Sophie's Story

   About a year and a half ago I nervously left my "safe" job in a corporate pharmacy. It was a nervous time for me. I wasn't sure where I could work or how we would manage. Less than a week later C took me to a nearby independent pharmacy he had found. He wanted me to meet Anne,the manager.   I instantly liked her. She and I had a lot in common professionally even though I am old enough to be her mother. I liked the store. We interviewed each other and liked what we saw. I was hired, first as casual on call, then as part time.   A little over a year ago we obtained the files of a pharmacy that was closing. Along with those files we got two technicians and a delivery driver. One of the techs is Marie. She is tough, smart, funny and can do nearly anything with our computer system. The other tech is Lynn. She is quiet, sometimes unsure of herself and very good with customers. Even though we barely knew each other we just all seemed to fit together for lack of better wor

   Yesterday C called me while I was at work. He had bought all the things we needed food wise for the next few days. He told me that he had been unable to find a Christmas present for me. "It's all right," I said, "Don't worry about it." We ended the conversation and I went back to work.    I had not got him anything either. In truth I didn't know what to give him. The fact of the matter was that Christmas had snuck up on us this year. The past couple months had been a bit challenging. For the first time in my life I was on the receiving end of health care. For the first time in his life, C was faced with having to take care of his wife. The stress of the situation had caused him to succumb to the worst cold he'd ever had. I'm on the mend now, but neither of us is in great shape.   The question of Christmas presents stayed in the back of my head the rest of the day. Do I really want anything? The answer quite honestly was no. We had spent qu

   Hi! This is Skamp!    Sophie isn't feeling well so I am going to write the column this week. We're not quite sure what is going on. Sophie is at home with us, but C is taking care of us this week.    The interesting thing is that C doesn't do things quite like Sophie. For instance, we do get fed but it is at a much later time. C also doesn't put water in our food like Sophie does. I asked Sophie once why she puts water in our food,she said it's because she doesn't want us to get dehydrated. We do have a water fountain to drink from.     Sophie also sits on the floor next to me while we eat. This is to prevent Colby from shouldering me away from my dish and eating my breakfast. I don't get it. Why does Colby have to eat so fast? It is much better to eat slower and enjoy your food. Colby doesn't do that. He wolfs things down like he'll never eat again. He's always been like that.    C sometimes forgets to give us our dry cereal. When he do

      I'm having a case of writer's block. It doesn't happen very often thankfully, but when it does it's a frustrating experience. There are few things worse than staring at a blank piece of paper or a blank computer screen and having absolutely nothing to fill it with.    I found an article on the internet on what to do when you get writer's block. The author had several good ideas of things to do to help cure writer's block. One of them is play, the author likes Legos. Actually that could work if I had toys in the house. One of the disadvantages to being a childless woman is that my house is bare of things for children to play with. The few children that visit either have to bring their own toys or play with the cat toys that I have. In fact, for some reason, children seem to really like cat toys.   Maybe I should get some Play Doh  and Silly Putty. I used to really like playing with those when I was a kid. I also liked the Slinky. Does anyone remember wh

   The week before last former United States President George Herbert Walker Bush passed away at  age 94. There was a funeral for him at the Washington National Cathedral in Washington DC. The service was televised and also streamed on the internet. Like many people in this country I watched the proceedings.   Four men were selected to give tributes at this service, Jon Meacham, historian and author, Brian Mulroney, former Prime Minister of Canada, Alan Simpson, former senator from Wyoming and former President George W. Bush, his oldest son. All were excellent speakers and gave their tributes from their varying points of view.    One of them touched me deeply and I've listened to it a couple of times. There were many lessons taught during that eulogy that we could all stand to learn and incorporate into our lives. I'd like to focus on the tribute given by Alan Simpson.   First a bit of background. Alan Simpson is 87 years old. Her served as a senator from Wyoming from 1979

   It's that time of year again. The time of year when I start getting the itch to put on my sweatshirt with the Christmas tree on it, get out the flour, sugar, butter, baking soda and powder and other ingredients and make some Christmas cookies. I want to dip some Ritz cracker peanut butter sandwiches in melted chocolate. I want the house to smell like gingerbread.   There just one problem. There are only two people in the house. We can't eat all the things I want to bake.    I know what you're thinking. Give them away. Take plates of cookies to your friends and neighbors. I'd love to do that, but that is another problem. Most of the people I know are either on gluten free diets,doing sugar detox, have various allergies to thing that are in cookies that I bake or trying to lose weight. I literally have no one to give cookies to.   It's a bit sad. Baking cookies while Christmas music is playing on the stereo is about the only thing about this time of year that

