Posted in: Uncategorized
Three times while reading a wide range of articles yesterday, I came across the word eponymous. It is a fine word - or was - but so overused as to become an annoyance. So non-fiction writers of ephemeral blog posts, may I ask a favor. Like the horse in the stall next door, eponymous is dead. Could you please stop flogging?
It's a Lazy Monday and I haven't an idea in my head - and taxes to figure - so instead of a blog post, I'm going to link to articles that I found interesting in the last day or so.... Over at the Guardian, an author points out a bit of hypocrisy ... Philip Hensher stirs debate among authors after refusing to write for free
How long until someone busts 2 hour marathon? ... Kimetto Smashes Course Record to Win Chicago Marathon
I made my own corned beef over the weekend ... It was a hit, so here's the recipe ... Corned Beef and Cabbage with Horseradish Cream Sauce Recipe
I came across a comment on a political blog yesterday that piqued my interest as a writer. Probably would make a good thriller if I wrote thrillers ... or we might discover it was too true.
Why didn't NSA detect the LIBOR rigging by the big banks? Why do they only seem to see small potato type malfeasance while entirely missing the felonious and sometimes treasonous activities of the major players? Is it because they're not competent, or are they compromised? Or do they see their mission as one of protecting the "haves" from the "have nots?" Exactly who are they protecting, and from whom?
Come to think of it, NSA is in a perfect position to make a killing in the market based on their access to "insider knowledge." Perhaps there's a symbiotic relationship here - they don't drop on the big guys simply because they're making too much dough off them. I dunno, but it stinks.
Oldsters like me will remember Zola Budd ... and Mary Decker before she was Slaney ... if you were wondering what happened to Zola, she still runs. So does her daughter ... Zola Budd's Daughter Runs Fast in Her Footsteps ... Check out the last paragraph. It sounds like she's every bit as good a Mom as she was a runner.
The first chapter (unedited, so if you find errors, it won't hurt my feelings if you point them out) of my novel, Finishing Kick. Publication date is expected to be in December 2014 by Cruiser Publications, LLC.
![Pageflex Persona [document: PRS0000035_00034]](http://static.squarespace.com/static/5300251fe4b0056790cc068c/537f7db2e4b0a2446d0dde90/537f7db5e4b0a2446d0ddf78/1378838263000/Finishing-Kick-Final-Small.jpg?format=original)
Callie chased her on a gentle downhill slope, three hundred meters of fairway to the finish line of the State Championship. Through eyes hazy with exhaustion and the remnants of a cold, she could see her twin teammates, Anna and Hanna, sprint past the finish marker in a dead tie.
Two hundred meters to go and Callie could hear the gasping breath of another runner closing on her. Five strides later, the girl was beside her. Callie pumped her arms harder, willing her legs to move faster. Legs that could carry her for miles were failing now with the finish in sight.
Noise flooded both sides of the course and, penetrating over it, someone shouting her name. The cheers of the fans and coaches slid past her as she fought for position.
She saw the red singlet and slashing white diagonal as the last of the Fairchild Academy runners eased by her. Swearing, Callie leaned forward to gain momentum, rising up into a full sprint, her calves already starting to cramp, alternating with each foot strike, each spasm an opportunity to quit, to let the girl go.
Seventy meters and Callie still matched strides with the Fairchild girl.
At fifty meters, another girl caught both of them. She was a tiny runner from a small school up north, and her breath came in sobs.
The three of them closed on the flags at the top of the finishing chute. Callie felt the agony of each breath as it exploded from her lungs, too little air for starving muscles. The blood pounding in her head drowned out the runners beside her, and Callie’s vision squeezed down to a small circle focused on the white line that marked the end. She could sense the presence of the runners next to her and drew on their struggling effort, seeking just a small advantage.
The sobbing girl finished one step ahead, the last sob a moan as she collapsed. Instinctively, Callie dodged the fallen runner as she lunged past the line, a half-step ahead of the Fairchild runner.
Relief and exhaustion mingled with joy but a small doubt blossomed.
Was it enough?
“You did okay.”
Callie, huddling to avoid the chill brisk breeze that snaked its way to her still sweaty skin under the Cloverland High warm-ups, looked over to Mark. The wind had been worse out on the course but there, movement generated heat. The twins, Anna and Hanna, were shivering under the blanket they were sharing, blond heads touching as they all waited for the results.
“Not good enough,” she said, feeling the echo of the final kick, legs heavy with lactic acid overload, girls passing her on the long straightaway to the finish line.
Mark shifted to his other foot. “You don’t know that yet.” Sweat, bobbing on a lank of hair, dripped off. Mark still had not put on sweats after running his own race, his broad shoulders and legs exposed to the wind. An inch over six feet, he towered over the girls on the team.
Callie kept her face impassive, looking toward the microphone stand, waiting to find out whether they had made it or not.
“I mean, with a cold and all…” Mark shifted uncomfortably back to his original foot. “You did great.” He trailed off as Callie kept her eyes on the awards table. Lined up were the trophies for the top four teams and medals for the top eight finishers.
She was listening but between the head cold and the gnawing sense she let down the other girls, his words were just washing over her. Idly, she thought it was nice that he was trying to cheer her up. He was a little on the weird side but a nice guy. Feeling a sneeze coming, she searched her pockets and found a tissue.
There was activity up front and Callie’s attention sharpened. She put the used tissue, folded, back into her pocket.
“Finally!” said Anna. They watched the announcer, a slightly overweight man, make his way to the microphone beside the podium. The podium, a broad white stand with a pyramid of steps numbered one to eight, was the goal. Callie and the rest of the team unconsciously closed ranks, pressing up to the rope that separated with winner’s space at reviewing stand. The top four teams got to the stand. Cloverland was close, closer than they had ever been.
The official photographer, camera resting at her hip, waited for the teams to be called up, one at a time, to the stand for its brief moment of recognition. She shot the picture quickly, and the next team filed onto the stage, everything organized with impersonal precision. The winning team, the champion, was allowed to linger for a few extra moments. It was on the schedule.
“Thank you athletes and parents for your participation in the Washington Interscholastic Athletic Associations’ State Cross Country Meet. The individual results for the Division 1 Girls Race are as follows…” He proceeded to read through the top eight finishers with each runner taking her place on the stand as her name was called.
Jenessa, her teammate, also a junior, had placed eleventh overall, easily the best finish ever for a Cloverland runner. The two seniors on the team were standing at the rope, staring at their last chance to stand on the podium, a reward for the years of work they put in.
