Fat Cats!

Sometime back, I wrote about how some veterinarians in England were prescribing Ritalin for cats who had "personality" issues. A recent article in the London Times indicates that there are a lot of fat cats in England and that apparently the issue of obese cats is a "growing" problem. Here's an excerpt from that article:

"Fat cats in Britain are beginning to suffer the same diseases as their owners. A growing number are having type 2 diabetes diagnosed, as obesity and lack of exercise take their toll.

A pioneering study at the University of Edinburgh has found that one in every 230 cats in Britain is diabetic. Although there is no baseline for comparison, the evidence suggests that the rates of feline diabetes are rising rapidly. A study in America in the 1970s found only a fifth as many cases.

Professor Danielle Gunn-Moore, who led the study, said: "'The lifestyle of cats, just like their owners, is changing. They are tending to eat too much, gain weight and take less exercise. Unfortunately, just like people, cats will overeat if they are offered too much tasty food, particularly if they are bored and have little else to do.'"

“'While cats would naturally exercise outside, many cats are now house-bound — perhaps because they live in a flat or because their owners feel that it is too dangerous to let them out — so they have little to do all day but eat, sleep, and gain weight.'”

Diabetes in cats, as in people, is a serious, often fatal, condition and affected cats need daily insulin injections and a special diet. They also face an increased risk of pancreatitis, urinary tract infections and other problems."

I certainly don't want to leave the impression that this is just a humorous take on obese cats. I think that it speaks fairly eloquently to the fact that we humans don't take very good care of ourselves—or our animals.

I-35W Bridge Collapse in Minneapolis

At 6:05 P.M. on Wednesday, August 1, the I-35W Bridge over the Mississippi River in Minneapolis suddenly collapsed into a heap of rubble. Minneapolis instantly become the focal point of local and national news reports. In the hours after the bridge collapse, most of the people who were on the bridge were rescued or were able to swim to safety. Remarkably, fewer than 100 people were injured, and amazingly, perhaps only a dozen or so people lost their lives. Ironically, the design of the bridge probably saved lives, even as it collapsed into the Mississippi River.

Even as we attempt to understand this tragedy, stories of heroism and courage have emerged. One of these incidents involved a school bus carrying sixty day campers. The bus came perilously close to falling into the river, which might have resulted in numerous casualties. One of the camp counselors, 20-year-old Jeremy Hernandez, quickly evacuated the bus, and all of the children were rescued. Naturally, Jeremy was interviewed by local and national media. The rescue efforts are still underway, but the currents in the Mississippi River have made the rescue effort difficult.

The I-35W Bridge was finished forty years ago and was opened for use in the fall of 1967. You can see the bridge under construction in this 1967 photo. But why did the bridge collapse? Over the next several weeks and months, many investigations will undoubtedly take place. Although there has already been a great deal of speculation about the cause of the collapse, no one can know for sure at this juncture. Even though most of the commentary and news reporting about this tragedy has been respectful, it is most unfortunate that a few media types and politicians have begun politicizing the bridge collapse even before all of the victims have been recovered from the river.

I would be the first to acknowledge that the political climate in this country has been become very polarized in recent years, but one would think that self-proclaimed experts would restrain themselves from waxing eloquent at least until after we find out what happened to the I-35W Bridge over the Mississippi River in Minneapolis. Perhaps that's asking too much, but one can always hope.

A Crazy Weekend Stunt

It seems that one Kent Couch of (who lives in Bend, Oregon) wanted to do a little flying over the weekend, but he accomplished his goal a bit differently than most normal people. According to the Associated Press, he "settled down in his lawn chair with some snacks — and a parachute. Attached to his lawn chair were 105 large helium balloons."

"Nearly nine hours later, the 47-year-old gas station owner came back to earth in a farmer's field near Union, short of Idaho but about 193 miles from home." "'When you're a little kid and you're holding a helium balloon, it has to cross your mind,'" Couch told the Bend Bulletin. "'When you're laying in the grass on a summer day, and you see the clouds, you wish you could jump on them,'" he said. "'This is as close as you can come to jumping on them. It's just like that.'"

