Ben offers a relatively gentle gag, but it jibes with a conversation I had at the park with another dog owner the other day (keeping six feet apart, yes).
I’m a great-grandfather, which required starting the process in my 20s, such that, when the boys and I got down on the floor to play, I was still able to truly disappear into the game.
When my grandchildren came along, I was in my mid-40s and found that I was more consciously “playing.” The patterns on the oriental carpet were no longer roads for cars; I had to actively pretend they were.
I told her I was okay with that, but it made me feel like Wendy, when Peter returns. She very much wanted him to take Jane and let her experience it.
But it was too late for her to fly again, and that was okay.
Look, I realize we lived in an era when it was easier for young parents to afford to have one person stay home with the kids. But here y’all are, home with your kids.
The rest is a crisis and a potential disaster, but that part is a gift you shouldn’t waste.
Get on the floor.
That dinosaur isn’t gonna walk itself.
Meanwhile, over in Betty, Bub has a different opportunity and I’m all in favor of that one, too. It’s a lovely time to be living beyond the concrete.
Our park is shared mainly by dog walkers and bird watchers, and I saw my first mockingbird of the season the other day. I’m eager for a little more warmth so I can sit in the sun at the picnic table and enjoy an extended morning concert.
The powers that be are warning people off the more popular trails here, but that probably just increases the odds of your seeing something really cool while you take a break from being cooped up.
Though we started up a moose the other day, and that’s a little too much nature, thank you.
Everyone in moose country loves the big galoots, but preferably at a distance: Huge, near-sighted and somewhat pugnacious is not a comforting combination.
Fortunately, the dogs didn’t spot Bullwinkle and he went galumphing off upriver before they could.
Wallace the Brave continues our nature talk, and, unlike Wallace, I don’t have to worry about whether my friends like dogs because the only people I know in three dimensions are from the park.
Still, I sympathize with Amelia’s love of reptiles, because I fostered a little snapper for about two years.
It was probably illegal, but I’d found him as a hatchling headed the wrong direction to find water, so I don’t feel too guilty.
Canadians of a certain age may know why I named him “Howard,” but I didn’t expect him to come to it nor did I want him to anyway: It would be a death sentence for him to become socialized, since there’s no way I was going to hang on to him once he became large and dangerous.
But there was very limited chance of that, since he came preloaded with an attitude that Amelia would appreciate. I did nothing to reduce his level of reptilian suspicion, but I’m pretty sure it would have been futile anyway.
He was, indeed, the anti-dog, and when, after two years of glowering at everything, he finally began to come out of his shelter when I approached, not for affection but to see if I was going to feed him, I knew it was time to find him a swamp deep in the woods where he’d be unlikely to run into people again.
It’s been over a decade, but I still kinda miss that nasty, anti-social little dude.
The Barn got a special laugh because when I worked in the circ/marketing department of my newspaper, I was just through the wall and around the corner from circulation.
Each morning, they’d have a rush of phone calls from “skips” — customers who somehow didn’t get a paper — and so we’d have people on the phones constantly from six until about nine, and then everything dropped off and they’d start goofing around on their computers, playing games or sending each other funny clips or loading animated wallpapers.
Our production head told me that about 90 percent of the viruses and trojans and other virtual crap that entered our system did so through the circulation department.
He also told them that, but, well, he might as well have told Howard.
Prickly City gets it right.
I won’t put you through my usual discussion of Wall Street stock swappers again, except to recall back when Warren Buffett began to tout newspapers as a good investment and some knuckleheads responded by saying, “See? We’re a great industry! Warren Buffett says so!”
Which is like turkeys being excited because they get so much attention right before Thanksgiving.
Buffett just sold out the Buffalo News. Oh, excuse me — I meant to write “sold the Buffalo News.”
But there is good news: The Hearst chain will have no layoffs, no furloughs and no pay cuts during the coronavirus crisis, and is suspending the tracking mechanism for executive bonuses during the period.
In its coverage, Poynter adds “It helps that Hearst is a private company …”
Talk about an understatement.
Anyway, there are nearly 1,300 daily newspapers in the country.
Hearst owns 24 of them.
I wouldn’t want to miss a chance to get into Grumpy Old Man Mode, so I’ll pass along this Loose Parts with the observation that they ruined baseball cards when they started making them available in large packages without gum.
Buying baseball cards was like buying lottery tickets. You’d get a pack, throw away that stiff, nasty gum, and see what you had. You’d keep the good ones and stick the bad ones on your bike.
Buying a whole set at once destroyed that experience.
Anyway, you wouldn’t attach baseball cards to a jet engine.
You’d use a balloon.
And, finally …
Releasing turtles into the wild
Why is “peccary” such a disturbing word? Maybe by approximating both “pecker” and “pessary”.
The other night Sen. Angus King (I-Maine) explained that Mainers had no problem maintaining the correct distance because it was, roughly, as long as a moose.