Two Fairchild runners were among the eight. One was a senior and she stood there on the third place block. The other, Roxanne, a junior, placed seventh. She and Jenessa ran together for the first two and a half miles before she dusted Jenessa heading into the finish. Callie frowned when she saw Roxanne glaring at Jenessa. Not a very good winner, she thought.
They finished with the top runner, who had qualified on her own, then went out and outran the entire field. She was a junior too and had already accepted a spot at the West Regional at the Footlocker Invitational next month. If she did well there, she’d be racing in San Diego in December. It was a select group, runners who had both the talent and the work ethic to excel. Callie wished she had the talent.
Watching the diminutive runner accept the first place medal, Callie thought it had to be a lonely feeling, running as an independent, racing without a team. There was a bit of steel in that girl that was missing in most of the runners.
“And now for the team results…”
Callie felt light-headed and realized she was holding her breath as the pudgy man ran down through the results. The tension was growing for all of them. The seniors had their arms wrapped around each other’s hips.
“In sixth place, with a score of 183, Winston…”
“In fifth place, with a score of 102, Cloverland…”
The team deflated. Little sighs combined into a collective groan as the girls realized that, once again, they were one step shy of getting onto the podium. Months of hard work got them to State but it wasn’t enough to get them into the top four.
One of the senior wiped a tear away. There was no ‘next year’ for them.
“In fourth place, with a score of 101, Asotin…” The Asotin fans cheered and the team made their way up onto the podium and had their picture taken, and then they were herded off.
One Point! Callie thought. Just one point, realizing that the place she had given away to the sobbing girl at the end of the race was the difference between a fifth place ribbon and the seniors standing on the podium.
The third place team, followed by the second place finishers, took their place in order but Callie wasn’t paying attention any more. A guilty mantra…one point….…one point….echoed through her mind.
Finally, the winning team, Fairchild Academy, was announced. The Fairchild girls were strong runners and their team had not lost any meet – not even the big invitational in Oregon - in more than three years. It was their fifth consecutive championship.
The Fairchild team took to the podium, laughing as they climbed the steps. They goofed around getting settled while the photographer waited impatiently. As the camera came up, they struck a pose, five fingers of their left hands up, the forefinger of their other hand pointing toward the crowd as they laughed.
There was a murmur from the crowd and Callie felt the flush of anger. She looked to the seniors. They had both stiffened at the implied insult. Jenessa looked grim and even the twins were taken back. It wasn’t just Roxanne – the whole team was a bunch of poor winners.
Mark shook his head slightly. He was standing right next to Callie and he watched her flinch when the results were announced. She was busy blaming herself, he thought, even though she was still getting over a killer cold that had kept her from running for two weeks before the district meet.
Girls, he thought, are aliens. Guys knew that you had to go for it. If you won, you were the hero. If you didn’t, if you blew up, you were a hero returning on his shield. Winner either way. Girls didn’t get that…
He watched the misbehavior of the Fairchild team and saw Callie cheeks flush red, almost as red as the nose she kept wiping. He glanced down at her face, studying it, auburn hair pulled back in a ponytail and vivid green eyes when another random thought bounced around, then out and surprised him, “…kind of a cute alien, though.”
Finishing Kick
Copyright © 2013 Paul Duffau
First draft of A Walk with Rose is finished. It turned out not to be a novella but a medium long short story, at least before I go back and do some editing. It should be ready for publication in about two weeks.
A reminder that 25 percent of the profits of the story will go the local Humane Society shelter. If you want to know how the sharing will work, go here and I explain it.
Visiting the bed and breakfast at St. Gertrude's Monastery is like wandering into the kitchen of your favorite grandma. The one that would bake you a chocolate cake for dessert - and serve it warm from the oven - just because. And would pull out the ice cream to go with it because warm chocolate fudge cake with cold ice cream is nearly heaven.
Sister Chanelle met us at the entry to the Inn at St. Gertrude's. It was perhaps the nicest welcoming I've ever experienced. There was no registration card to fill out, no corporate hustle and forced pleasantry. Instead, Chanelle guided my wife and I through the Inn and offered insights into the grounds, little tidbits of history, and put us at ease.
St. Gertrude's Monastery sits just outside of Cottonwood separated from the highway by four miles and a century of memories. The grounds of the Monastery overlook the Camas Prairie to the east - wide, sweeping vistas - and, with a short hike to the upper meadows, the snowcapped Seven Devils Mountains to the south stand against the blue sky.
The Monastery itself, fitted into the hills like a natural outcrop of the blue porphyry quarried on site, was started in 1920 and finished in 1924 though there have been new additions - a school, a spirit center, the Inn - throughout the years. Channele was kind enough to show us the Monastery after breakfast our first morning.
For the structural nerd like me, the three foot thick walls of stone were impressive but the woodwork and detail of even the hallways was beautiful and modern conveniences like the new elevator are blended into the architecture so skillfully that they appear to have always been there.
And, since the Inn at St. Gertrude's Monastery is a bed and breakfast, a word about food.
You have a choice for breakfast - either a continental in the Inn or breakfast with the nuns. The fare for the nuns is basic and satisfying but the atmosphere can't be duplicated. I enjoyed their hospitality after spending an hour sitting in the Adirondack rocking chairs 
on the patio of the Bluebird room, sipping coffee and alternately reading and admiring the view.
Later in the morning, I spent more time in the rocker, napping, before we went to the museum. An eclectic collection is waiting in the museum, an early baby incubator sitting a few feet away from the religious relics and, at the back of the museum, a collection of Asian artifacts dating to the Ming dynasty donated by Sam Rhoades in honor of his wife, Winifred Rhoades.
The Inn at St. Gertrude's Monastery has all the technology you would expect in a upper class hotel - wifi access, large flat-screen television. We didn't use any of it. We didn't miss any of it either.
Here is the link you're interested in visiting the Inn at St. Gertrude's
This is the final installment on Act I of a little novella, A Walk with Rose, that I’m working on. Act II is started but on hold until I get done with my novel - which should be done by the Fourth of July. Once I finish that, I’ll be finishing this novella and put it up on Amazon as a Kindle book.
I will be donating 25 percent of the proceeds from publication to the local Humane Society.
Please feel free to share with your friends…if you want to cut and paste it into an email, I simply ask that you include a link back here. Many thanks!