"Couch is the latest American to emulate Larry Walters — who in 1982 rose three miles above Los Angeles in a lawn chair lifted by balloons. Walters had surprised an airline pilot, who radioed the control tower that he had just passed a guy in a lawn chair. Walters paid a $1,500 penalty for violating air traffic rules."

It's one thing to be bold and go where no one has gone before, but this guy (just like Larry Walters) is definitely messing around with the law of gravity, if not common sense. These kinds of stunts are fairly harmless unless, of course, you suddenly lose altitude! As for me, I plan to enjoy life while firmly planted on terra firma.

April — Transition Time

In many ways, April is a time for transition. Although the weather can be tricky during April, especially up here in the Upper Midwest, the precipitation that we have is generally in the form of rain rather than snow. Just this past week here in Minnesota, we have had several days of rain. The grass is turning green and the buds are begin to come out on the trees. It won't be long before we store our snow blower and start firing up our lawnmower. Nancy has already prepared the ground around last year's new deck in order to plant flowers and the like. And we are also planning to put a coat of protective sealant on our new deck as soon as we get some warm, dry weather.

But April also represents other transitions as well. In the academic realm, these next few weeks are the last weeks of the school year. If you are a senior in high school, you are anticipating graduation from high school and perhaps planning to attend college in the fall. The last few weeks of high school can be pretty exciting, but you are also beginning to realize that there many changes in the offing. As for college seniors, what has been a four (or five, or six!) year academic journey is finally coming to a conclusion. With graduation from college comes the excitement (and sometimes a little anxiety) of figuring out what you are going to do with your life. For many college graduates, getting married or getting a job are at the top of the "to do" list.

And for those of us who teach, the end of another school year represents the culmination of sharing our academic expertise with a unique group of students. While we will teach some of those students in the coming years, other students will be graduating from college or will choose to attend another insitution. For me, the end of the school year has always been a time of great rejoicing. It is satisfying to finish up classes and bring the academic year to a close. This will mark the end of my thirty-fifth year of teaching, but with every graduation there is a little sadness as you say farewell to students whom you might not ever see again. You hope and pray that God will protect them and bless their lives. For them, in a way, their adult lives are just beginning (which is why we call graduation "commencement"), but for those of us who teach, it is a reminder that the years of our lives are continuing to add up.

Indeed, April is a time of transition.

Cats: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

When we lived in Greenville, South Carolina, we had several cats and a couple of dogs as pets. One of our dogs, affectionately known as Charlie, was a beautiful standard poodle. But he became very jealous of the kids, and we finally sold him to a couple who had no children of their own. As it stands right now, we are down to one cat, and he is pictured here:


His name is Kitty Baby. Friends of ours in Greenville named their cat Kitty Baby, so we borrowed the name from them. Kitty Baby was rescued from the dumpster at our local McDonald's in 1993. Daniel was working there at the time, and he brought Kitty Baby home in a little shoe box. I determined to take the cat to the humane society the next day, but Nancy and the kids prevailed upon me to keep their cat. I did not take Kitty Baby to the humane society, and he is still with us to this day.

I must say that Kitty Baby is pretty selective about who he will allow to hold him. For some years, he was a male chauvinist cat, and he would not go to any female members of the family. Of course, when Peyton and Oscar come over to visit, Kitty Baby goes into deep hiding. He will have nothing to do with the grandchildren. He has mellowed out in his "old age," but he still has his preferences.

The reason that I even bring up Kitty Baby was an article in London's Daily Mail. It seems that some veterinarian in Brighton, England, decided to give Prozac to a cat named Twiglet. Acording to the article, "the patient would not go out for fear of being bullied, moped around the house and sought comfort in eating. The 12-year-old grey tabby, whose weight had ballooned to 15lb, became one of the first pets in Britain to be given anti-depressant drugs, on the advice of a vet who said she had 'anger management issues'. And the results have been dramatic. Five months later, Twiglet has lost almost 7lb and is roaming around the back garden without fear." I don't know about you, but medical science seems to have branched out a good bit over the years. You can check out Twiglet and her owner here:


And I close today's lesson on pets with a couple of photos of "bad-looking" cats. Perhaps these two need a little Prozac as well:

The First Post

This is my first post on my own blog, so I have much to learn. As I get this figured out, I'll add more entries. But this is the beginning.