Cover them Over

Traditionally read at Memorial Day ceremonies in New England:

Cover the thousands who sleep far away--
Sleep where their friends can not find them to-day;
They who in mountain, and hillside and dell
Rest where they wearied, and lie where they fell.
Softly the grass-blade creeps round their repose;
Sweetly above them the wild flow'ret blows;
Zephyrs of freedom fly gently o'erhead,
Whispering names for the patriot dead.
Cover the faces that motionless lie,
Shut from the blue of the glorious sky;
Faces once lighted with smiles of the gay--
Faces now marred with the frown of decay.
Eyes that beamed friendship and love to your own;
Lips that sweet thoughts of affection made known;
Brows you have soothed in the day of distress;
Cheeks you have flushed by the tender caress.
Faces that brightened at War's stirring cry;
Faces that streamed when they bade you good-by. Faces that glowed in the battle's red flame, Paling for naught, till the Death Angel came. Cover them over--yes, cover them over-- Parent, and husband, and brother, and lover:
Kiss in your hearts these dead heroes of ours,
And cover them over with beautiful flowers!
-- Will Carlton

How hopped up on cough syrup am I?

I've been miserable, on and off, for the last 10 days.

First a 24 hour plus a little bit flu on Wednesday, then a mild fever Saturday night even though I deliberately took that day easy. Cut a very little amount of firewood on Sunday just desperate for fresh air...and I've had a cold all this week...which has now turned into full blown laryngitis.

I have a habit of re-using the 32oz juice bottles when I buy them a water jug for a week or so (rinsing / washing of course). So today I grab the empty from my desk, fill it half with water, go to the fridge, top it off with orange juice.

At which point I find myself thinking, "Huh, they mislabeled this. It's clearly orange juice, but the container says it's Ruby Red Grapefruit." It honestly took me a minute to figure it out.

To think I went for a long drive today and bought a copy of Audobon's Field Guide to Trees. And I'm not even on the good stuff for cough syrup, just plain old non-drowsy formula.

Nightsoil in China

I'm not even sure how or why I stumbled upon this book in Google:

The use of 'nightsoil' or human manure immediately springs to Western minds when Chinese agriculture is mentioned, and although it may occasion considerable repugnance to us, to the Chinese it was an obvious and simple way to return fertility to the soil, the validity of which emerges clearly in modern chemical analyses.

(It goes on to note that this practice has probably aided greatly in maintaining fertility in China; compare this particularly to long-term declines in other bread bowls like the fertile crescent and the Mediterranean)

Newspapers circling the drain Part II

Soon after I started working at the T&G I knew enough about the revenue side to seriously question what was being paid for newspapers.

Assuming you're looking for a 10% return on investment on capital, and need to achieve that from ongoing operations, then most I could see a newspaper being worth was around $1,000 per unit of circulation. Unless you're running a Ponzi scheme, that's the only way you truly make money in the long term -- from the underlying business earnings.

Hearst bought the Chronicle after the Times bought the T&G from the Chronicle.
Hearst paid $1,375 per unit circulation for the Chronicle.Times paid $2,757 per unit circulation for the T&G.In 1993 the Times paid $1,666 per unit circulation for the Globe (averaging daily and Sunday circulation).

If you took the difference between $1,000/circulation I figure was a fair value and what was paid for these papers and bought investment grade securities earning 4% instead, today Hearst would have $250 Million extra in the bank and Times would have $1 Billion extra.

With the Chronicle losing $50-70M in 2009, that $250M combined with reasonable business cost cutting would by them 4, 5, 6 years to weather this economic storm.

The Times currently has $1.1 Billion in debt -- including $250 Million in a loan from a Mexican businessman at an unbelievable 14% interest rate! Had they not overpaid for the Globe and T&G, they could be nearly debt free today. Had they not built an new headquarters building...they too would have several hundred million in cash and investments on hand.

These bad decisions have now hamstrung the old media companies.