A Walk with Rose
Everybody makes mistakes. On January 13th, Laura Fitzpatrick made two. The first, made at 2:47 PM, was forgetting her purse. She remembered before she left the driveway and rushed back into the house, leaving the driveway one minute late. She made second mistake after picking up her daughter from elementary school. At the only stoplight on the street, she braked to a hard stop in the left hand turn lane when the light turned yellow, a light that she could have made it safely. Eighteen seconds later, at 3:18 PM, an elderly man driving north blacked out, swerved and, his car accelerating under his convulsing foot, smashed into the front passenger side of her car. Laura was uninjured.
Her daughter was not; her right foot was mangled by the crushing steel of the oncoming vehicle. Paramedics arrived swiftly, gasped, and started feverishly working to save the girl’s right foot. She was loaded into the ambulance and rushed to the hospital. Left at the scene of the accident was one small pink shoe, blood-soaked.
********
On January 13th, Mrs. Joy Williams passed. Roy, husband of 52 years sat on one side, holding her hand, not crying because she had asked him not too. On the other side, resting her head on the bed sheets was Joy’s dog, Rose, friend and helper as she met this last stage of life.
Her son, James and daughters, Anne and Marie, waited in the living room, sitting on the dated couch and love seat, eyeing the knickknacks that lined shelves, recognizing gifts given in childhood, the wall of pictures, faded blacks and whites in old-fashioned frames, color pictures of the kids as they grew, marriage photos, and grandchildren’s school pictures. Joy always brought visitors to the wall.
A gentle squeeze on Roy’s hand, a single finger lifting on the other hand to give Rose one last scratch under the chin, she passed, quietly.
********
“That’s an awfully brave girl you have.” said Shelly above the racket from the kennels. The dogs, seeing people and wanting out, barked and whined. Somewhere in the back, a hound howled, the deep “Ahhhhwoooooo” echoing through the building. They watched as Emily, brown hair pulled back in pigtails, leaned on her crutch as she made her way down the aisle between the dog kennels.
“Yes, she is.” replied Laura.
Her voice was soft and Shelly had to strain to hear her. Months ago, Shelly’s statement would have led to tears but Laura had no more. Eleven year olds should not have to be brave. Four surgeries in six months had exhausted her and Galen as they watched their little girl, tiny in the hospital bed, go through each procedure. The doctors had explained, choosing their words with care, that they, the doctors, could do no more for Emily. They asked if the family prayed.
“She doesn’t cry anymore.”
Shelly looked at her sympathetically while watching Emily. The young girl stopped at each kennel, peering through the chain links of the gate.
“You took the survey?” she asked Laura.
“The one they gave us up front?” replied Laura. “I let Emily fill it out. It’s going to be her dog.”
“Is Emily going to be the one taking care of the dog?” probed Shelly. Too often, the shelter had gotten dogs returned because the parents discovered that the kids didn’t follow through with the work of caring for a pet and the parents were already overwhelmed with careers and children.
“She says she will. If not, I’ll help.” Laura smiled at Shelly. “But thank you for the warning.”
Shelly nodded. Emily might be different, she thought, but it never hurts to bring it up.
Emily reached the end of the kennels and started back to her mother in a rocking hobble across the concrete, swinging her right leg but unable to support any weight on it.
She looked up when she reached the adults.
“So which one do you want?” asked her mother.
Emily paused, brown eyes looking up to Laura. She shook her head.
“My dog isn’t here yet.” And she turned to leave.
********
The day they lost Rose, Roy suffered his first stroke, a minor one. The stroke scared his daughter, the eldest. It was her week to be his caretaker. Since Joy had passed, one of them occupied the house every day and most nights with him, trying to replace memories with bustling activity.
The weather was hot and very dry that September. Roy was puttering in the flowerbeds. He was a large man, a block of weathered gray granite, more broad than thick, and tall. He and Joy had separate gardens, with separate rules. Hers was filled with a profusion of color, oranges nasturtiums, white peonies, pink pincushion flowers, Mount St. Helen’s coral bells bursting into reds above the bed. Joy’s garden welcomed their friends, escorting them blossom by blossom along the walk, up the steps to the front door.
Roy’s was orderly, squashes and peppers and peas, the little cherry tomatoes that delighted Joy, cucumbers – picklers and slicers - all set in the back yard, little popsicle sticks with tags marking each row. Roy tilled the soil by hand each year, blending in the new compost and laying out each row and rotation. Joy would watch as he would turn the soil with his bare hands as he planted a seedling, gently setting into a hole, tamping the rich earth. Each harvest, from early summer to late fall, filled little baskets shared with the neighbors, fresh vegetables topped with fresh flowers from Joy.
Rose was lolling under the shade of the dogwood tree. Its shade was her retreat when Joy and Roy, her people, were out front, a place she where she would watch them, tail wagging a greeting to the little children flitting past and the old ladies out for a walk. They all knew Rose and called by name, the same as they did with Roy and Joy.
It was almost noon and Roy was too long in the sun, bent mulching and weeding the flowers, fertilizing the last of the late season irises. He tried to stand, and discovered he couldn’t, his right leg unresponsive, then his right arm. Rose saw him take a short fumbling fall to hands and knees. She stood and went to his side, snuffling in his face, sensing, with that intuitive knack that every good dog has, that her master was in trouble. She wouldn’t leave him so she faced the house and barked. No response. She barked longer and louder but not letting Roy out of sight.
Roy heard the screen door finally squeak open – he had meant to oil that hinge – as his eldest daughter, Anne, came to the front porch, intent on shushing the noisy animal. She paused, framed between the pillars and, in her matronly silhouette, Roy saw his little girl again.
He heard her say, “Dad.” He could see, could turn his head as she came tumbling down the walkway. He heard everything. He looked at her, but his efforts to say, “I’m fine” came out as gibberish. He saw the fear blossom in her eyes and sadness. It’s alright, little one, he thought as he continued to struggle to his feet.
What Roy remembered most of the ambulance was the embarrassment. The paramedics were professionally considerate while his daughter flitted from one side to the other before fleeing to call the other two children. Gently, they made him lay down, to stop trying to upright himself. It vexed him, that he was crushing Joy’s flowers and that the paramedics were walking on them. The crushed flowers released a sweet perfume and memories of Joy.
They loosened his pants and removed his shoes, exposing the hole in one sock. They stripped open his shirt, attaching filaments with tape to the gray hairs and skin, peeled his eyelids back to blind him with bright lights that hurt, quieted him when he tried to talk.