   Every so often I will watch a clip of Last Week Tonight on Youtube. Last Week Tonight  is a late night show on HBO hosted by British comedian John Oliver who also writes for and produces the show.  The clip that I watch is a 20 minutes or so where Mr. Oliver talks various topics of interest from that week. He's talked about televangelists, multi level marketing, various political figures, authoritarianism and why the state attorneys general election is important.    I enjoy his humour and his point of view. He makes some very good serious points in what he says. The part I don't like is some of his language. He likes to use a certain four letter word for emphasis. I don't get it. Mr. Oliver is a smart man. He went to a good college. Why does he need to use profanity for emphasis?   Why do comics in general feel the need to use profanity? I have never understood it. George Carlin is a good example. Many of his comedy routines are laced with profanity. However,one of h

  Last week I decided to post on Facebook each day one thing for which I am grateful. I hadn't planned to do it. My original thought was to post something about how blessed I feel to be working where I am working. I had planned to post a picture of a rock with the words, "Keep the Faith"  carved on it that my boss left near my workstation one morning.    As I was planning the post, I thought it would be a good exercise for me to expand it to one thing each day for a week. I also decided I had to list why I was grateful for that thing. I decided to include things that might be taken for granted.   Monday I posted about my job and coworkers as originally planned.   Tuesday I posted that I was grateful for C. I assured him that the posts not in order of importance.   Wednesday I posted that I was grateful for the cats. Later that day Scamp peed in on the dining room floor for no reason that I can think of. It was hard to feel grateful for him after that happened.    

   This is not your traditional Thanksgiving day column. Usually I or one of the cats writes about things for which we are grateful. I'm going to take a slightly different spin on that topic today.     I have been a healthcare provider for 25 years. In all those years I have always provided the health care, not received it. Lately, I've found myself on the receiving end. It's been an interesting experience. It's made me grateful that I live in a state where there are a lot of good healthcare providers. I only wish that health care wasn't so expensive so more people would be able to get the care they need. (That's another topic for another day.)    I have been learning a lot. I've been learning that certain tests are not as scary as I thought they were. I've learned that it is possible for a phlebotomist to have a really good sense of humor. I've learned that questions are encouraged.    I have also learned that it is not easy to take a pill twic

     My uncles are always saying that they are busier now than they were when they were working. One of my uncles says that retire means being tired over and over again. I never understood that. When you retire, you don't have to get up and go to work every day. You decide what you are going to do and when you are going to do it. Right?    I'm beginning to understand now. I'm not retired, but I work part time as opposed to full time. That means that I should have lots of time to do the things that I want to do. Knit, crochet, read, cook, housekeeping, instrument practice, work on my Personal Progress, study my Scriptures and do service work.    My to do lists should always get done. There is not a single task that I should have to leave for another time. I'm not working full time so I should have plenty of time to do everything. Shouldn't I?   I'm finding that this is not the case. Take Monday for instance. I had a to do list with four items on it. The fir

   There are all kinds of things I can do with a smartphone. I can text, take pictures and text them to people. I can use the counting app when knitting. I can look up Scriptures. I can get directions to anyplace I want to go.    One thing I discovered I can do with my phone is use an app called Bitmoji. This is an app that allows you to make a character that looks like you. You can dress this character in various types of clothing or costumes. You can use this Bitmoji on social media and texting. (I still haven't figured out how to use it on Facebook.)    I really like Bitmoji. I am lucky in that my character does look quite a bit like me. (She has more hair than I do though.) I even found hats that look like hats I own to put on my Bitmoji. Here are a few reasons why I like Bitmoji. (These are in no particular order.)   There are a wide variety of pictures with different types of text to choose from. For instance if I search for hello, I get Hellooooo?, Hi!, Yo!Hey You! and

