The shopping cart on this website has been custom designed using Cold Fusion technology.  This improves the shopping experience and adds security across multiple platforms.  Our company has gone to great lengths to protect your transaction and security including the use of 128-bit encryption technology, the strongest available and not permitted outside the USA.  Basically, (SSL) software is the industry standard and among the best software available today for secure commerce transactions. It encrypts all of your personal information including credit card number, name, and address, so
that it cannot be read as the information travels over the Internet.

Additionally, we have obtained a Thawte security certificate for the entire website, including e-commerce transactions. You may contact Thawte to verify our certificate and the website integrity. We are so confident in our system that we offer a 100% money-back guarantee if your credit card is in any way compromised by an e-commerce transaction with us via this website.  Click on the logo above to authenticate.

The Other Cookie

Besides the doggie cookies on this website, there is another kind of Internet cookie.  The ONLY thing we will ever "put on your computer" is a "cookie" related to your personal LOGIN so that prior order information can be retrieved and minimize your data entry.

PERSONAL INFORMATION is NEVER SHARED. Anything you transmit to us is kept confidential. We do NOT share e-mail addresses or any other data with anyone. We DO NOT track any of your browsing habits. Period.

If you share your computer with other people, you should probably answer NO when asked if you want our store to save your information for your next visit. Otherwise your personal information (address, phone number, etc.) will be visible to anyone else using your computer.

So what are cookies? Basically a cookie is a small amount of text that is stored in your browser's directory. The browser is directed to save the cookie by the site you are visiting. Cookies are somewhat controversial, as some sites use them to track what sites you visit, and get information about your browsing habits. They do this to target advertising to your particular favorite topics, but many people see it as an invasion of privacy.

But one of the major uses of cookies is to just give you a user ID that can be used to identify you as you go from page to page. It also can identify you when you return to the page again in the future. This is extremely useful for things like keeping track of items in a shopping cart, or for online forums, to keep track of messages you have read.

This site makes use of cookies in such a way. We do not use cookies for any kind of tracking, or in any way that would be an invasion of your privacy. When you place an order, you can choose to set a cookie that will save your customer number so that when you return to the store, your information can
be retrieved automatically and you won't have to type it in again. This does NOT include your credit card number. We also use cookies to identify your cart number as you move from page to page.

However, we understand many user's concerns regarding cookies, and so have designed the site to work even if you turn cookies off. Instead of your ID being stored in a cookie, you will see it being passed from page to page on the site address. If you would still like to be able to quickly retrieve
your user account information when placing an order, you can do so with our user accounts.

If you do wish to disable cookies, we recommend that you turn them off completely, rather than just using cookie warning. Otherwise, our store will continue to warn you as you go from page to page.

We hope this answers any questions you might have about cookies and our site's use of them. Your privacy is important to us and we want you to feel safe while browsing our site. For more information on cookies, visit Cookie Central.

The Virus / Worm

The Internet is still very much like the Wild West. This means that we all must watch out for ourselves and each other. In this spirit, we wish to alert you to be careful when opening any files that come along as attachments to an e-mail message --- even if you know who sent it!  Ask about unexpected attachments before you open them!  Know what it is, before you click. Be sure you have anti-virus software installed and set to monitor inbound e-mail. And be sure to go back to the anti-virus vendor site on a regular cycle to download the current anti-virus virus definitions. The software you installed six months ago knows nothing about a virus written last week!

Many virus scares are simply hoaxes. Click here to learn more http://symantec.com/avcenter/hoax.html

Click here for more information on the very dangerous I-worm/MTX.A virus http://symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/w95.mtx.html

The Savvy Surfer

Viruses are programs --- executable files. The attachment you're looking out for must be of this nature. If you do not execute the file (click on it), it will not generally run itself.  However things are always changing.  Executable files types end in EXE, COM, MAC, VBS, BAT, DOT, SHS, PIF, LNK, SCR.  Harmless files types --- if they do not include and executable macro inside the file --- are DATA files, not executable files.  These file types include files that are compressed files (ZIP), graphics files (JPG, GIF, BMP, PCX, TIF, MP3) and document files (TXT, XLS, DOC, CDR, MDB, etc).

Because of the extremely high threat of virus infection, if you send us files, WE WILL NOT OPEN OR DOWNLOAD executable file types, even with an anti-virus program running.  Period!  We hope this information is beneficial.