Have you ever had an animal in your life that touched your soul? That seemed to connect with you beyond the normal pet-owner relationship?

I did. Her name was Pandora and she was a beautiful red dachshund. She would follow me everywhere. She'd let other people pet her, hold her and, from time to time, she'd even sit with them. But when I came into the room she was all daddy's girl.

For 15 years she and our fellow dachshund, Waffle, traveled the country with me. We moved seven times in eight years: From Texas to Atlanta to Texas to Denver to LA to Arkansas to Oklahoma City and, finally, back to Denver. We lost Waffle to old age (18) in OKC, but we had already picked up a little guy named Prince, a brown and white dapple dachshund with a ton of personality.

I had plans to keep Pandy, as we called her, around for many more years. Unfortunately, my generosity, and bad habit, of giving my dogs barbecue rib bones, took a heavy toll. I knew something was wrong with Pandy when she started to have a hacking cough. I was pretty sure she had a rib bone stuck in her throat. Being around animals as much as I have – I spent several of my formative years on a horse ranch in Texas with horses (of course), dogs, cats and rabbits – you come to have a feeling about these things. Anyway, in an effort to get to a vet that was more conducive to our hectic schedules, my wife and I had switched from a sole proprietor vet to one with more of a corporate structure but that was open on Saturdays and late into the evenings.

I took Pandy to the vet and explained the problem. They took Xrays from the shoulders down and deemed her to be suffering from "gas." That was Wednesday evening. Saturday I took her back to the vet and again explained the problem, all but insisting they Xray the entire dog. They refused.

Sunday morning Pandy died from internal bleeding caused by the rib bone that had been stuck in her throat. She, in effect, slowly bled out over four days.

To this day I still hate myself for allowing her to die that way. But, I promised if I could ever do it I would build a place where I could have a lasting memorial to her where all my friends could come and see what a special animal she was and what a special place she still holds in my heart.

That special place is this site. You can find Pandy's memorial here. This site was built mostly through the hard work of my good friend and business partner, Adam. A better programmer you won't find anywhere.

Adam's down in Texas and I'm in Colorado, but our hearts and thoughts go out to animal lovers across the globe that have lost their special friends.

So look around, leave a comment if you like or even post your own memorial. But most of all please spread the word that there is now a place on the web to post a lasting memorial to our treasured friends.

Adam and Gunner