Given changes in the business since then (collapse in advertising) and substantial risk, off the top of my head I wouldn't value a newspaper at more then $400/unit circulation today. That price gives you some ability to see your investment appreciate -- if things turn around with the economy and the industry, you might see $500-600 values be reasonable in the next 5 years or so.

As a sanity check, I just googled this which has Barclay's valuing the Globe at $192M and the T&G at $18M. That gives the Globe a value of $458 per unit circulation and the T&G a value of $180 per unit circulation.

For the T&G, I suspect the analyst didn't credit the T&G's modern printing plant in Millbury to the T&G -- figuring it's worth at least $12M and shifting that value from the Globe to T&G...both papers end up right around $400 per unit circulation. So I think I still have a good handle of newspaper values, MBA or no MBA. :)

Can you make money in newspapers today?

ABSOLUTELY.

First step though is to run them through bankruptcy. They're carrying debts that are not supportable by their underlying value, and those have to go. Even in cases where just enough cash can be squeezed to make loan payments, a realistic valuation of assets is likely to trigger convenents to call the loans. Executives made bad decisions, investors made bad decisions...bankruptcy is the way those mistakes are corrected.

Newspapers circling the drain...

I worked at the Worcester Telegram & Gazette for a bit more then five years. The T&G was grouped together with the Boston Globe as the New England Media Group by their parent organization, the New York Times.

It was my favorite job ever and I doubt I'll ever have one that combines the interesting challenges with the terrific co-workers I had. Newspapers have a surprisingly complex workflow where many different, discrete pieces are brought together to produce the final product. From an Information Systems perspective, it's a really mentally stimulating industry.

Today clearly it's an industry circling the drain. While the industry would've been challenged by the economy and techonological changes, the true yoke around it's neck is the debt levels taken on over the last 20 years -- an example of the widespread use of capital in the U.S. in unproductive ways. Even when parent companies spent cash to buy other newspapers they did so at the cost of not making other, wiser investments. Money being spent to spend money, rather then careful and considered investments.

Does make you wonder how much greater our productivity gains from Information Systems over the last 25 years would've been had we not had so much poor and unproductive money shuffling going on.

Today TIME came out with an article on papers likely to go under soon, they figured 8 out of the following 10:

1. The Philadelphia Daily News.
2. The Minneapolis Star Tribune
3. The Miami Herald
4. The Detroit News
5. The Boston Globe
6. The San Francisco Chronicle
7. The Chicago Sun-Times
8. The New York Daily News
9. The Fort Worth Star-Telegram
10. The Cleveland Plain Dealer

Some I don't believe will disappear -- the Boston Globe needs a serious Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization to say the least, but it's a media market that needs someone to serve it.

My experience with the San Francisco Chronicle is only secondary -- they sold the T&G to the New York Times about a year before I joined the T&G. What I saw coming into the T&G is the past owners had been too frugal -- milking the profits while not making reasonable investments to improve efficiency. Assuming the Chronicle was run with similiar tight reins the most reasonable assumption to explain their current predicament is the debt load from Hearst's take over of them -- $660 Milllion for a paper with a circulation of 480,000.

To be continued...

Hmmm, what should I post about?

How about look how quickly the snow is melting!

It pretty much disappeared overnight...


And by the afternoon load of wood, even the puddles had mostly dried up!


It was 60º today and absolutely gorgeous. See a post that wasn't about wood :)

Oh, but I do want to mention racks:

Saw these online today, looks like a fantastic design -- although I'd like a pitch to the roofs personally:

More wood!

This should be the first load for the 2009/2010 season.
Hopefully get ahead of the curve this spring so I have nicely seasoned wood all season. I have another load this size to bring in tomorrow morning then I'll split it up to useable size and stack on pallets this week.

March Woodcutting

A special post just for Rebecca since she gets a chuckle out of my wood.



