dog named Didi, cats names Snowball, Squirrel and Dirt

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We name almost all our cats Bob, but we have last names, which we call them by like:

I need opinions here. This is the scenario. I absolutely love squirrels. I know a lot of people think they are a nuisance, but they happen to be my favorite backyard animal. I have feeders for them in my front yard so I can see them from my office window. Now I'm not one to cause trouble, but today one of my neighbors almost splatted one of my beloved squirrels on the street right in front of my house as it tried to take its peanuts and cross the road. Mind you, I live on a quiet cul-de-sac street, and there was no reason why this person couldn't have hit the breaks and let the squirrel cross without scaring it and me half to death. What would you all do, would you say something to this neighbor? Or should I just let nature take its course?

Fire investigators are pinning several recent spot fires near Seeley Lake on an unlikely group of arsonists - squirrels.

A man reported the wildfires last Wednesday afternoon outside his home on Montana Highway 83, moments after turning the ignition key on his RV.

Unbeknownst to the driver, a local colony of gray squirrels had been stowing pine cones in the vehicle's exhaust pipe, and the loaded tailpipe began blasting fiery cones across his driveway like a Roman candle, igniting a handful of

small grass fires.

According to the tongue-in-cheek fire report, Incident Commander Scott Meyer responded to the wildland fire with several engines in tow, and later ruled that the squirrels belonged to a paramilitary squirrel organization that has abounded for years in Seeley Lake, called the Pine Cone Liberation Organization (PCLO).

�A lapse in squirrel-oversight intelligence had allowed the PCLO to engage in recon, planning and sabotage without fear of consequence or retribution, in the form of being chased by a broom,� according to the report.

Calling the attack one �which will live in infamy,� Meyer blamed the incident on a well-known local dissident, �Slippy the Squirrel.� A critter notorious for his chirping fits and histrionics, Slippy's resistance efforts had previously been nonviolent in nature, Meyer said.

�After years of being shot at with blow-guns, run over by logging trucks and chased by neighborhood dogs, the squirrels struck back,� the report states. �This had been their Bastille, their Red October, their chance at glory! Suppression efforts were started by all fire engines - the owner of the property upon which the squirrels had made their presence felt let the firefighters use the garden hose to cool off the pine cones. At 15:16, all resources were released from the fire. At that time, Meyer called the fire controlled, contained and dead-out. Slippy the Squirrel, however, remains at large. The PCLO could not be reached for comment.�

'Someone asked the other day, 'What was your favorite fast food when you were growing up?'

'We didn't have fast food when I was growing up,' I informed him. 'All the food was slow.' 'C'mon, seriously. Where did you eat?'

'It was a place called 'at home,'' I explained. ! 'Mom cooked every day and when Dad got home from work, we sat down together at the dining room table, and if I didn't like what she put on my plate I was allowed to sit there until I did like it.'

By this time, the kid was laughing so hard I was afraid he was going to suffer serious internal damage, so I didn't tell him the part about how I had to have permission to leave the table. But here are some other things I would have told him about my childhood if I figured his system could have handled it :

Some parents NEVER! owned their own house, wore Levis, set foot on a golf course, traveled out of the country or had a credit card. In their later years they had something called a revolving charge card. The card was good only at Sears Roebuck. Or maybe it was Sears & Roebuck. Either way, there is no Roebuck anymore. Maybe he died.

My parents never drove me to soccer practice. This was mostly because we never had heard of soccer. I had a bicycle that weighed probably 50 pounds, and only had one speed, (slow). We didn't have a television in our house until I was 5. It was, of course, black and white,

I was 13 before I tasted my first pizza, it was called 'pizza pie.' When I bit into it, I burned the roof of my mouth and the cheese slid off, swung down, plastered itself against my chin and burned that, too. It's still the best pizza I ever had.

We didn't have a car until I was 4. It was an old black Dodge.

I never had a telephone in my room. The only phone in the house was in the living room and it was on a party line. Before you could dial, you had to listen and make sure some people you didn't know weren't already using the line.

Pizzas were not delivered to our home. But milk was.

All newspapers were delivered by boys and all boys delivered newspapers my brother delivered a newspaper, six days a week. It cost 7 cents a paper, of which he got to keep 2 cents. He had to get up at

6AM

every morning. On Saturday, he had to collect the 42 cents from his customers. His favorite customers were the ones who gave him 50 cents and told him to keep the change. His least favorite customers were the ones who seemed to never be home on collection day.

Movie stars kissed with their mouths shut. At least, they did in the movies. Touching someone else's tongue with yours was called French kissing and they didn't do that in movies. I don't know what they did in French movies. French movies were dirty and we weren't allowed to see them

If you grew up in a generation before there was fast food, you may want to share some of these memories with your children or grandchildren. Just don't blame me if they bust a gut laughing.

Growing up isn't what it used to be, is it?