Friends and neighbors came to their porches, watching everything and recording the details for gossipy dinner-time conversations. Passersby on the road slowed, rubbernecking to see the source of the commotion before they sped away.
They loaded him into the ambulance and his daughter rode with him to the hospital.
From under the tree where she retreated when Anne came down the steps, Rose watched the ambulance arrive. She carefully watched the very precise actions of the paramedics took to saved Roy. She saw the neighbors on the porches. Some, the closer friends, gathered in small pockets to worry together. She watched the doors of the ambulance close and Roy driven away. The neighbors faded back into their homes.
Roy tried to remind them to take care of Rose as they loaded him into the ambulance but the paramedic, very professionally and sympathetically, quieted him again.
It was a full day before the children remembered Rose; by then, she had moved on.
********
“Back again?” Shelly asked Emily. Laura and Emily had come to the shelter once a week since August. Shelly had tried to guide Emily to dogs, good dogs, some trained, all sweet-natured and gentle. Emily would lean into her crutch, inspect the dog Shelly suggested before trekking over the concrete, kennel to kennel to look at each of the other dogs, the unruly, the unmannered, the loud, the shy, the happy-go-lucky goofballs, each dog getting a chance. Each week, she walked out alone with her mother.
“Yes ma’am.”
“Well, I’m fresh out of suggestions for you, young lady.” Shelly told her over the racket of anxious dogs. Laura gave her a sidelong glance; Shelly had called earlier to make sure they were coming. Emily nodded and labored off, stopping at the first kennel for a moment, making polite sounds to the dog inside before moving to the second.
“So why the mystery?” probed Laura. “You wouldn’t have called if you weren’t excited about one of the dogs.”
“True enough, but your Emily has a mind of her own. She’s turned down all my recommendations so far. I didn’t want her to turn this one down just because it came from me.”
“Emily wouldn’t.”
They watched her travel down the aisle, stopping at each one with a dog, passing by the empty stalls.
“How many dogs do you have this week?”
“Eight. Three of them Emily’s already seen. We have a family interested in the black lab you saw last week so hopefully he finds his forever home today. They’re supposed to be in around four.”
Emily approached the fifth kennel. Shelly’s body stiffened as her eyes followed Emily.
“The dog is in that one?”
“Um-hunh.” Shelly flashed a look at Laura. “I think this is the one. She’s a sweetheart, just has a good soul. She doesn’t belong in here.”
“None of them do.”
Emily stepped in front of the gate and looked inside. Sitting quietly, waiting for her turn, was a golden retriever. Her coat was matted in spots and she wore a dirty green collar with a heart-shaped tag but her eyes were bright and warm and patient. The dog cocked her head to the side as if inspecting Emily, seeing the slim form, the crutch, the foot. The dog seemed to make a decision and leaned forward to put her nose at the chain-link of the gate. The girl, balancing on the crutch on her right side, stuck a delicate hand through the opening and began to scratch the dog on the side of the neck. Rose licked the inside of the girl’s arm.
“Hey you.” she said. “Are you ready to go home?”
Beware the path most travelled - it just might add lots of bonus miles!
In this case, I was running the loop around the Seven Devils, part of the Hells Canyon National Recreational Area, which is about a 30 mile run.
I was bombing along and, with the exception of tripping on a tree root while trying to get a picture of a herd of elk, everything was running according to plan.
Until I burst (okay, jogged) out of the trees and saw a gorgeous lake in front of me. That's 
when I took this picture. That's Baldy Lake and the only problem with it is that it wasn't on the loop route - it's off a spur.
So, the first thing I did was snap the picture - no sense in letting a little mistake distract me from the beauty of the lake.
Then I yanked out my topo and figured out where the heck I was. I did an eyeball triangulation off the peaks to dial it in and figured out where I missed my turn.
If you look at the first picture, there is a tiny trail on the other side of the log on the left side. That's actually the main loop trail but nobody makes it past Baldy Lake coming this direction.
I ended up turning about 35 miles that day and my feet were very tired puppies by the time I was done. But I did get a great picture that is still my desktop background and a wonderful memory.
The path least travelled may make all the difference but sometimes you can do both - the beaten and unbeaten paths - and each can have it's rewards.
I'm going to post installments of a little novella, A Walk with Rose, that I'm working on. Every couple of days, I'll put up a new piece of the first act. Act II is started but on hold until I get done with my novel. Once I finish that, I'll be finishing this novella and put it up on Amazon as a Kindle book.
I will be donating 25 percent of the proceeds from publication to the local Humane Society. If you want to purchase a copy of the whole work then, send me an email at thatguy at paulduffau.com and I'll put you on the list.
Please feel free to share with your friends...if you want to cut and paste it into an email, I simply ask that you include a link back here. Many thanks!
A Walk with Rose
Everybody makes mistakes. On January 13th, Laura Fitzpatrick made two. The first, made at 2:47 PM, was forgetting her purse. She remembered before she left the driveway and rushed back into the house, leaving the driveway one minute late. She made second mistake after picking up her daughter from elementary school. At the only stoplight on the street, she braked to a hard stop in the left hand turn lane when the light turned yellow, a light that she could have made it safely. Eighteen seconds later, at 3:18 PM, an elderly man driving north blacked out, swerved and, his car accelerating under his convulsing foot, smashed into the front passenger side of her car. Laura was uninjured.
Her daughter was not; her right foot was mangled by the crushing steel of the oncoming vehicle. Paramedics arrived swiftly, gasped, and started feverishly working to save the girl’s right foot. She was loaded into the ambulance and rushed to the hospital. Left at the scene of the accident was one small pink shoe, blood-soaked.
********
On January 13th, Mrs. Joy Williams passed. Roy, husband of 52 years sat on one side, holding her hand, not crying because she had asked him not too. On the other side, resting her head on the bed sheets was Joy’s dog, Rose, friend and helper as she met this last stage of life.
Her son, James and daughters, Anne and Marie, waited in the living room, sitting on the dated couch and love seat, eyeing the knickknacks that lined shelves, recognizing gifts given in childhood, the wall of pictures, faded blacks and whites in old-fashioned frames, color pictures of the kids as they grew, marriage photos, and grandchildren’s school pictures. Joy always brought visitors to the wall.
A gentle squeeze on Roy’s hand, a single finger lifting on the other hand to give Rose one last scratch under the chin, she passed, quietly.
