Sophie's Story

I've been spending too much time on the computer. It starts out innocently enough. I check my email and then my Facebook page. I go to the Animal Rescue site and click on it. Then I scroll through the headlines on Yahoo news and that is where the trouble starts. I see an interesting story which leads to another interesting story and the next thing I know it's a few hours later. My to-do list is unfinished and Scamp is giving me the long cat stare because I have not given him enough attention. Whoops. Sometimes I'm amazed at the stuff I will look at. For instance, I read an article about Tim Tebow's first press conference as a New York Jet. Why? I'm not a Jet fan. I don't understand why they even signed Tebow when they have Mark Sanchez, but that's a story for another day. I decided that yesterday was going to be a No Internet Day. I was not going to log onto the computer for any reason. This isn't a new thing for me. I routinely do this on my Sundays off...

I had just spent an entire hour writing a column about my biggest pet peeve, people who don't do what they say they are going to do. I wrote about how it seems that keeping one's word is not considered important anymore. I branched off to talk about how once when a public person makes a comment that generates controversy, instead of backing away from it or saying they were misquoted, taken out of context or were speaking off the record the person should either say that that is what they really think or admit that it was a stupid thing to say and move on. I wrote about the prevalence of meaningless phrases like how are you and your call is important to us. I wrote about how C and I disagree about what people say when they are angry. I think that anger shuts off the little editor that we all have in our heads that keeps us from saying what we really think. C says that angry people say things out of hurt that they really don't mean. I read over all that I had written and reali...

"I don't have pet peeves,I have whole kennels of irritation." Whoopi Goldberg C and I played a harp and guitar duet at church last Sunday. While we were preparing to play Bishop Campbell spoke a little bit about the hymn we were going to perform. He referred to my harp as a "machine". My Dad, a broadcast engineer, taught me that a machine was a device that did work and had moving parts. A car is a machine, the appliance that washes clothes is a machine. A harp is NOT a machine. Vibrating strings do not count as moving parts. I did what I always do in such situations. I craned my neck around and gave him "The Look". Now, I admit this was a minor faux pas. Normally only a close female relative can give "The Look" to a man. I was acting out of pure reflex. Misuse of the word "machine" is one of my pet peeves. Like Ms Goldberg I do have a small kennel of irritation. Most of us do. I'd like to share a few with you today in hopes that...

Today is St. Patrick's Day. There will be parades,celebrations,consumption of green beer and feasts of corn bread,cabbage and soda bread. To all of you who have an Irish background, I hope you have a happy holiday. I will not be celebrating. My background is Italian, not Irish and Patrick is not my patron saint. In fact I'm not even Catholic. This isn't my holiday and now that I am an adult, I don't have to celebrate it. When I was in school our classroom would be decorated in shamrocks. If you didn't wear green on 17 March, you'd get pinched by other students. I don't know where that awful custom came from, I always disliked it. Green was never a colour I liked to wear and even when I did wear it I almost always got pinched anyway. ("That's green? I didn't see it.") To me it feels almost oppressive. No other nationality gets a day of celebration. If you look at a Hallmark calendar,Dayrunner calender or any other calendar St. Patrick's ...

Mr. Swenson's wife called yesterday afternoon. She told me that he had died the night before and that if I had any prescriptions for him, I should put them back in stock. I was surprised, but then I wasn't surprised. He was an elderly man who had cancer and the cancer had spread. I'd seen him about a month ago and he still seemed all right. I knew he wasn't going to stay that way. I'd taken care of a couple of people with cancers in the brain before. It wasn't pretty. It's one of the few things that I hope I never have to watch. I know that medical research has made great strides when it comes to treating cancer,but at Mr. Swenson's age, there probably wasn't much that could be done. I don't like losing customers. It happens though, people move, get angry because of something or have to use a mail order pharmacy due to insurance issues. When you work with a large geriatric population as I do,you also lose customers through death. I remember when ...

I've been rereading the book "Quiet Strength" by Tony Dungy lately. I like to read it about once a year or so. I think it might have been his first book. It was published in 2007 the year after Indianapolis won the Super Bowl. I have always been a Tony Dungy fan. I wasn't into football when he started coaching at Tampa Bay. By the time I had started to notice him he had been coaching the Colts for a few years. He is a class act all the way around. I remember watching the 2006 Super Bowl where the Colts played against the Chicago Bears. I rooted for the Colts. I had to, no self respecting Packer fan roots for the Bears-ever. In a business filled with egomaniacs, low level thugs and loudmouths, he is refreshingly human....and humble. The book is sort of an autobiography of Coach Dungy. He talks about his short career as a player in the NFL and how he made the transition into coaching. He takes the reader through the jobs and other events in his life and ends at winning ...

Hi! This is Scampurrrr. I am also called Scamp. A few months ago my brother Colby and I decided to reorganize the duties we have at this house. The stress level of the humans was getting pretty high. We decided there was need for a therapy cat. I decided to step down from my position as Chief House Cat to be come the Chief Therapy Cat. Colby agreed to step up and become the new Chief House Cat. I must say that our job switch has worked quite well. I like being a therapy cat. I enjoy all the petting and grooming sessions required to make my humans feel better. Sometimes I just look at them with my stunning green eyes and they pick me up and start to cuddle me. I can also nap wherever I want. I don't have to nap near the windows or in the living room. As much as I enjoyed looking after the safety of my humans, I like this job much better. Colby is a natural CHC. Every morning he likes to patrol the hallway and make sure all the doors are shut. He sniffs everything and everyone that c...

There are a couple of movements that I've read about on the Internet lately. Both of them are trying to get people,especially younger people,to stop using two words in a derogatory way. The two words are "retarded" and "gay". I agree with both of these causes for two reasons. The first is that we have a rich language, there are better words than "retarded" and "gay" to describe something that is bad or less than ideal. The second is that when you turn a label given to a group of people unto negative word, it is much easier to think of people with that label as less than or not human. This can lead to some pretty bad things. I would like to take up the cause of another group that is constantly subjected to denigrating language. Most of us are blissfully unaware of the barrage of damaging images that constantly assault the ears of this undeserving group. I am talking about left handed people. Thankfully,we are past the barbaric days when left h...