Second Chances

Sometimes I manage to land in a cesspool and come up smelling like a rose. In spite of my recent stupidity, I somehow wound up with exactly what I wanted. I’m back in Forest Lawn again (yeah!), back on night shift (Hooraw!) and down to just four nights a week (the same four nights Maureen works). It just doesn’t get much better. Best part is I didn’t even have to eat all that much crow. Believe me when I say second chances like this do not come along every day. To this end I find myself repeating the test pilots’ prayer, “Please God, don’t let me f**k up!”

The same is true for stray cats. Over the years I have offered more than a few strays a second chance. The day we had to say goodbye to poor Odo we returned to a very empty home. When we moved in here seven years ago we had four wonderful cats; now only Max remained. So we loaded our empty cat carrier into the car and set off to the Calgary Humane Society (4455 110 Avenue SE) to see what we could find. In the end we wound up adopting two strays, one kitten (Minnie) and one six year old gentle giant named Bear. Bear is a big suck, just the kind of cat I adore. He sits on my chair (doesn’t really fit in my lap) and purrs like an approaching freight train. He loves to have his enormous belly scratched and will actually let me brush it, something no other cat liked at all—good thing since he’s a long-hair.

The riding continues--I went out Monday morning after work and while it was pleasant enough, one of the people sharing the bike path was anything but. I was busy climbing back on my bike after walking it across a roadway when this moron came blasting past me swearing like a stevadore just because I was stopped on the side and he had to go around me. Why he felt the need to ride flat out, I have no idea. Why it was such a big deal to him to have to slow down and go around me, I'll never know. What I do know is that his rudeness ruined what could have been an otherwise enjoyable ride. Thanks a lot bozo. Oh, and one other thing: the bike paths are not a racetrack and you are definitely no Lance Armstrong.