********
“That’s an awfully brave girl you have.” said Shelly above the racket from the kennels. The dogs, seeing people and wanting out, barked and whined. Somewhere in the back, a hound howled, the deep “Ahhhhwoooooo” echoing through the building. They watched as Emily, brown hair pulled back in pigtails, leaned on her crutch as she made her way down the aisle between the dog kennels.
“Yes, she is.” replied Laura.
Her voice was soft and Shelly had to strain to hear her. Months ago, Shelly’s statement would have led to tears but Laura had no more. Eleven year olds should not have to be brave. Four surgeries in six months had exhausted her and Galen as they watched their little girl, tiny in the hospital bed, go through each procedure. The doctors had explained, choosing their words with care, that they, the doctors, could do no more for Emily. They asked if the family prayed.
“She doesn’t cry anymore.”
Shelly looked at her sympathetically while watching Emily. The young girl stopped at each kennel, peering through the chain links of the gate.
“You took the survey?” she asked Laura.
“The one they gave us up front?” replied Laura. “I let Emily fill it out. It’s going to be her dog.”
“Is Emily going to be the one taking care of the dog?” probed Shelly. Too often, the shelter had gotten dogs returned because the parents discovered that the kids didn’t follow through with the work of caring for a pet and the parents were already overwhelmed with careers and children.
“She says she will. If not, I’ll help.” Laura smiled at Shelly. “But thank you for the warning.”
Shelly nodded. Emily might be different, she thought, but it never hurts to bring it up.
Emily reached the end of the kennels and started back to her mother in a rocking hobble across the concrete, swinging her right leg but unable to support any weight on it.
She looked up when she reached the adults.
“So which one do you want?” asked her mother.
Emily paused, brown eyes looking up to Laura. She shook her head.
“My dog isn’t here yet.” And she turned to leave.
********
The day they lost Rose, Roy suffered his first stroke, a minor one. The stroke scared his daughter, the eldest. It was her week to be his caretaker. Since Joy had passed, one of them occupied the house every day and most nights with him, trying to replace memories with bustling activity.
The weather was hot and very dry that September. Roy was puttering in the flowerbeds. He was a large man, a block of weathered gray granite, more broad than thick, and tall. He and Joy had separate gardens, with separate rules. Hers was filled with a profusion of color, oranges nasturtiums, white peonies, pink pincushion flowers, Mount St. Helen’s coral bells bursting into reds above the bed. Joy’s garden welcomed their friends, escorting them blossom by blossom along the walk, up the steps to the front door.
Roy’s was orderly, squashes and peppers and peas, the little cherry tomatoes that delighted Joy, cucumbers – picklers and slicers - all set in the back yard, little popsicle sticks with tags marking each row. Roy tilled the soil by hand each year, blending in the new compost and laying out each row and rotation. Joy would watch as he would turn the soil with his bare hands as he planted a seedling, gently setting into a hole, tamping the rich earth. Each harvest, from early summer to late fall, filled little baskets shared with the neighbors, fresh vegetables topped with fresh flowers from Joy.
Rose was lolling under the shade of the dogwood tree. Its shade was her retreat when Joy and Roy, her people, were out front, a place she where she would watch them, tail wagging a greeting to the little children flitting past and the old ladies out for a walk. They all knew Rose and called by name, the same as they did with Roy and Joy.
It was almost noon and Roy was too long in the sun, bent mulching and weeding the flowers, fertilizing the last of the late season irises. He tried to stand, and discovered he couldn’t, his right leg unresponsive, then his right arm. Rose saw him take a short fumbling fall to hands and knees. She stood and went to his side, snuffling in his face, sensing, with that intuitive knack that every good dog has, that her master was in trouble. She wouldn’t leave him so she faced the house and barked. No response. She barked longer and louder but not letting Roy out of sight.
Roy heard the screen door finally squeak open – he had meant to oil that hinge – as his eldest daughter, Anne, came to the front porch, intent on shushing the noisy animal. She paused, framed between the pillars and, in her matronly silhouette, Roy saw his little girl again.
He heard her say, “Dad.” He could see, could turn his head as she came tumbling down the walkway. He heard everything. He looked at her, but his efforts to say, “I’m fine” came out as gibberish. He saw the fear blossom in her eyes and sadness. It’s alright, little one, he thought as he continued to struggle to his feet.
What Roy remembered most of the ambulance was the embarrassment. The paramedics were professionally considerate while his daughter flitted from one side to the other before fleeing to call the other two children. Gently, they made him lay down, to stop trying to upright himself. It vexed him, that he was crushing Joy’s flowers and that the paramedics were walking on them. The crushed flowers released a sweet perfume and memories of Joy.
They loosened his pants and removed his shoes, exposing the hole in one sock. They stripped open his shirt, attaching filaments with tape to the gray hairs and skin, peeled his eyelids back to blind him with bright lights that hurt, quieted him when he tried to talk.
Friends and neighbors came to their porches, watching everything and recording the details for gossipy dinner-time conversations. Passersby on the road slowed, rubbernecking to see the source of the commotion before they sped away.
They loaded him into the ambulance and his daughter rode with him to the hospital.
From under the tree where she retreated when Anne came down the steps, Rose watched the ambulance arrive. She carefully watched the very precise actions of the paramedics took to saved Roy. She saw the neighbors on the porches. Some, the closer friends, gathered in small pockets to worry together. She watched the doors of the ambulance close and Roy driven away. The neighbors faded back into their homes.
Roy tried to remind them to take care of Rose as they loaded him into the ambulance but the paramedic, very professionally and sympathetically, quieted him again.
It was a full day before the children remembered Rose; by then, she had moved on.
The last installment of Act I of A Walk with Rose will be posted on Monday, June 17th. I'm working on Act II....promise!
Early start to a productive day with a shorter-than-planned run in Field Springs State Park in Anatone, Washington. I had been hoping to do the loop around the perimeter of Field Strings which will take you through some nicely wooded areas wit
h very small rolling hills, and then out to the edge of Puffer Butte, overlooking the Idaho side of the Snake River and Waha Mountain.
The shorter-than-planned part happened when I reached a cattle gate and saw the "Closed -Hunting" sign leaning on the hinge side of the gate. Apparently it is turkey season - something I should probably know since I think this is the third year in a row I've managed to have a run curtailed. And, no, gate crashing is not recommended. The other folks are armed and, hopefully, careful. Hope isn't a plan; staying out of their way and letting them enjoy the area is A-Okay.