MEMORIES from a friend :

My Dad is cleaning out my grandmother's house (she died in December) and he brought me an old Royal Crown Cola bottle. In the bottle top was a stopper with a bunch of holes in it. I knew immediately what it was, but my daughter had no idea. She thought they had tried to make it a salt shaker or something. I knew it as the bottle that sat on the end of the ironing board to 'sprinkle' clothes with because we didn't have steam irons. Man, I am old.

How many do you remember?

Head lights dimmer switches on the floor.
Ignition switches on the dashboard.
Heaters mounted on the inside of the fire wall.
Real ice boxes.
Pant leg clips for bicycles without chain guards.
Soldering irons you heat on a gas burner.
Using hand signals for cars without turn signals.

Older Than Dirt Quiz :

Count all the ones that you remember not the ones you were told about

Ratings at the bottom.

1 Blackjack chewing gum
2. Wax Coke-shaped bottles with colored sugar water
3. Candy cigarettes
4. Soda pop machines that dispensed glass bottles
5. Coffee shops or diners with tableside juke boxes
6. Home milk delivery in glass bottles with cardboard stoppers
7. Party lines
8. Newsreels before the movie
9. P.F. Flyers
10. Butch wax
11. TV test patterns that came on at night after the last show and were there until TV shows started again in the morning. (there were only 3 channels)
12. Peashooters
13. Howdy Doody
14. 45 RPM records
15. S&H greenstamps
16 Hi-fi's
17. Metal ice trays with lever
18. Mimeograph paper
19 Blue flashbulb
20. Packards
21. Roller skate keys
22. Cork popguns
23. Drive-ins
24. Studebakers
25. Wash tub wringers

If you remembered 0-5 = You're still young
If you remembered 6-10 = You are getting older
If you remembered 11-15 = Don't tell your age,
If you remembered 16-25 = You're older than dirt!

I might be older than dirt but those memories are thebest part of my life.

I can also remember:

1. Licking and sticking S&H Green Stamps into a saver book and taking them to the redemption center with my mother. That's how I got my first luggage set.

2. Raleigh coupons that came in the cigarettes that Dad smoked. These were also good for redemption for merchandise, but mom had to package them up in bundles of 100 with rubber bands, pack them in a box, wrap the box with a brown paper grocery sack cut to fit and tie it with string. We then mailed it and waited the customary 6 - 8 weeks for our merchandise to arrive. I believe she got a set of dishes with this once and who knows what else. It, like the Green Stamps, was so common place in our home that we didn't really pay attention to what was purchased with them.

3. Going to the soda fountain at the drug store downtown and ordering a Coke float.

4. We lived on a farm and sometimes processed our own meat. I can remember helping to package and label package after package of beef or pork.

5. Related to the above, I can remember my mother straining milk that our milk cow produced twice a day. For each gallon of milk, about a third of it was pure yellow cream. My dad would drink the cream off the top of the milk with supper at night. That kid doctor in the original post probably would have had a stroke over that. Surprisingly though, Dad never did and lived to be the ripe old age of 83. Mother also made and sold fresh-churned butter and buttermilk. That buttermilk made the BEST cornbread to go with the peas that Dad grew in the garden and Mom canned for us to eat through the winter. Sometimes peas and cornbread WAS supper.

6. I can remember getting a special dress twice a year....once on Easter and once on Christmas.....and wearing it to church with my family. Of course, these dresses were designed and crafted and sewn by my mother. All of my clothes were, in fact, and I always got so many compliments on my clothes and from people with money at that!

7. I can remember going into town with Daddy on Saturday mornings and getting 25 cents worth of candy. It was enough to last a whole week but it seldom did. We didn't get candy or soft drinks every day and they were a special treat.

8. I didn't eat a "store bought" cookie until I was at least 13 years old.

9. I didn't have a "store bought" dress until I was at least 9 years old and only then because I was attending a wedding and mother did have time to make me a new dress (which she thought I had to have a new dress for any "occasion"). I think it cost $12 and my daddy had to work for about 6 hours to pay for that dress!

10. I can remember segregation and the first year our little school integrated.

11. I can remember watching the evening news and seeing the casualty lists from the Vietnam War being scrolled across the screen.

12. I can remember JFK's assasination and funeral and my mother crying as she watched the news coverage on our black and white TV while ironing. She was using one of those bottles described in the original post.

13. I remember our class being taken to the auditorium and watching the first man walk on the moon.

14. I remember daily assemblies that included Scripture reading and prayer at school and these were lead by a teacher.

15. I didn't see a color TV until I was about 12 or 13 and that was at a friend's house. I didn't know they even existed until then.

16. I remember the first attempt at movies on disks. They were huge plastic things in huge plastic boxes and the picture quality was abysmal. Of course, we thought it was great.

17. I remember Hi-FI stereos with automatic record changers that played 33s and 45s and what an improvement it was to be able to stack records and not have to change them after each one was finished. At least I'm not quite old enough to remember using a Victrola!

When I think about all the innovations and inventions I have seen in my lifetime, it amazes me. There are microwaves, color tv, personal computers, cell phones, MP3 players, CDs, VCRs, DVDs, and the list goes on. Boy, do I feel old now!