   Now that elections are over it's safe to watch TV again. The political ads get pretty tiresome. The worst are the attack ads.    I don't understand why political candidates still run attack ads. I don't know anyone who likes them. They are not helpful in making an informed decision on who to vote for. They've got to be expensive to put together. They must be effective though or I don't think candidates and other entities would continue to use them.   To me campaigning for political office is like applying for a job. The only difference is that instead of one or maybe a few other people that interview a job candidate, there is a county, an area,a state or even an entire country that interviews and then votes for who they think would do the best job representing them.   If you look at campaigning for political office like interviewing for a job, then you can understand why I don't get attack ads. It's usually considered to be in poor taste to bad mouth

   C is a member of a few local Facebook groups. He likes to post positive messages in these groups because sometimes, quite frankly, the commenting can get pretty negative. A few days ago he shared a post about respecting the opinions of others and not humiliating those with whom you do not agree.  The post reads, "It's okay to have an opinion. It's ok to disagree with someone else's opinion. It's not okay to humiliate someone because they don't think the same as you do. Show some respect. Society needs more of it." Then he sat back to see what kind of response he would get.    Everyone reacted positively to the post.  Although to be honest I'm not sure if that means anything. Many times people just surf through Facebook and hit "like" without really reading what they are liking.Several also made a comment agreeing with the statements.    One guy commenting that he was tempted to make some sort of flippant remark after seeing the positiv

      I'm slowly coming around to the advantages of having a smartphone. It's been really helpful at work. I feel like I'm finally up to speed with my coworkers. I've even got a Bitmoji. It's been handy for checking email and Facebook.    The thing I like most about my smartphone is the ability to text. I like texting. I've even been able to text my Dad which has been very nice.    This week while we've been on vacation I've been using my smartphone to virtually take my friend,Celine, along. Celine recently moved to Minnesota and has never been in the Midwest before. As her friend, I've felt it my duty to show her  as much of this part of the country as I can.    A few weeks ago when we went to  the North Shore I told Celine that I was going to "take" her along with me on our road trip. Everywhere we went I took a few pictures so she could see and then I would text them to her. It was kind of fun, sort of like keeping a little journal

  Lots of changes have happened the last week or so. There were two big changes announced at General Conference two weeks ago. The first is that church is not going to be three hours long anymore. Lots of people are very happy about this. The second change was that members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints no longer refer to themselves as Mormon or LDS. I can understand this. We don't call Roman Catholics "Papsists". We don't call other faith that are Bible based "Bibleists". I have never understood why it is all right to call members of The Church of Jesus Christ by the name of one of our books of scripture. As a sign that the Church Leadership mean business on this  one, the name of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir was changed to The Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square.   We're on our annual vacation to Door County and there are more changes.    Our room has been redecorated. The big armoire is gone and there is a dresser in it's plac

   During the women's session of this last weekend's General Conference of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, President Russell M. Nelson gave a list of four things that all women in the church should do help themselves spiritually.   One of those things was a ten day fast from social media. This is not the first time the president of the Church has encouraged members to abstain from social media, which generally means Facebook, but could include Twitter and Instagram as well, for brief period of time. In June President Nelson encouraged the youth to take a seven day fast calling it, "break from fake".   I was planning on doing the fast, but thought that I would start it when we go on our yearly pilgrimage to Door County.   It occurred to me that that might be cheating. When we are in Door County we are usually out and about. There isn't much time to look at computer screens. The purpose of a fast is to refrain from something in order to gain cl

  This past weekend was General Conference weekend. Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints gather in meeting houses, the Conference Center and  around TV screens, computer screens, smartphones, radios and tablets to listen to talks given by church leaders on a variety of subjects. There is music by the Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square and and sometimes other choirs.   C and I were among those gathered to listen to the talks. I enjoy listening to them. I must confess, though, there is one thing about conference I like more than the talks.   I like the organ.   The organ in the Conference Center amazes me. It's huge. It's beautiful. It sounds really nice even over computer speakers. I love watching the organists play it. Their skill fascinates me. I'm challenged by one keyboard, yet there are five on the Conference Center organ.   If that isn't enough there are also a lot of foot pedals. I have no idea how many. There's a lot of stops that a