Cutting up a couple swamp maples (probably Silver Maple or a Red Maple / Silver Maple hybrid) near my house. Trying to get them done before the thaw sets in in earnest this weekend! That's a solid 1/4 cord in the bed. Might be the last I need to split this year, depending how mild March and early April is I may have enough wood to make it through the rest of the year now.

Makes clean up of the rest of the trees still on the ground pretty quick since I can just haul the whole logs over to the woodpile and leave them there to split later.

Notice...there's snow on the ground again. Had 9" on Monday, mostly between midnight and dawn.

February Woodcutting

Just in the nick of time to avoid a post-less month!

Cut about 3/8ths of a cord of wood up on the Prince Hill Road side of my property -- most cleaning up oddly shaped trees to encourage the better shapes ones.

One small ash, and a few smaller red oaks (I believe -- I really need to learn better how to identify trees, I'm really embarrased since I thought I knew them better).

Biggest red oak was maybe 12" diameter breast height, if I didn't run out of daylight I would've easily made it to half a cord of wood.

Here's my truck with the first load, about 1/4 cord, in it.

January day cutting firewood

For reasons of health & time, I didn't have everything split and waiting for winter.
I do have enough wood, but a lot is still in logs (old enough to not be green) that need to be bucked and split.

So I didn't have much choice if I wanted heat this upcoming week without hitting my "special reserve" of rapidly dwindling split stuff then to go out with the saw and tools and make some firewood.

Even if it was 12º. Maybe 13º. But sunny and warming quickly towards 20º

1) Hmmm, have I ever switched the air intake thingy on the Stihl to cold weather mode? I remember 11 years ago hauling trees across the pond, so maybe then.

2) Whats worse then fogging on safety/sun glasses? Your sweat freezing the instant a drop hits them.

3) The bug I found was NOT an Asian Long Horn beetle, to my great relief. It was black & white and 1-1/4 long, but was an Eastern Eyed Clicking Beetle. Visions of my property being turned into pasture courtesy of USDA were dancing in my head till I determined that.

4) Most of the sycamore was not bad to split, but the bottom 5' or so has some of the nastiest, stringiest heart wood I have ever encountered.

5) Whats worse the sweat freezing to your glasses? After you eat lunch, you come back out and the sun goes behind the clouds.

And the moisture on your gloves start to form an ice layer on your fiberglass handled tools. The Fiskars wasn't bad at all, but the maul and sledge...that took a lot of extra concentration. And the steel wedges were like holding onto a greased pig.

6) I didn't have the other yellow link chain hanging where I thought it was when I went to bring all my chains to the guy who sharpens them, town highway crewman who works the dump on Saturdays. Oh well, well get the other yellow and the green sharpened.

And there was nothing good to scavenge from the dump, either.

7) Sycamores burning nice but pretty darn fast. It's bone dry, at least what I'm burning right now.

IF I can get a couple hour window between snow storms 1 and 2 tomorrow, I'll have to break out my new chain and buck a couple more 24" logs off my nice, long burning ash to mix in with this stuff during the week.

I suspect the big difference is the ash was on the ground, and is still pretty moist -- any moister I'd call it green.

Overall, it was a nice day -- I'm starting to get into my wood cutting shape. I just want to be able to get a couple weeks ahead so I can have a great chainsaw massacre and start felling trees for next year's supply!

December 2008 Ice Storm

On December 11th a major storm ice storm struck New England. The main area of damage was around northern Worcester County, MA, the Berkshires, and southern New Hampshire, with areas of Connecticut, Vermont, and Maine also impacted.

The storm was associated with significant rainfall -- in Windham County, CT from 12/10 through 12/12 from 3-1/2 to 5" of rain was recorded! Overnight Thursday into Friday morning 1/2 to 3/4" of ice setup in the worst hit areas.

1.25 Million customers lost power in what I believe is was the most catastrophic damage ever to the New England power grid and only rivaled by the 1965 Northeast Blackout for customer outages. There was still significant areas without power 10 days later, and full restoration took some three weeks for isolated customers.

