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Health & Fitness

Goodbye, Studio City! Heidi 2002-2013

Heidi: Columnist. Actress. Dog.

Heidi’s last column was about her very special car trip to Carmel-by-the-Sea, the dog-friendliest town in California (although Studio City runs a close second).  We are glad that Heidi got the chance go on this recent trip because she passed away very peacefully on Thursday morning.

She was happy, playing with her squeaker toys, running in the park and sniffing out Studio City news right up until the end.  In recent days we spoiled her with  many of her favorite treats, including a mini-Fatburger, usually reserved for her birthday. Being a very social animal,  she even went out to dinner at one of her favorite SC haunts, Jinky’s Studio Cafe, on Wednesday, her last night out on the town, our town.

And in the morning before she died, she was still squabbling with Sherman the Squirrel (truly the scourge of Studio City) and went charging out after him after his usual morning visit, taunting her from the trees that hang over our back deck.  For the record, we don’t blame Sherman for her passing.  Well, maybe a little.

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This is Diane, not Heidi (as her readers know, she always wrote that the other way around) writing to say thank you to Studio City and Heidi’s former editor, Mike Szymanski, for allowing us to have so much fun discovering our community together. It’s not every editor that will give a dog a byline. And, even as a veteran journalist, it’s amazing how much more you can discover with a dog reporter by your side. 

Heidi and I always shared a byline, but at first the column was written in my voice only.  But not too long after the column was launched, I was trying to write it with a bad case of the flu and for some reason it seemed that it would be easier to write it as Heidi.  After that, there was no stopping her.  In fact, the two of us got a bit competitive about who was the better writer. For the record, Heidi won in the SC Patch poll.

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There are so many SC friends my husband Alan and I would like to thank on Heidi’s behalf:  Editor Mike, the gang at Sam’s Green Paw, Maxwell Dog for helping to throw her a great community birthday party, Nader Kashani of Spotless Green Cleaners  (who hung Heidi’s head shot next to Justin Bieber’s!),  all of her readers and commenters…there are too many to name and, like any winner at the Academy Awards, I don’t want to risk getting played off the stage.  You all know who you are.  For more, here's a link to Heidi's Dad Alan's blog about her.

If you want to make other animals happy on behalf of Heidi,  please donate to her favorite charity, The Cheetah Conservation Fund. Yes, she even loved cats.  

Thanks to all, 

Diane Haithman & Heidi

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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