Dear Bob:

Last September, on Labor Day weekend, we adopted a little girl, and we named her Charley. Even though it’s a name usually reserved for boys, my husband and I both had the name in mind; and anytime we can agree on something, we need to go with it. So our little girl is Charley. She was such a sweet little thing, a snuggler, and of course very playful. She used to love to play with balls and noisemakers of just about any kind. I say, “used to,” because she doesn’t get to have squeaky toys anymore. It became a particular goal of hers to see just how quickly she could find and remove the squeaker in any toy. If I say we’ve gone through more than $100 in balls and toys, with or without squeakers, I would not be exaggerating at all. We thought we had outsmarted her when we realized there was a “chew rating” on many of the toys, and we started buying only toys rated at least an 8 or higher, for “aggressive chewers.” If I say she could ruin a chew toy rated #8 or higher in less than five minutes, I would not be exaggerating there, either. She has also chewed on the carpet, rugs, furniture and every bed/blanket/towel that we’ve tried to use in her kennel.

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Some days, I’m anxious to get home and watch the evening news. Some days, as I’m watching the news, I turn it off and go do something else to get my mind off of the news. It’s such a dilemma. It’s not that I don’t care about what’s going on. It’s just that some of the news these days is hard to take. Whether it’s mounting death tolls from the coronavirus, our tanking economy, or political squabbling and jabbing, there’s not a lot of positive things to report. What I appreciate in every evening news broadcast (I watch CBS), they try to end with a “feel good” story.

* I am going to brag again about my niece Jenny. She was commissioned to paint a large mural in the new elephant exhibit at the Kansas City Zoo. Pretty cool!

Biographies are generally not my favorite genre to read. In fact, I could probably count on one hand the biographies I have read; I just don’t go to that aisle of the library. But there was something about the stories I heard when Donald Stratton died that made me want to learn more about him. Just to remind you, Donald G. Stratton was the USS Arizona Survivor who died on February 15, 2020 at the age of 97. A motor cade in his honor came through Stockton the evening of February 27, carrying him to his final resting place at Red Cloud, Nebraska, where he grew up.

I am writing in regards to Lynn McKinnis Shinohara’s inquiry (May 7th issue) of the 1900’s flu epidemic.

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mind·ful·ness

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