WTAG on Asnebumskit Hill in Paxton lost their power and landline phones -- it was Tuesday I believe before they had full phone service restore. From Friday through the following Friday they suspended their normal programming and instead acted as an information clearinghouse. Without phones, they depended on a single cell phone over the weekend while requesting questions and answers be sent in by text messaging, which they'd then read over the air. A few public officials were put on the radio by holding the cell phone to the radio microphone, hardly a hi fidelity option.






Top damage:




Pine tree in the center lost it's top -- which is now impaled into the ground 75' away (to the right)


Icing on a white pine. This was a nor'easter -- north and east facing trees took the brunt since the rain was being driven by the wind from that direction, and there where a few more protected spots I passed that you'd see one side of valley with heavy icing, and the other looked like any other winter day.


Route 31...still spots where they had just made the road passable but hadn't cleared it yet.

Town Meetings Gone Bad.

Well, I just got home from that New England tradition, the Town Meeting.

Sometime's there small; sometime's they're large but only a couple people speak and things move along quick. Sometimes they're large, active, and still move well.

Usually the Board of Selectmen who control most matters going before the Town Meeting have a good sense of where the votes are. I have seen the occasional Town Meeting go unexpectedly against them (the Town Meeting held over re-locating the Correctional Center to off of South Street and building an industrial park around the new prison being the most memorable). And I've seen ones you didn't know how it would turnout until the vote was held (the Town Meeting over whether to erect a gate across Maynard Road at the town line in order to prevent it's use by gravel hauling dump trucks).

Then...there are the train wrecks.

To the point I had to call a Point of Order to cut off someone speaking about sunshine and lollipops and town harmony. Nice sentiment, but unfortunately that had nothing to do with the motion on the floor -- and it's important to follow rules of order to keep meetings on topic, civil, and moving along. Two speakers earlier I was starting to step forward to Point of Order the First Selectman who was giving a solliquy about two other ordinances that had already been voted on and rejected, when he yielded the floor.

As both these speakers had been carrying on off topic, I was envisioning my departed aunt (who was a long term Town Clerk as was my grandfather) shaking her head and muttering under her breath about people being out of order. Normally when the Town Moderator has a conflict of interest, the Town Clerk will step into moderate the meeting. I know when my aunt was in office, if the Moderator had a question on procedure he would consult with her, and I believe that's still a role for the Town Clerk.

And I like our First Selectman, he's the best business manager we've had in a while. But man, this was not his finest hour. I haven't seen a public official get shellacked this bad in town in a long time.

Heavy turnout should have anticipated for this meeting since there was a number of controversial items affecting the power or composition of three major town boards and adopting a blight ordinance.

Yet they only had 50 copies of the warrant printed. Attendance I estimated around 200.

Nor was the wireless PA system setup. Since we usually hold the Town Meetings now in the middle school auditorium that's a big problem since the acoustics are engineered so people speaking from where their seats are hard to hear. A couple runners with wireless mics to bring to people so they don't have to walk down to the podium to be heard easily would have been good.

The blight ordinance was a multiple page document. Too long for the Moderator to read and people to understand verbally, and since there was only 50 printed copies it was moved to table the item since people wouldn't know what they were voting on.

The Recreation Commission Ordinance came up and the Moderator asked why Section 2 of the ordinance being amended was in the motion, since "Section 3" was the financial change everyone knew was coming before the meeting. After it was explained why (moving appointment authority of Rec Department employees from the Recreation Commission to the Board of Selectmen), someone asked for the original wording of Section 2. The Town Attorney spent a couple minutes shuffling through his stack of papers authoratively until the Chairwoman of the Recreation Commission volunteered that she had the original ordinance and could read the desired section.

Then when the motion to amend the Fire Commissioners Ordinance came up the Town Attorney had to explain that the wording of the amendment on the article was wrong, admitting it was his fault, and that the motion should be amended to include the corrected wording.

Didn't help that there was supposed to be a meeting last night to present a new Route 6 Development Plan that was cancelled at the last minute, which already had a number of people annoyed by that dropping of the ball.