So I played on the trails available. Wildlife was a little scarce though some deer had 
obviously been through some time recently. Turkeys were nowhere to be seen and no signs of bears. This was the same trail that I was running with my daughter, Sara, and a friend when a bear came bouncing out of the woods and stopped staring at us in complete surprise. It was one of those quite mutual things and after the little guy took off, we kept worrying about mama bear.
After finishing, I broke out the laptop and got some writing in on the novel - I swear it will eventually get done! - and snacked on strawberries and cherries from the garden. The blueberries were store bought as I'm can't seen to get mine to produce worth a dang. 
Throw in a little chicken from the grill and it was a nice way to wrap up the run.
The best part is that I had the trails to myself (the open ones, of course.) Field Springs is only 30 minutes from the Lewiston and Clarkson but no one bothers to make the trip up except the cross country team a couple of times in the summer.
That's okay - I'm happy to hog it for myself.
I'm going to post installments of a little novella, A Walk with Rose, that I'm working on. Every couple of days, I'll put up a new piece of the first act. Act II is started but on hold until I get done with my novel. Once I finish that, I'll be finishing this novella and put it up on Amazon as a Kindle book.
I will be donating 25 percent of the proceeds from publication to the local Humane Society. If you want to purchase a copy of the whole work then, send me an email at thatguy at paulduffau.com and I'll put you on the list.
A Walk with Rose
Everybody makes mistakes. On January 13th, Laura Fitzpatrick made two. The first, made at 2:47 PM, was forgetting her purse. She remembered before she left the driveway and rushed back into the house, leaving the driveway one minute late. She made second mistake after picking up her daughter from elementary school. At the only stoplight on the street, she braked to a hard stop in the left hand turn lane when the light turned yellow, a light that she could have made it safely. Eighteen seconds later, at 3:18 PM, an elderly man driving north blacked out, swerved and, his car accelerating under his convulsing foot, smashed into the front passenger side of her car. Laura was uninjured.
Her daughter was not; her right foot was mangled by the crushing steel of the oncoming vehicle. Paramedics arrived swiftly, gasped, and started feverishly working to save the girl’s right foot. She was loaded into the ambulance and rushed to the hospital. Left at the scene of the accident was one small pink shoe, blood-soaked.
********
On January 13th, Mrs. Joy Williams passed. Roy, husband of 52 years sat on one side, holding her hand, not crying because she had asked him not too. On the other side, resting her head on the bed sheets was Joy’s dog, Rose, friend and helper as she met this last stage of life.
Her son, James and daughters, Anne and Marie, waited in the living room, sitting on the dated couch and love seat, eyeing the knickknacks that lined shelves, recognizing gifts given in childhood, the wall of pictures, faded blacks and whites in old-fashioned frames, color pictures of the kids as they grew, marriage photos, and grandchildren’s school pictures. Joy always brought visitors to the wall.
A gentle squeeze on Roy’s hand, a single finger lifting on the other hand to give Rose one last scratch under the chin, she passed, quietly.
********
“That’s an awfully brave girl you have.” said Shelly above the racket from the kennels. The dogs, seeing people and wanting out, barked and whined. Somewhere in the back, a hound howled, the deep “Ahhhhwoooooo” echoing through the building. They watched as Ellie, brown hair pulled back in pigtails, leaned on her crutch as she made her way down the aisle between the dog kennels.
“Yes, she is.” replied Laura.
Her voice was soft and Shelly had to strain to hear her. Months ago, Shelly’s statement would have led to tears but Laura had no more. Eleven year olds should not have to be brave. Four surgeries in six months had exhausted her and Galen as they watched their little girl, tiny in the hospital bed, go through each procedure. The doctors had explained, choosing their words with care, that they, the doctors, could do no more for Ellie. They asked if the family prayed.
“She doesn’t cry anymore.”
Shelly looked at her sympathetically while watching Ellie. The young girl stopped at each kennel, peering through the chain links of the gate.
“You took the survey?” she asked Laura.
“The one they gave us up front?” replied Laura. “I let Ellie fill it out. It’s going to be her dog.”
“Is Ellie going to be the one taking care of the dog?” probed Shelly. Too often, the shelter had gotten dogs returned because the parents discovered that the kids didn’t follow through with the work of caring for a pet and the parents were already overwhelmed with careers and children.
“She says she will. If not, I’ll help.” Laura smiled at Shelly. “But thank you for the warning.”
Shelly nodded. Ellie might be different, she thought, but it never hurts to bring it up.
Ellie reached the end of the kennels and started back to her mother in a rocking hobble across the concrete, swinging her right leg but unable to support any weight on it.
She looked up when she reached the adults.
“So which one do you want?” asked her mother.
Ellie paused, brown eyes looking up to Laura. She shook her head.
“My dog isn’t here yet.” And she turned to leave.
I'm going to post installments of a little novella, A Walk with Rose, that I'm working on. Every couple of days, I'll put up a new piece of the first act. Act II is certainly started but on hold until I get done with my novel. Once I finish that, I'll be finishing this novella. 25 percent of the proceeds from publication will go to the local Humane Society. Everybody makes mistakes. On January 13th, Laura Fitzpatrick made two. The first, made at 2:47 PM, was forgetting her purse. She remembered before she left the driveway and rushed back into the house, leaving the driveway one minute late. She made second mistake after picking up her daughter from elementary school. At the only stoplight on the street, she braked to a hard stop in the left hand turn lane when the light turned yellow, a light that she could have made it safely. Eighteen seconds later, at 3:18 PM, an elderly man driving north blacked out, swerved and, his car accelerating under his convulsing foot, smashed into the front passenger side of her car. Laura was uninjured.
Her daughter was not; her right foot was mangled by the crushing steel of the oncoming vehicle. Paramedics arrived swiftly, gasped, and started feverishly working to save the girl’s right foot. She was loaded into the ambulance and rushed to the hospital. Left at the scene of the accident was one small pink shoe, blood-soaked.
********
On January 13th, Mrs. Joy Williams passed. Roy, husband of 52 years sat on one side, holding her hand, not crying because she had asked him not too. On the other side, resting her head on the bed sheets was Joy’s dog, Rose, friend and helper as she met this last stage of life.
Her son, James and daughters, Anne and Marie, waited in the living room, sitting on the dated couch and love seat, eyeing the knickknacks that lined shelves, recognizing gifts given in childhood, the wall of pictures, faded blacks and whites in old-fashioned frames, color pictures of the kids as they grew, marriage photos, and grandchildren’s school pictures. Joy always brought visitors to the wall.