   I like looking at the memories that pop up on my Facebook page each day. Some of them are funny, some are baffling and some are insightful. One thing I've noticed the past few days is that my memories include things I've shared. All are pictures of with different sayings. One of them was "I am not a product of my circumstances. I am a product of my decisions." Another is, "You can easily judge the character of a person by how they treat those who can do nothing for them." The last one is, "You have no responsibility for what happened to you as a child. You have complete responsibility for what you do about it now."    I can guess what prompted me to share those posts. Obviously, I was dealing with someone, or perhaps several someones that were choosing to blame others for actions or choices that they were making now.    I'm sure that I'm going to get a certain amount of criticism for what I'm about to write. I believe that there

   I wasn't planning on doing this much writing about current events, however, there are certain topics I simply can't ignore. Some of the recent articles about the first woman accusing the nominee for the Supreme Court of sexual misconduct have caught my attention. (Yes, I'm aware I'm two accusers behind and that she is testifying today.)    There are two things in particular that have me slightly steamed. One is the question of how she could remember her assault when he cannot and denies that it happened. The other is the question of why she didn't report it.    I am going to answer those two questions today using an incident that happened to me. While what happened to me is not the same as what happened to her, I think there is enough similarity to make my point.    When I was in seventh grade I was poked and groped from chest to waist by two or three boys during a home economics class. I was sitting in front of the teacher. The boys were sitting on either s

   C and I are taking a little trip. Last year we went to the North Shore with Sarah and Dean. We had such a good time that we decided to do it again. This time we'll be on our own. One of the benefits of working part time is that our weekend is whenever we want it to be. We were able to easily make a reservation.    We packed up the car and headed out. We took I 35 E and headed north toward Duluth. It was a nice drive. It was cloudy, but not rainy and just the right temperature. I brought my knitting as usual. I'm working on knitting T-shirt yarn into thick ropes that I can sew into a basket. I managed to knit one ball of T-shirt yarn while we were driving. I like doing things like that because it makes me feel like I'm being productive.   Another thing I decided to do was text my new friend, Carolina, while we were travelling. She and her husband and daughter just moved to Minnesota a few months ago. One thing I have been trying to do is educate her about her new home

   One of the stories in the news lately is the growing number of Roman Catholic priests being accused of sexual abuse. Along with this are also accusations against bishops and other Catholic clergy leaders who have covered up the actions of the accused priests.    The first major story I saw on this subject is the grand jury investigation in  Pennsylvania earlier this year. They have discovered that over 1,000 people were victimized over a period of 70 years by more than 300 priests. There are calls for all states to conduct investigations of the Catholic church in an effort to find additional abuse cases and find out how those cases are being handled.    The Pennsylvania grand jury story has spawned numerous articles on related topics. There are articles about people who were investigated after accusing a priest of abuse. There are articles claiming that there was a large detailed coverup of the problem going all the way to the Vatican and other articles claiming there is no cov

     I like to wear hats. Sometimes I get complimented on the hat that I'm wearing. Many times I will hear something like, "I would like to wear hats, but I just don't look good in them."  I never understand women who say this. That makes as much sense as saying, "I don't wear tops because I don't look good in them." Just like there are many kinds of tops, from crop tops to long tunic tops, there are many kinds of hats.     I believe that all women look good in hats. It's just a matter of finding the right hat. I've looked at several charts and found that there are 12-15 different basic styles of hats.     Most women see a hat in a store or on a rack and try it on. They look in the mirror, dislike what they see and take the hat off. Then they assume that they don't look good in hats. The fact is, they don't look good in the hat they tried on.   Not every woman looks good in every style of hat. There are several styles that are un

Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old he will not depart from it. Proverbs 22:6 KJV     A few weeks ago I got an email from a friend of mine. He lives and farms in a small town in North Dakota. He wrote about harvest beginning, crop prices and vacations taken over the summer. He wrote about his daughters who play in sports programs at their school.    He also wrote about reporting a member of the high school football team who was using chewing tobacco. This is against the team rules and the player received a suspension. The player involved is as a lineman and a good player. My friend wrote that he had received angry emails and a lot of flack. he usually goes to the football games to help the the sideline chains. He did not go that week. (Maybe he is still staying away. I don't know.)    One of the things my friend wrote is that he is being considered the bad guy. That really struck me. my friend, who reported a player who was breaking the rul

