Ramblings
Little teeny spider
I'm becoming soft-hearted. As I was stepping out of the shower one morning, I saw this
little, teeny black spider right at my feet. The spider was jumping around and I was trying to get out of its way.
I took my towel and snapped it at the spider. It must have been a direct hit, because the little teeny
spider flew up in the air and fell to the floor dead, dead, dead. I don't know why, but I felt really bad
about that. I guess I didn't really mean to kill it. I thought about it the whole day. Sorry, little teeny
spider.
Top
Honey the Horrible
In the warmer months, I leave my balcony door open so my cat Honey can go out and
"prowl". One day I was sitting on the couch watching TV when I heard a sudden, sharp clattering
noise from the balcony blinds. Honey raced past me with something small and brown in her mouth.
She had caught something. Honey ran to the dining room and dropped her prey which turned out to
be a small bird. As soon as she dropped it, the bird took off. Honey took off and I took off. The bird
flew through the kitchen followed very closely by Honey, both of them outpacing me. I heard some
"bonk" sounds which appeared to have come from the living room lamp. When I got to the living
room, Honey had caught the bird again and was carrying it down the hall. She ran down to the end of
the hall and dropped the bird again. I finally caught up to the action and was faced with a very still
bird lying on the floor and a very wide-eyed cat nearby. I didn’t really know what to do. I reached
down and picked up the bird. It was alive, but the poor thing must have been paralyzed by fear, because it offered no
resistance at all. I carried it back down the hall, gently stroking its back, trying to see if it was injured. As
I approached the balcony door, the bird started to swivel its head back and forth, perhaps
seeing some outside light. I just held the bird out the door and gave a little shove. The bird flew off
to a nearby tree, apparently unharmed. Honey spent a large part of the day hovering in the hallway
with eyes, ears and whiskers on full alert, looking for her missing prey. Now, whenever Honey is prowling
on the balcony, I can tell from all the chatter that the birds know: Don't mess with Honey the Horrible!
Top
Molly! Go Home! 
Dave and Cindy were visiting Dave’s family and everyone gathered at Mom and Dad’s
house. We were out in the front yard playing volleyball when we saw a little dachshund
waddle into the yard to visit. At first, she was a little wary but Dave got her going and she played and
romped with us. She was cute. We were concerned that she may be lost and might get hit by a car. She was
wearing a collar with a tag which had an ID but no phone number. Greg tried to call the veterinarian, but
they were closed. Greg and I walked down the road to see if we could find her owners. Greg eventually
found a neighbor who said that the people who lived behind him had a small dachshund named Molly.
The neighbor said that all you had to do was say "Molly! Go Home!" and she would bark and then head
for home. When we returned, Greg called "Molly" to the dog, who was receiving a lot of attention from
everybody, and it was obvious she knew her name. Molly came running. Greg then shouted "Molly! Go
Home!" Sure enough, Molly barked and started to head for home. However, she didn’t go
very far, because of all of the attention she was getting from everyone and soon returned. We
kept telling her to go home, but Molly started to waddle further up the road, further from home. Dave had his video
camera running and after Greg introduced himself as a world famous animal trainer, again shouted
"Molly!" Molly stopped in her tracks. Greg shouted loudly "Molly! Go Home!"
Molly abruptly turned around and started to head back towards her home. Greg again:
"Go!" "Hurry!" "Hurry!" and Molly ran off the road and through a neighbor’s yard as fast as her little legs
could carry her.
Top
Winter driving
One winter night I was driving my 1984 Honda Accord on a two-lane blacktop road that was
covered by absolute glare ice. It looked like I was driving on a mirror. I was coming down a very gentle
grade to a part of the road that was heavily crowned. I backed off to about 10mph, but the car started to
slowly slide over to the right... and there was a deep ditch there. My speed kept dropping and dropping,
but the car kept sliding and sliding. I tried pumping the brakes as fast as I could, but it made no
difference at all. This went on for maybe 100ft. It seemed to take forever. It got to the point where
I was convinced I was going into this ditch at all of 5mph. At the last moment, I put the gearshift into
neutral and pulled my feet away from all the pedals. Somehow, I managed to coax the car away from the edge
of the road. It quite possibly could have been the slowest crash ever.
Top
A dream
This dream occurred during a time when I was drinking a lot of Ovaltine. I've often wondered if
chocolate causes dreams. The person Bob mentioned here is my best friend, Bob Mikels. Bob and I used to go
train-watching a lot and at the time of this dream, we had both recently turned 50 years of age.
I was helping some lady fix the walls on her business, which kept falling down. She said she kept getting citations
for the fallen walls. I told her where I thought she should nail the walls up and left.
Then I was walking along a downtown street looking for a street light or something to hang from for a few moments so
I could stretch out my back, when I unexpectedly ran into Bob. We decided to have lunch at the Burger King at the 50, which was
located on a steep hill. While we were there, Bob was ringing a bell. After we finished eating, we left the Burger
King at the 50 and decided to go train-watching.
We walked until we found a spot where one railroad crossed high over another. We were on the lower set of tracks and as I looked
up at the steep embankment I was wondering how we were going to get up to the tracks above. Bob suddenly produced
a small windsail, which he had in his back pocket. Bob unfolded it, held onto the left-hand side and told me to grab the
right-hand side. After I did this, Bob lifted the front of the windsail slightly and we easily floated up to the
tracks high above. I remarked that in all of my years of train-watching, I had never traveled that way before!
We hadn't seen any trains yet when we looked down on the tracks below and saw one Volkswagen Beetle towing
another Volkswagen Beetle, which was idling. I remarked as to how slow they were going. I didn't know whether to
count this as a train or not.
It was getting dark. I'm taking notes and looking for my watch, when Bob says he hears a popping sound off in
the distance. I lean back in my lawn chair to look and almost fall down the steep embankment. I looked more
carefully and saw lights flashing sequentially alongside the tracks and the lights are coming towards us. Also, the
high-tension wires alongside the tracks were flashing at the same time as the lights along the tracks.
Bob was wondering what was going on and I replied that the railroad was just testing their light-sticks. The lights
flashed by us, and went off into the distance.
Suddenly a big windstorm approached. Along with the windstorm, there were millions of bats flying overhead. Then we saw
thousands of floating bats hovering near the track ballast and they were coming towards us. We decided to leave.
And then I woke up.
Top