’s what people in Colorado do. Here are a couple pictures of us climbing rocks and mountains.

Simba and Nalla Rock Climbing

We had a lot of fun and met a lot of dogs including a Chihuahua that was even smaller than Nalla and a couple Pit Bulls that were about my size. I also met another Pomeranian. She was mean and tried to bite me when I said hello.

After all that hiking and climbing, we were too tired to walk back to the car. Mom & Dad had to carry us. We slept in the car all the way back home.

This was my best birthday ever.

Simba & Nalla by their Pool

What a beautiful day today was. The sun was shining. The temperature was warm, but not too hot. Summer 2010 is off to a good start. And what better place to celebrate the start of summer than poolside. So Nalla and I suited up and hung out by the pool. I’m actually not much into swimming; I don’t like getting my hair messed up.  I just like to lay out by the pool and work on my tan. Nalla usually likes to float on a raft. But today she just relaxed and laid in the sun with me. I love lazy days when I can just lay around and do nothing. That’s my life most of the time. And that was how I chose to start my summer.

My dad is the best cook. He cooks dog food for us that is so good, he should be on that Iron Chef TV show. When he cooks dinner for us the aroma fills the whole house. Wherever I am I can smell it. I come running over to watch as he carefully chops, sautés and mixes. He has the best dog food recipe. It takes about an hour, but its sooooo worth the wait. Nalla and I just keep running around his feet while he’s cooking, hoping he’ll trip and drop something. Sometimes he does. Here’s a picture of the dinner he made tonight.

I sometimes feel bad eating such good food while my neighbors are eating Purina, Iams or (ugh!) Ol’ Roy. That stuff isn’t even fit for a cat. But I get over the guilt when I taste his decadently delectable canine cuisine. Mmmmm. Tonight’s entrée: Beef with Rice and Carrots. He likes to serve it with a side of Holistic Select kibble. That’s what we eat when he doesn’t feel like cooking. It’s supposed to be very healthy. The kibble adds a crunchy component that complements the tender beef and delicate rice blend.

Nalla and I go crazy for carrots. Those are our favorite treats. You can keep your Milk Bones and Beggin Strips; I’ll take a cool, crisp carrot any day. That’s the secret ingredient in this dog food recipe that really makes it kick.

This is the best dog food recipe I’ve ever encountered in all my years. Everyone should be as lucky as me. So I’ll share it with you here. I hope you enjoy it. 

As you humans say, bon appétit. Or as we canines say, don’t let the jackals steal your carcass.

Dad’s Best Dog Food Recipe

Beef with Rice and Carrots

1 lb lean ground beef	1 cup brown rice
1/2 cup chopped carrots	2-1/2 cups water
1 cup Holistic Select dry dog food

 

In a medium saucepan, add brown rice and carrots to boiling water. Reduce heat, cover and simmer for 45-50 minutes until rice is soft and all water is absorbed. While rice and carrots are cooking, brown beef in a large skillet. Make sure it is broken into small pieces and thoroughly cooked (no pink). Drain excess fat and water from pan. When rice is ready, fold in the beef and half of the kibble. Let it sit about 15 minutes to cool and to allow the beef flavors to soak into the kibble and rice. Serve in a bowl, surrounded by remaining kibble. Garnish with carrot strips.

Serves 8 Pomeranians

Why are some people mean? Why do some humans feel it is necessary to hurt other humans for no reason? Is it because they had a bad childhood? Maybe some bully at school beat them up and stole their lunch money so now they have to prove to the world that they are tougher than someone else. Or maybe someone at work got the promotion they felt they deserved so now they have to prove that they are smarter than someone else. Maybe they’re just plain evil. Whatever the reason, I never can understand it. Dogs aren’t like that. If we bite you it’s because you threatened us. If we steal your food its because we’re hungry. We don’t do things to hurt others for no reason.

Last night my website was hacked by a group that calls themselves N2N Algerienn Hackers. This morning I received an email from my site saying my password was changed. Hmmm… When I checked my site I saw this:

N2N Hackers Website

Why would someone want to do this to me? I’m not even human; I’m canine. Why me? Maybe a dog bit him or chased him down the street one time so now he is taking it out on me. I filed a complaint with the ASPCA, but they said hacking my website cannot be considered animal cruelty. Maybe I was just the victim of a random act of meanness. I guess it’s true what they say on the farm: four legs good, two legs bad.

So who exactly are N2N Algerienn Hackers? I don’t know. How do you fix a site hacked by N2N Algerienn Hackers? I don’t know that either. Fortunately I know some good humans at CMIT who were able to fix the damage to my blog and get it back up today. For the benefit of anyone else who has been hacked by N2N, I’ve asked them to explain what they did to fix it. Here’s what they said:

The first step with any hack (not just N2N) is to change all your passwords (hosting provider, WordPress and database). If they got your passwords and try to come back this will slow them down if not stop them. I used passwords that are stronger than the ones you were using (passwords with upper and lower case with letters, numbers and special characters are harder to hack).

The next step was to replace your .htaccess file with your original one. N2N modified this file to redirect all your traffic to their site. That’s how they got their site to show up instead of yours. Removing this allowed your WordPress site to get traffic.

As the secondary part of their hack, they altered data in your database to display a message stating that you were hacked by N2N Hackers. And to make it more difficult to recover, they deleted all your posts and comments from the database.

So next we restored your database backup. Unfortunately, your last back up was in August 2009 so it did not contain any posts or comments since then. However, we were able to use Google’s cache to retrieve your more recent posts. Here’s a helpful tip that bears explaining: If you ever again lose content from your website, use Google and search for site:www.simbadog.com (or any other site). The search results will show all the pages on the site that Google had previously indexed. If a page listed there is no longer available on your site, look for a link in that listing that says “cached.” This will show you what Google saw the last time they visited the page. You can then copy and paste content from there back into your site, which is what we did. Note that Yahoo and Bing provide this capability also. If Google didn’t cache the pages you need, maybe one of the others did.

They also left some image files in your uploads folder, which I deleted.

The final step was to perform a full backup of files and the database. I recommend you do this yourself a little more frequently. I also notified your hosting provider. N2N Hackers brag about their technique, which involves a vulnerability in the Linux kernel. I asked your provider to ensure they keep their servers up-to-date with patches and security updates.

John

So that’s my story for today. If you’ve been hacked by N2N Algerienn Hackers let me know how your recovery went and if they ever came back.

I met my cousin Baron last weekend.  He’s a Doberman Pinscher. He just moved here from New Jersey.  I always heard that Dobermans are tough and that people from New Jersey are tougher. So I was a little worried about meeting Baron. 

Nalla, Simba and Baron

Well, he may be tough, but he’s no match for me. I scared the pee out of him.  When he saw me walk through the front door he peed and ran away. I wasn’t even trying to scare him. I guess I just look tough. He and I are about the same size, but I’ve got that macho thing going on, you know.

Baron’s alright. He’s a nice guy. Once we established who the Alpha was, we got along quite well. I couldn’t always understand what he was saying though because he barks with an accent. And he kept saying “fugedaboudit” whatever that means.

Simba and Baron

While I was at his house I noticed he doesn’t have his own door to go outside to the potty. When he wants to go out he has to tell his mom & dad and they take him out. Can you imagine that? I can’t. I’d sooner go on the floor in the house… Oh wait, I do that anyway. Well I’d do it more often. When he comes to my house I’ll show him my door and tell him to ask for one.

Baron and I will probably be spending a lot of time together now that he’s living here. I think we’re going to be good friends.