SCARFING UP GOODIES WITH PAPA

What's better than an afternoon following a morning at preschool with Papa? Here's what you get:

Cartoons. Scarfing up a chocolate covered Eclair with custard in the middle. Miniature golf in between raindrops. Two squirt gun fights. Ball game with one of the dogs. Two sit down read a book stories.

Does it get any better than this? I'm thinking about how my grandmother spoiled me ("Pop" was always working and never around for special moments). No wonder I loved my grandmother so. She spoiled me much the same way that Grace is being spoiled during our daily afternoon visits. Spoiled really isn't the word to use, is it? But we use it anyway.

Grace will have precious memories of her grandparents.

For you youngsters, "scarfing up" is a 60's term for gobbling or eating something.

This is our 16 year old cat Fluffy Marie. At 16 she's going strong. We lost her sister Coco Marie 6 years ago to coyotes. Damn them!

Coco used to get on the back of my recliner and "groom" the hair on my head. She'd lick and lick to make certain I was spic and span. What a cat. I miss that cat.

Fluffy sleeps outside in our shed. We tried the house and then the garage but it didn't work out. Fluffy sheds a lot of fur. What a mess she makes. Regardless of how much hairball medicine we give her, Fluffy always barfs up hairballs. Then of course the dogs want to scarf up on the little treats Fluffy leaves behind. Not a good thing.

The litter in the sandbox flies when Fluffy uses it. There's always a mess to cleanup.

And then there's the sleeping on the cars in the garage thing. An open window on anyone of the vehicles was an invitation for Fluffy to spend a night in luxury. Ever get into your car and discover that you've just sat on one big juicy hairball?

Now the cat has her own castle in which to barf up hairballs and throw litter around to her little heart's content.

Fluffy's igloo is equipped with a heating pad. In the winter the pad is set on medium and turned to low in the summer. Because she's older, Fluffy sleeps a lot much like people in their late 80's or 90's. In cat years, Fluffy has to be at least that old.

The dogs love this cat. They chase her around the yard until Fluffy is tired of that nonsense. Then she sits. The dogs smell her and then Jilli humps Fluffy for lord knows why (female on female thing). Strange ritual.