The Never-ending Song

Sometime around mid-morning Millie realized her little dog was not in the apartment with her.  Max, the Yorkshire terrier, who had been  Millie's companion, comforter, and best friend for close to 12 years never went out of Millie's sight.  But Millie had been having some problems lately.  After a stroke which left her with speech problems and other weakness, she found she was having increasing problems remembering things.  She walked many times a day from her end of the senior community to the far end where her brother lived in a similar apartment in another building.  Most of the time Max went along, perfectly trained to heel, looking up into Millie's face when she stopped.  He never barked at people or other dogs, even if one of those dogs barked loudly as they strolled past. Max never left the apartment without Millie unless he was taken for a walk by Millie's brother, Sid, who always kept Max on a leash. When Millie could not find Max in the ap...

We had a pot luck lunch today at Joseph's Dream.  Quite amusing as nearly every dish was some type of salad.  They were all delicious, especially Amy's potato salad.  She is reluctant to divulge her secret ingredients.  Betty made salmon patties.  I was rather hesitant about trying one.  I love salmon but my experience with any kind of loaf or patty thing made with it was not exactly encouraging.   Once when my children were young I decided to "cook healthy". Not that we ate a poor diet since we had a big garden and I canned and froze veggies for winter meals too.  But we did like hot dogs and spare ribs with barbecue sauce and steaks on the grill.  Other than tuna and the occasional batch of fish sticks , my children had not been exposed to much fish.  Salmon was just becoming recognized for it's value.  Recipes were beginning to appear featuring different ways to prepare salmon.  So one evening I proudly placed a large...

It has been hard to find a time in the late afternoon to be on the computer due to the recent trend of thunderstorms rolling through from 3pm on into the evening. In the mornings there are always people in my apartment or things going on (meetings etc.) in the community room, so late afternoon had become my time on the computer.  That has changed this week! I unplug my computer the minute Hannah begins her anxious panting and pacing.  She always knows before there is any indication of a storm.  She is more accurate than the tv weather station.  Yes I have battery back-up, but it is very slow, so I seldom resort to using the computer that way. The good thing is (and I believe if one looks hard enough you can always find something good about most everything) , these storms have so far provided enough water to my flowers so that there is no need for me to lug the jugs of water every evening to  keep them happy.  Of course the other side is that Hannah ages ...

At coffee hour this morning one gal was telling about a bar of dark chocolate she purchased from a local chain store in town recently. When she got home and opened it, the chocolate had white edges all around and seemed brittle.  The "best by" date on the outer wrap was good.  Somehow the bar must have been exposed to excessive heat.  She threw it away.   Another lady spoke up and said she should have returned it and gotten her money back.   "Well, it would have cost more in gas to return it than the chocolate cost, so I just tossed it", was her reply. I think this happens more often than one would believe.  Truth is, companies really want to know when a product is misrepresented or not as expected or damaged in some way.  However it is a pain to hunt out the receipt and make a special trip back to the store for a small refund. Many people shop for all manner of goods, including food items,  on line now.  I find it is very convenient ...

Cat toys seem to be a big selling item these days.  I get catalogs filled with all manner of large and tiny imitation mice, some with catnip, some made of fur, climbing posts. scratching posts, tunnels, feathered toys, toys of brilliant colors, realistic appearing mouse and/or bird toys, toys made for interaction between cat and owner.  (excuse me-we do not own cats, they choose those with whom they wish to interact.) You could spend hundreds on a variety of things intended to amuse your cat.  My cat, Susie, has a drawer full of toys I have purchased thinking this would be just the item to get her moving and help her to lose that sagging belly. There is one she does like. The toy is a feathery "bird" on an elastic cord which is attached to a length of light-weight dowel rod.    But does it get her to move?  Nothing more than a paw.  She lies on her back and casually swats at the bird as I swing it past her.  If I draw it away and swing it ou...

