Phot via ABCLiz/Twitter

Looks like French bulldogs just can’t stay out of the headlines! Following Lady Gaga’s harrowing dog-napping ordeal, another dramatic dog fiasco has recently made the news.

Recently, a Bay Area woman was reunited with her French bulldog, Brody, after he had been found 600 miles away…in Tijuana, Mexico.

According to Brody’s owner, Debbie Campbell, she had been frantically searching for her emotional support dog for weeks after he “wandered away” from her front yard on February 3rd.

Immediately after Brody’s disappearance, Campbell and her family launched an intense search party. They posted flyers around town and posted on social media to find her beloved Brody, but no luck. Just when the Campbells thought they would never see Brody again, they received a mysterious message from Mexico.

A man named Benjamin Gonzalez contacted the family on Facebook and told them he had bought Brody a few weeks prior, on the streets of Tijuana.

By an odd twist of fate, Gonzalez had previously lived in the Bay Area himself before being deported to Mexico two years prior. Since he had lived in the Bay Area since he was a baby, his entire family still lived there.

When Gonzalez showed his new dog to his American family, they recognized Brody from social media posts and told him that Brody looked like a local missing dog. They told him to contact Debbie Campbell.

When Gonzalez contacted her, Campbell asked him to send her a picture of Brody’s tattoo for proof. “And the minute he did I knew it was my dog,” Campbell told KGO reporters.

Gonzalez said he can relate to the dog’s situation. Gonzalez told reporters that it made sense that Brody was far from home, because the dog seemed depressed.

“I’m deported myself, and you know I’m out here by myself, so we could relate,” Gonzalez said. “He doesn’t have family here…I don’t have family here, I’m out here by myself, so you know I was like, man, if I can return him I’m going to do the right thing.”

Within 24 hours, Debbie Campbell was reunited with Brody. She was overjoyed to be with her emotional support dog again. Campbell recounted the emotional situation through tears: “When he video called us to show us the dog, that took my breath away,” Campbell said KGO. “It’s a blessing that that man called, because otherwise there’s no way we could have gotten him back.”

According to The San Francisco Chronicle, thieves have been targeting French bulldogs more and more recently due to their popularity.

A police spokesperson referred to them as a French bulldogs are considered “a high-value ticket item.” Dog-nappers can make $1,500 to $6,000 reselling the pups on the black market.

“Frenchies are ‘in’ right now,” San Francisco SPCA president Dr. Jennifer told the Chronicle. “If I had a Frenchie, I wouldn’t let it out of my sight right now.”

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Screenshot via YouTube

Rats are such interesting creatures. They’re usually associated with dirt and disease, but they’re also some of the most popular animals on the internet.

Those who have been around rats for longer than a few seconds (hey, that’s how long it usually takes us before we run screaming!) know that they’re highly intelligent creatures.

And no one knows this fact better than Miguel Angel Silva, affectionately known as the “Rat Man of Peru“.

Recently, a TikTok went viral showing a man on the streets of Lima playing with a group of rats on the sidewalk. The video begins with what can only be described as a rat-version of Cirque du Soleil.

The man holds his finger out like a trapeze before one of his rat friends jumps onto his finger and flips around on it like a trapeze artist.

The video continues with the man crouched on the ground, his rats in an orderly line in front of him.

It’s immediately evident that these aren’t your ordinary rats–they’re super obedient. Trained, even.

To make things even more entertaining, the TikTok poster captioned the video with: “Yo haciendo malabares con mi ex.” (“Me playing games with my ex.”)

While the TikToker doesn’t identify the man, he is very-well known to locals. His name is Miguel Angel Silva, otherwise known as “Ratman”.

Silva has been covered extensively by different media channels for his abnormal lifestyle. Not only does he perform tricks with his rats on the street, but he also lives with them–around 100 of them, to be exact.

Silva, who is also a drummer in local rock bands, spends almost all of his time with the rats–he often has one on his shoulder as a travel companion. Camera crew have followed him as he goes about his normal day, running errands, playing music–all with a rat on his shoulder. They even eat from the same plates as him.

In various interviews, Silva has revealed that his love for rats started as a child, when he saved a rat from being killed from his friend. The rat ended up living in his roof for a while before he permanently befriended it. It was then that Ratman was born.

Silva says he loves rats because they are misunderstood creatures, shunned and abused by the public.

He acknowledges that many people judge him harshly for his lifestyle, thinking he is dirty and his home is unsanitary. But Silva says he keeps his rats clean, washing them everyday and making sure they’re never infected with dangerous parasites.

We’re glad Silva is following his dreams regardless of what people think. Hopefully, we’ll see him on the streets of Peru one day.

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