     C bought several devices for our cell phones earlier today. He got some pop-up stands and a couple of devices that allow the phones to be mounted on the dashboard of the car.    The pop-up and mounting that he bought for me were pretty simple. The pop up sticks to the back of the phone. The mount sticks to the dashboard of the car and the pop-up slips into the mount. No problem.    The ones he bought for himself are a little fancier. The pop up spins and can also be used to organize cords. The mounting device clips to the vent and is magnetic. Both came with several parts. There were no assembly instructions in the package only a picture on the back. The picture isn't very helpful.   The picture of the mounting device shows four small round magnets. There were none in the package just two things that looked like small mirrors.  The package was sealed so there is no way the magnets could have dropped out before purchase. C and I checked the counter and the floor around whe

  My hat collection is now complete. C, the excellent husband that he is, bought me a fascinator.    For those of you who don't know, a fascinator is a type of headgear. You know those crazy looking things precariously perched on British women's heads at weddings. Those are fascinators. For the record, mine is very tasteful and will never be worn at some bizarre angle.   I was a little curious about how this came to be called a fascinator so I did a little digging online. It turns out that the origin of the modern fascinator was a bit more modest. According to several sources a fascinator, (although that word was not used at the time) was actually a crocheted or loosely knitted hood or scarf made of lace, wool or soft light yarn. Gradually over the years, more decorations were added to them until they became what we see today. One source I consulted referred to them as a hat decoration without the hat.   I had always wanted a fascinator but had decided that I truly had eno

     I thought I was going to have to cancel the Annual Birthday Lunch this year. None of my friends would be able to attend. Carol had tickets to see the musical Hamilton. Dana was going to be out of town.  Ellen would be working, preparing for the new school year. I have other friends, but I either hadn't seen them in years or would most likely be unable to some. I felt sad. I can't remember when I didn't take someone to lunch on my birthday. Maybe it would just have to be C and I this year.    A few days later I had an idea. I had recently met a young woman from church named Carolina. She and her husband had recently moved here. I'd spent a couple hours visiting with her in her home and liked her immensely. I should ask her. We could have lunch and then walk a little on Summit Ave so she could some of the new area she moved to. I knew she was out of town so I took a chance and sent her a text. She replied that she would be back from her trip. I was happy. The lunc

   A man running for a state office in Minnesota has been accused of domestic violence by a former girlfriend. The accuser claims to have a video of the incident which she has so far refused to release.   I'm being intentionally vague about this because I don't want to write about this specific case. I want to write about the situation in general. It's another one of those times when I have some conflicting feelings.   The thing that bothers me the most is the attitude toward the video that the accuser claims to have. There are many out there, including at least one women's group, that says she should not have to release the video. She made an accusation and her word should be enough. There are some that think that requiring her to release the video who then place the same requirement on other women who have made sexual violence accusations.   I'm torn about this. Claims of sexual harassment, abuse and violence often have little in the way of evidence to back u

   In November of 1992, Queen Elizabeth II gave a speech where she referred to the soon to be past year as her "annus horribilis" There were many scandals in the Royal family that year. Then Windsor Castle, where the Queen lived during World War II nearly burned to the ground. It was indeed a very bad year.   Everyone goes through a rough patch now and again. For C and I this year was in some ways sort of rough. (Although it was not anywhere near as bad as 1992 was for Queen Elizabeth.)   What made it difficult was that it was a year of transition. A little over a year ago, I changed jobs and started to work part-time. This had a greater affect than I had expected.   It meant that I was at home more. In many ways this is good. It means that I am able to be at home to clean the house, wash dishes and clothes, in general, to be of more help in the house. We were able to work on projects we wanted to do, like organize the storeroom, plant our garden in a timely manner and s

   C located a smartphone that someone wasn't using. The owner was willing to give it away but said that the screen needed repair. C found a place that could repair the screen for a decent price and made arrangements to get the phone.   I still wasn't crazy about the idea of a smartphone. However, since my boss and coworkers rely on texting to communicate, I seemed to have little choice.   We got the phone on Monday afternoon. The screen did have a little damage in the corner, but nothing that would keep the phone from working. We decided to wait to repair the screen. Since it used to be someone else's phone we needed to wipe it. Google is a wonderful thing. It tells you how to wipe a phone. We were able to change the passcodes and get some things set up. The next thing we needed to do was activate it. That should be pretty easy, right? Just call the cell company and they can activate it.    It turned into a small nightmare. The company couldn't activate the phone