A gentle squeeze on Roy’s hand, a single finger lifting on the other hand to give Rose one last scratch under the chin, she passed, quietly.
This article was published by the State of Washington in their semi-annual newsletter to Real Estate Licensees. I was very pleased that my work met their standards. Next I hope to get a paying gig.... During the public comment portion of a recent board meeting for the Home Inspector Licensing Advisory Board, the inspector asked for clarification regarding the process of real estate agents attending the home inspection. While it spurred considerable discussion, the issue was outside the scope of the Board’s purview. “Why don't you go get a cup of coffee or something while my client and I concentrate on this inspection?” is what one home inspector said to a Licensee recently during an inspection. The agent balked and stated "I'll be fined!" Here is the story from the inspector. Within minutes of beginning the inspection the agent involved had begun asking the inspector leading questions. The inspector recognized that the real estate Licensee was attempting to exercise damage control. In this case, the issue really was a big deal - it needed to be attended to as soon as possible and it was important that the buyer understand it fully. The liability for everyone was substantial. Every Licensee is familiar with the process of the inspection. The Department of Licensing now has regulations on how to conduct the referrals including requirements for a written policy for each office and disclosure requirements for both the inspector and the agent. These are regulatory and legal requirements and need to be differentiated from the obligations that are placed on us by associations and clients. What we do not have are rules for the interaction at the inspection. That was the situation here where the regulatory requirements differ from the association rules. The inspector pointed out the inspection time is his time with the client to provide that client with the best available information. To protect everyone involved, the home inspector suggested the Licensee leave. The client fortunately was oblivious to the real messages being exchanged. Imagine the reaction of the client if the inspector said to the Licensee, "Why would you try to convince me to minimize a serious and expensive issue when it has the potential to bankrupt my client; and, if not fixed, make this house unsellable five years from now?" As home inspectors our primary obligation is to ensure that our client is as fully informed as possible. This means focusing on the concerns and questions that the client has; an agent asking questions at this juncture can interrupt the process and actually increase buyer anxiety. Given that strong-willed personalities populate our professions on both sides of the equation, let’s focus on how to avoid the potential for confrontation rather than assign fault. Could the inspector have been more tactful? Probably. Could the Licensee been less intrusive? Probably. But focusing on the confrontation does not move the industry forward. Instead, we should look at the facts on attendance requirements and information sharing. Then, we can look for common ground that will make the process more successful for all parties.
There is no legal requirement to attending the home inspection. That doesn’t let you off the hook though; your local MLS and Realtor Associations may have bylaws that will direct your actions on attendance. The Northwest MLS, for example in Rule 50(a) states, “no key holder shall leave any other person who is not also a key holder unattended at a listed property without the seller’s permission.” This, by definition, includes the home inspector and the mutual client. On the eastern side of Washington, the Associations are either indifferent (Lewis-Clark Association) – or actively discourage attendance (Whitman County Association.)
At the heart of the Northwest MLS position is the legal liability if property is damaged or missing after the inspection, not a matter of a lack of trust. The western side of the State is more litigious than rural Eastern Washington and the Multiple Listing Services and Associations have responded to that to protect their members. The purpose of the MLS rule is to actively protect the property of the seller by maintaining control of the property and monitoring the activities of those who are present – the buyer and the inspector. It is quite normal and reasonable for a buyer or the inspector to open and look into closets. It would be a rather different event if one or the other were trying on jackets or looking in jewelry boxes and the Northwest MLS recognizes this.
In Eastern Washington, there is a greater concern with unduly influencing the inspection. The region is less litigious than Western Washington and the incidences of broken or missing items very rare. A greater perceived risk for the real estate agent is the liability incurred by attending the home inspection. For example, an agent attending the inspection who tells the buyer that an item “isn’t a big deal” has injected themselves into the process and placed themselves in substantial jeopardy. Worse, the agent may find herself held responsible even if they say nothing; failing to point out a defect, even if the inspector missed it, may be enough for the agent to be held legally liable.
In each case, the MLS and local processes have taken into account the source of greatest liability to the members. But what of the inspectors….
The Inspector has legal and ethical rules he must follow. Under Washington regulations (WAC 308-408C-020(10), the inspector is not allowed to disclose the results of the inspection to any person other than the client. By that standard, the home inspector cannot and should not discuss the report in front of either the seller’s or buyer’s representative. Most inspectors have an automatic means built into their Inspection Agreements to gain this permission so that they can transmit the report to the agent representing the buyer. I am unaware of any inspector who routinely collects approval for transmission of information to the opposite party in the transaction.
Without the approval of the client, the inspector is required to exercise reasonable care in presenting the information without compromising the privacy of the client. Indeed, in a small percentage of cases, usually involving a dual agency by the real estate agent, the client will specifically withhold permission to share the findings of the report. In those cases, we cannot ethically discuss the findings while the buyer’s representative is present any more than we could if the home owner elects to be present.
So, clearly, while attendance is mandatory in some areas due to MLS Rules, it does not carry the force of law. The effect on the agent is unchanged as they can still be fined. What we need are an operative set of rules that both inspectors and agents can agree upon to work in a cooperative manner rather than treating each encounter as an adversarial adventure.
1. Mutual Respect. Too often, the real estate agent and inspector behave in a manner that does a disservice to their common client and to their industries. Instead, each should recognize the limits of their expertise and act within those bounds while respecting the obligations that are placed on the other person legally, ethically and morally.
Inspectors need to accept that the agent will be present. The inspector needs to communicate clearly his expectations to perform the task he was hired for without interference. The mere presence of an agent does not constitute interference. The agent is there to maintain the security of the property. Unless the inspector wishes to assume that responsibility, he should be supportive of the agent. Also, the buyer’s representative can directly get the information from the inspector at the appropriate time and with the permission of the client to best serve the needs of the client. This can serve to limit miscommunication by getting the information directly from you rather than relying on their interpretation of the report or the second-hand impressions of the buyer.
If the agent is the seller’s representative, understand that the communication with the buyer is confidential. The inspector is not being deliberately rude in avoiding you or asking you for privacy with his client but performing within his scope of responsibilities to his client.
2. Let the Inspector work. Every successful inspector has developed an individual system of performing the inspection and communicating the results. Both clients – buyer and seller - have expectations that the inspection will provide unbiased information. By systematizing his process, the inspector increases his accuracy for your clients while minimizing wasted time.
