I love the unabashed over-buttered, over-creamed, deep-fried, gooey, over-sugared excessiveness of Amish food.

My pet-sitting day ends around sunset, and it's very satisfying to know that I've made several living beings happy that day. That I left their food bowls sparkling clean and fresh water in their water bowls. That I brushed them so their coats shined, and played with them until all our hearts were beating faster. That I kissed them goodbye and left them with their tails wagging or flipping or at least raised in a happy kind of way. That's a heck of a lot more than any president, pope, prime minister, or potentate can say, and I wouldn't switch places with any of them.

They say God never gives us more than we can handle, but sometimes I think God has overestimated what I can take.

August in Florida is God's way of reminding us who's in charge.

I always see to the dogs first and leave the cats and the occasional birds and rabbits and hamsters for later. It isn't that I play favorites, it's just that dogs are needier than other pets. Leave a dog alone for very long and it'll start going a little nuts. Cats, on the other hand, try to give you the impression that they didn't even notice you were gone. Oh, were you out? they'll say, I didn't notice. Then they'll raise their tails to show you their little puckered anuses and walk away.

Perfume companies ought to bottle the smell of crisp bacon. Forget pheromones. I’ll bet a woman with a little spot of bacon grease behind her ears would attract every male within a five-mile radius.

Being young is easy, you know, but it takes guts to be old.