These hot days seem to be very hospitable to all the small insects that visit my flowers.  I spoke of the flutter-bys, (butterflies) and I think there are more of those on the Pentas every day.  There are also two sizes of what appear to be Bumblebees.  The larger ones are the type I am familiar with-ones I saw all over the fields and yard in New York state and Vermont enjoying the clover, both red and white.  But here there are ones who look very much the same but are half the size. They may not be solitary bees as are the larger Bumblebees for there are always a large number of the smaller ones feeding together. I will have to do some research.  (And No--they are not Honey or Sweat bees.) Today I was thrilled to witness a Hummingbird moth sipping from both the Penta and the Geranium.  So very much smaller than a Hummingbird, he is so similar in behavior that he might be mistaken for a young Hummingbird.  When he settled for a moment I got the chance...

My granddaughter, Seanna, spent much of her time with me when she was a toddler.  In her very early babyhood she "spoke" Korean.  When she came to be with me, since I spoke NO Asian  language, she was learning to understand and speak English. She had some very unique names for everyday items: The piano was a panio.  A flyswatter was a flyswatter. The one I cherish most is her terminology for butterflies. Flutter-bys makes far more sense than the name we call those lovely, flitting, delicate painted wings that grace our flower beds. Those wispy flashes of colors bear absolutely no resemblance to the fly we wave away from our food or smash with the rolled magazine.  And from whence came the name "butter"?  While many are a dazzling yellow, there are hundreds more who are cloaked in blue, maroon, black, brown ,orange, reds, and shimmering iridescent greens.   I have never noted them hovering above the pat of butter on the picnic table. They do...

For those of you who have been reading my posts regularly, I apologize for this long delay in writing. I have a good excuse.  My left arm is  black, red, and blue from wrist to armpit.  My left knee was puffy and not very reliable (MUCH better now).  My "sitter" was sore--still a bit.  Toes on my left foot scraped up and sore.-still healing. I could tell you that I was thrown from my pony--and that would be partially true.  I call my electric scooter my Blue Pony.  I gave a wrong signal and my pony and I had a disagreement which ended with me being extremely embarrassed, sitting half under the metal mail box unit in front of the office building in our community.  My pony ran a bit further and stopped too far away from me for me to reach it. It began when I was getting my mail.  One of those annoying ad post card thingies they insist on putting loosely into magazines fell out and lay part way beneath the mail boxes.  Well I did not wa...

There is a good deal I do not understand about the behavior of my cat, Susie, and my dog, Hannah.   One of the biggest riddles is why they do not seem to appreciate, or at least accept, my efforts at cleanliness.  I understand that smell is very important to both of them .  Why can't they enjoy the same scents that I do?   I carefully read the labels of the shampoo I buy for Hannah.   Adjusted pH for dog's skin and non-allergic ingredients.  My Vet had me using Dawn dish liquid for Hannah's too greasy coat. Now that her hair is of normal texture I have been using an oatmeal based shampoo.  It does a good job and smells  nice -- to me that is.  The moment Hannah is dry she cannot wait to get outside and find something to roll on.  In this community she is not allowed off leash so that limits her selections.  Once though, she discovered the remains of a mouse that Ginger, the feral cat, had been enjoying.  The pa...

Time was devised by man.  Thus many people are of the opinion that animals do not have any sense of time.  I have seen far too many incidences of animals understanding the passage of time to go along with that.  Of course they don't look at the clock and think " Hmm- it's 5:30 so where is my supper?"  But somehow a dog knows when it is time for the filled supper bowl to appear. Growing up on a dairy farm I learned that the animals were cared for before we ate.  So my Dad was up every morning--no sleeping in on the weekend--at 4am to feed and milk the cows.  In summer when the cows were out in the pasture over night, often in a field far from the barn, they always showed up at the barn door at milking time.  Once in a while if those cows were enjoying a nice summer day they might be a bit slower coming up for the evening milking and Dad would stand at the back door and call "Co' boss".   Every last cow  looked up and headed to the barn imme...