Additional people at the inspection add distractions and increase the likelihood that items important to your client will be missed or miscommunicated. Every inspector has a story of the first-time homebuyer who has both sets of parents, siblings, children, the aunts, uncles, first and second cousins show up for the inspection. This invariably makes the job of the inspector far more challenging and substantially changes both the flow and the quality of information that your client is receiving. As an attending agent, you can help by directing these flows and letting the inspector do his job.
Also, as an agent, you may have been through hundreds of inspections through the years. Resist the urge to provide your own commentary. The inspector is a licensed professional who adds to his knowledge base through annual continuing education. A comment such as “I’ve never seen an inspector say that is a problem…” places you in a position of liability and may not reflect the progress of the inspection industry. Let the inspector take that risk.
3. Attending the Inspection – or just Present? If you are required to be at the inspection, understand that this is a different requirement than attending the inspection. To quote Oliver E Frascona from an article in REALTOR® Magazine,
“Don't go through the house with the inspector. Explain to your clients that you sell real estate and the inspector inspects it.”
This is a time that you can catch up on emails, phone calls and other small tasks that do not require full office. One agent of my acquaintance reads or chats with the client. Her primary focus is to be ready to assist the client when needed and to be the buyers advocate if there is a claim of missing or damaged property. She coaches the client to let the inspector do his job and then proceeds to model that behavior.
When there are findings, she respects the client and trusts the expertise of the inspector. This licensee will ask clarifying questions to ensure that she understands the scope of the issue and the precise location. She finds that this greatly enhances her ability to communicate with all the parties involved.
4. Negotiations. It is a very different question when the buyer asks “Should I get this fixed?” versus “Should I have the seller fix this?” Inspectors need to be aware when they are crossing the line from inspector to agent. The agent is the person who has the expertise to handle the negotiations. Just as an inspector will grumble if an agent minimizes a reportable item in the report, the agent has every right to be unhappy if the inspector crosses the line from impartial observer to advocate. Inspectors need to resist the urge to leave their sandbox. Let the agents do their job representing the client.
The ultimate goal of each of us is to have clients successfully navigate the home buying/home selling process. For that to happen, real estate agents and inspectors need to act cooperatively in the best interests of our clients.
It must be my thick Romanian accent that is preventing my speech recognition program from understanding what the heck I’m saying. I followed the directions and it’s not as though I haven’t tried to work with it both diligently and patiently. I’ve spoken to it directly, cajoled it and yelled at it -nothing has worked so it must be the accent. This theory only suffers from two primary flaws. First, I’m not in the least bit Romanian and, second, I do not possess a noticeable accent. Still, the computer is having great difficulty in understanding my plain speech. Clearly it is my fault. I have honestly tried to train the computer just as the manual suggested. I’ve run through various training sessions on speech recognition included with the software. I now suspect these are included to build a false sense of security and accomplishment. By the time I reached the third training session, by way of example, I was able to speak at a comfortable speed.
It did seem as though the program was more interested in training me than receiving my input but I chalked that up to tweaking the program to me, the individual user. Some break-in time is always needed whether it’s a new car or a new computer program. I tried and, by the end of hours of work, I even managed to control some of the other programs through voice commands. Success!
Then I tried to actually use the recognition software while writing this little article. It turns out that I was less trainable than I had presumed. I noticed that I was having some difficulty in making myself understood. For example, the sentence above that starts with “It even offers the advice…” came out as “and even offers the pipes…” Now, I’m all for sharing and passing the pipe around, to recall an old John Denver song, but that wasn’t exactly what I had in mind today. The program seems to have an especially hard time when shore birds with short words such as “it”, “the” and anything that starts with a vowel sound.
It’s not as though I’m completely hopeless with computers. I remember the old days of ms-dos with a certain degree of fondness and I even did well in the only programming class that I took in college. Back then, computers were understood to be awfully dumb in general but very fast at adding and subtracting ones and zeroes. People bossed the computers - not the computers bossing us. Computers now are lightning fast at adding those ones and zeroes (but never twos and threes) but somewhere along the way, the computer became the infallible, a modern day oracle, all-knowing if inscrutable rather than a dumb machine.
The new default position when anything that goes wrong is that the fault lies with the person operating the system. In the old days, this was known as “bad programming” and was considered bad form since the program was supposed to serve people. In the intervening years since my first computer experiences, purveyors of such programming have decided that people are utter idiots that should under no circumstances be allowed to do more than hit a button and wait for commands. The user is the commanded, not the commander. Control, other than to set the pretty colors of the background, was wrested away from us.
So instead of the computer actively trying to learn my speech patterns, it shows every inclination of trying to force me into speaking like some plastic smiling news anchor for the local television station, the kind whose lips make those exaggerated pulls and purses practiced in the mirror while enunciating. each. word. slowly. It passively-aggressively refuses to acknowledge spoken words or will insert some nattering of barely phonetically related text but will enter a random “and” or “in” or “Then” at the mere sound of breathing.
That doesn’t mean that I’ve given up on beating the speech recognition into compliance. While rotten form for raising children, I have no moral qualms about verbally abusing my computer. I’ve gotten very good with several commands. “Undo that” is a particular favorite along with “Correct that.” Even then, with “Correct that” I can’t get it to recognize the phrase I am using and have to resort to “Spell it.” Have you ever tried to spell a word to a computer program that doesn’t hear an “H” and simply cannot understand “V as in Victor?”
I have tried some other commands of the sort that you might hear the in hallway of your local high school but these don’t seem to be programed into the system and, several at least, involve organic body parts the computer does not possess. Still, it lowers my blood pressure a bit and I’m exploring new avenues of creativity in that genre.
I remember the proper relationship between human and computer. So when I am “training” (beating into submission) the computer, if I sound as though I’m talking to a particularly stubborn and, perhaps, not too-bright two year old, I certainly don’t feel a bit guilty.
For those of you with doctors encouraging you to eat better and exercise to help with you diabetes, The New York Times had an article Diabetes Study End Early with Surprising Result you'll want to read. Bottom line, diet and exercise didn't help. My questions - did they stick with the Food Pyramid which is of questionable scientific validity; and, what type of exercise? Multivitamins can lower cancer risks in males. Good news for me....
And doctors are getting better at treating women for breast cancer. Good news for her....
And I'm glad the summer is over. I must admit it never occurred to me that my sunscreen might catch fire...I thought it was supposed to prevent burns.