So, the final score:

Motion to appropriate $76,000 for a new oil tank at the school: Passed (Money was already in the building fund, this was just a rubber stamp that was needed)

Motion to abolish the Open Space Acquistion Committee (which hasn't met in years) and give it's duties to the Conservation Commission (which meets monthly): Passed.

Motion to adopt a Blight Ordinance: Tabled and died.

It didn't help that during discussion the First Selectman admitted the two buildings that had been problems that led to creation of the ordinance had both been dealt with successfully under existing laws.

Motion to reduce the size of the Planning & Zoning Board from 10 to 7: Tabled, brought back up at the close of the meeting, and defeated.

The First Selectman is on record, repeatedly, asking for all 10 existing members to step down so a new Board could be appointed. This seemed be another way of forcing that goal.

Motion to require all organizations, agencies, and entities who request funds from the town General Government budget to submit financial statements: Defeated.

Discussion included the vaugeness of the ordinance -- would it apply, for instance, to oil comanies bidding on heating oil? What would specifically be the detail of the financial statements? Just a bottom line - which seems to me wouldn't be to helpful? Why couldn't the Selectmen implement this by policy, since after all they are the ones who need to be satisifed that the organization is worthy of town assistance and should be included in the General Government budget request sent to Town Meeting.

Motion to amend the Recreation Commission Ordinance, to make the Selectmen the appointing authority of Rec Dept employees, and to require the Recreation Commission submit their budget to the Selectmen and not the Board of Finance: Defeated.

Discussion pointed out the First Selectman appoints the Commission, so it's not like he lacks influence over their actions.

Motion to amend the Board of Fire Commissioners Ordinance, to make require they submit their budget to the Selectmen and not the Board of Finance: Defeated.

Discussion pointed out the First Selectman is a Fire Commissioner, so it's not like there should be any lack of communication between the boards; also Hans Kohl stood up and gave the background of the formation of the Board of Fire Commissioners back in '73, and his support for the current system and why the Selectmen were not given direct budget authority over them. Hans has never been a firefighter, he was a successful businessman and he's one of the key political figures in town having served on the Board of Finance for 20 years and P&Z probably even longer.

On both the Recreation and Fire budgets, the Selectman explained it would streamline the process and make it easier to present to the Board of Finance and Town Meeting. The Board of Finance chairman, backed up by other member, said it would not simplify the process on their end since they would still consider each line item as they already do. As the Town Meeting votes up or down on just the General Government budget (which includes everything but schools), how you can simplify that is a bit of a mystery to me.

On all the rejected articles my guesstimate was 12 for, 150 against. None were remotely close.

Oh, and tomorrow night Wal-Mart gives a dog and pony show on building a Supercenter in town that is not being universally greeted with open arms. That should be fun.

Misty

Misty went to the rainbow bridge on Thursday. She was thirteen -- I hadn't realized she was that old till I started looking back at the photos and saw she came here in 2000. Indeed, she had been here just a week or so shy of 8 years, and was 5 years old when she arrived.

Back in 2000, when my carpets were new and clean.

Misty was very scared of other dogs and kids, and her original owners had brought her to the vets to be put down. This is after she became comfortable here. Her original owners brought her into their vets to be put to sleep since she didn't get along with their new dog. They had tried bringing her to very strong dog training -- many years later I brought her to Sharon Griswold who helped me train Jake, and within minutes Sharon shook her head, "She's extremely well trained, you just don't know how to command her."

The first two days, she stayed by the front door, curled up, scared to death. It was the evening of the third day when she finally, slowly, crawled on her belly across the room to visit me by the couch -- completely scared of Jake and Oscar and being in a strange place.

It took many months for her and Jake to finally work out an amicable relationship.

She did seem to do better here when strange dogs came to visit later on though. Probably that Jake took on the role of defender of the homestead relieved her about worrying about strangers.



After a snow storm in February, 2003. Where can I squat?


