After a half a pot of coffee and half a box of Kleenex I'm beginning to join the living. I think.

I have come down with ANOTHER cold. That makes 2 since I've been at Mother's. Before that, I couldn't tell you when I've had a cold. But I'm outdoors a lot now. No matter the weather.

I have to walk the dog and take him outside to the bathroom. He has a gigantic bathroom now. The whole world. I don't just take him in the front yard then we're done. Oh no. We go all over.

The property meets with the 14th hole on the city's only Golf Course. If no one's coming down the fairway, we walk out to the pond and up to the 15th tee on the cart path. We occasionally find a stray golf ball. (When I was young, we'd snag golf balls and run a stand to sell them back to the golfers. We sold koolaid with real glasses and brought them home on horseback to wash them.)

My childhood home, as you can see, really brings out the memories. [sniffle, sniffle.. blow, blow .. cough, cough] Oh, I could tell you so much more about the golf course. Another time. Maybe.

Back to walking the dog... My next door neighbor, Penny, usually is taking her dog, Rogie, out each morning around the same time. We say hello, both standing there holding leashes with our darlings on the end. Bleary-eyed and wild-haired, usually with our pjs on and a coat over us.

"How's your Dad doing, Penny?" I'll ask.
"He's doing better. How's your Mother?"

Her home once rang with children's laughter and bikes and swingsets and now they've grown and moved on and she's back home taking care of her Father (she's an RN). So we have a great deal in common.

That's all the 'thrills a minute' from my little corner of the world.