Sunday, September 23, 2007

Sunday Morning

Today was one of those rare days at home. The morning started a little cool, slightly sunny, leaving starting to turn, light breeze...I love autumn!

It was a PERFECT Autumn Sunday morning:
- a pot of coffee made with my usual mix of Starbucks, Kroger Columbia and Vanilla with creme' brulee' creamer.
- The Sunday Pantagraph, the Chicago Tribune and tons of flyers
- The door open, watching the neighborhood walk by
- Rita sleeping on her pink leopard blanket behind my knees
- a day of football behind us and one more on the horizon

We need more of these sleepy, sunny Sundays ...really relaxing, recharging and enjoying life!!

Tuesday, September 4, 2007

The Front Porch Fly Catching Dog


The past month has flown....or rather not since the heat wave dragging most of the country down (except Texas which is drowning...I think that is the Alamo that just floated past us on the Illinois River...). So the month has flown as fast as it can in 98 degree weather with a 105 heat index. For like 20 days straight. (And yes, people still ask me how I made it in Texas....good lord people even Texas has ice tea, beer and air conditioning....!!).


Anyway..I digress. With all of our changes we had some time this summer to experience the joys of the front porch and neighborhood coffee. Shella and I had long ago discovered how much we loved to drink our coffee together on the decks. But it is hot and sunny even at 7 a.m. in the summer so that wasn't working. During our garage sale planning we discovered we could drag our lawn chairs outside in front and have our coffee out there. Rita loved hanging out with her peeps and we all chatted, drank coffee (or diet pepsi) and scanned the garage sale ads.


During this blissful time we discovered a special talent of Rita's....Rita is a fly hunting maniac. She has a laser gaze which can apparently work for things other than treats. She will stare down a fly until it gets close enough and then -- I kid you not -- jump in the air with jaws that would frighten that ole shark Jaws himself. Then she chews the fly and licks her lips satisfyingly.


She does not have so many flies at the new place. But I know if things ever get tough we can count on Rita to be a fly catcher and bring home the ...er...flies.