One day I noticed a growth on her rear end and brought her to the vets.

Dr. Smith examined her and stated, "This appears to be a benign, fatty lump."

"Well, I know she is, but what's that on her butt?"

Dr. Smith just glared back, I guess she didn't share my sense of humor.

At any rate, we chose not to operate unless it began growing again which worked for two or three years. Then I noticed one day Misty was "listing" to the side when she sat down since the lump was growing (and very quickly). This photo was at the vets when she was arriving for surgery. If I remember correctly, the lump weighed eight pounds.

Hell Hounds in 2004 -- Oscar & Misty, with Jake smelling the tiger day lillies.

One of my favorite photos, can you say happier then a pig in shit? Misty was ecstatic to find that Farmer Fred had dropped off a load of manure.

Misty loved to climb under the covers of the bed. This sometimes would cause conflicts come my bedtime when she would not be a happy camper being asked to move. But at it's most humorous, she would occasionally decided to climb underneath the fitted couch cover. I'd come home from work and find a very large, moving cushion on the couch -- the fitted cover having closed behind her. I'd have to pull the elastic edge back to let her out again.

Finally another pic from back in 2000. This was Misty's chair for all eight years. After she could no longer climb under the covers of the bed, she would go to great efforts to curl up in this chair at night and even quite often during the day if I wasn't home. With her weight and arthritis, it could take her several minutes to climb into it...but she wanted too. A comfy bed on the floor just wasn't the same to her.

One of the major reasons I knew her time was short was she had given up trying to climb into the chair a few days before the end.

Only after she was gone did I realize just how vocal she had been -- her continual chorus of purrs and groans and whines and whimpers just became the background here. It was eerily quiet that first night without her -- God speed Misty, you were a grumpy one for sure but you're still missed.

Not everyone liked FDR

I should research this some more one day. I still remember vividly the day I was working at the Brooklyn Library and mentioned something about Roosevelt and got corrected -- very sternly -- by one of the old ladies of the town (I truly wish I could remember who!). It was the first time I heard criticism of FDR.

Poem collected from: http://www.ytmag.com/cgi-bin/viewit.cgi?bd=ttalk&th=637268

A stranger stood at the gate of Hell
And the Devil himself had answered the bell
He looked him over from head to toe
And said "My friend, I’d like to know
What you have done in the line of sin
To entitle you to come within?"
Then Franklin D. with his usual guile
Stepped forth and flashed his toothy smile.
"When I took over in ’33,
A nation’s faith was mine", said he
"I promised this and I promised that,
And I calmed them down with a fireside chat.
I spent their money on fishing trips
And I fished from the decks of their battleships.
I gave them jobs on the WPA
Then raised their taxes and took it away.
I raised their wages, then closed their shops,
I killed their pigs and buried their crops.
I double-crossed both young and old
And still the folks my praises told.
I brought back beer and what do you think?
I taxed it so high they couldn’t drink.
I furnished money with good loans
When they missed a payment I took their homes.
When I wanted to punish people, you know,
I put my wife on the radio.
I paid them to let their farms lie still
And imported foodstuffs from Brazil.
And curtailed crops when I felt mean
And shipped in corn from the Argentine.
When they started to worry, stew and fret,
I’d get them to chanting the alphabet.
With the AAA and the NLB
The WPA and the CCC.
With these many units I got their goats
And still I crammed it down their throats
While the taxpayers chewed their fingernails.
When the organizers needed dough
I signed up plants for the CIO.
I ruined their jobs and I ruined their health
And I put the screws on the rich man’s wealth.
And some who couldn’t stand the gaff
Would call me up and how I’d laugh!
When they got too hot on certain things
I’d pack up and head for Warm Springs.
I ruined their country, their homes, and then
Laid the blame on the ‘nine old men’."
Now Franklin talked both long and loud
And the Devil stood with his head bowed.
At last he said "Let’s make it clear,
You’ll have to move, you can’t stay here.
For once you’ve mingled with this mob
I’ll have to hunt myself a job."

Hog Killing

Nice write up of old fashion community hog killing:

http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/martin/hogkilling

Nice fall day...

First heavy frost of the year -- at 10:30 am there was still frost on the ground.

The air is still, but quite a few leaves are falling spontaneously from the trees in the woods -- makes an odd crackling sound. One doesn't hear dry, crisp leaves hitting the ground on a breezeless afternoon too often.

Saw three deer in the lower yard, with their darker "winter" coats on.

Cleaning up....

Catching Up...

Been busy with work, with the garden, with the fire company, and with following politics since Palin's nomination :)

So I haven't had time to blog much. Be prepared for some catch up.

Garden Totals:
Weighed: 361#
Donated to Food Pantry: 170#

Rain:
4.65" June
5.7" July
2.6" August
9.75" September (T.S. Hannah accounted for 4" of that)

Frost hit on 10/7, killing the summer squash & tomatoes. I had picked the remaining good green tomatoes the afternoon before the frost.

Lost a lot of tomatoes in September to "exploding" thanks to the frequent, heavy rains later in the month.

Also lost a lot of potatoes from the 2nd planting. Not sure if that was because I was using left over storage potatoes from last year, or if it was due to not picking them soon enough. A lot were rotted, or half-eaten, or green. The half-eaten and green ones at least could be salvaged by cutting off the offending parts.

Made some beef stew this week, using my own taters and celery. Had to buy the rest -- carrots, onions, garlic, sweet peppers, corn, peas, and cortland apples. Hopefully all but the apples will be from my garden next year :)

Having weighed my harvest this year, I'm convinced of the economy to buy a freezer next year!

Farming with Dynamite

Dear God, this is me Dog...

FROM: THE DOG

Dear God: Is it on purpose our names are the same, only reversed?

Dear God: Why do humans smell the flowers, but seldom, if ever, smell one another?

Dear God: When we get to heaven, can we sit on your couch? Or is it still the same old story?

Dear God: Why are there cars named after the jaguar, the cougar, the mustang, the colt, the stingray, and the rabbit, but not one named for a dog? How often do you see a cougar riding around? We do love a nice ride! Would it be so hard to rename the 'Chrysler Eagle' the 'Chrysler Beagle'?

Dear God: If a dog barks his head off in the forest and no human hears him, is he still a bad dog?

Dear God: We dogs can understand human verbal instructions, hand signals, whistles, horns, clickers, beepers, scent ID's, electromagnetic energy fields, and Frisbee flight paths. What do humans understand?

Dear God: More meatballs, less spaghetti, please.

Dear God: Are there mailmen in heaven? If there are, will I have to apologize?

Dear God: Let me give you a list of just some of the things I must remember to be a good dog.

1. I will not eat the cats' food before they eat it or after they throw it up.

2. I will not roll on dead seagulls, fish, crabs, etc., just because I like the way they smell.

3. The litter box is not a cookie jar.

4. The sofa is not a face towel; neither are mom and dad's laps.

5. The garbage collector is not stealing our stuff.

6. I will not play tug-of-war with Dad's underwear when he's on the toilet.

7. Sticking my nose into some one's crotch is an unacceptable way of saying hello.

8. I don't need to suddenly stand straight up when I'm under the coffee table .

9. I must shake the rainwater out of my fur before entering the house, not after.

10. I will not come in from outside and immediately drag my butt across the carpet.

11. I will not sit in the middle of the living room and lick my crotch when we have company.

12. The cat is not a 'squeaky toy' so when I play with him and he makes that noise, it's usually not a good thing.

13. I will not bite the officer's hand when he reaches in for Mom's driver's license and registration.

14. My head does not belong in the refrigerator.

P.S. Dear God: When I get to heaven may I have my testicles back?

Blerg!

Had my xD memory card for my camera crash....again.

Cost me $39.95, but this was able to recover them: http://www.cardrecovery.com/