Is this heaven? No, it's the gym

I worked late today and decided I did not have time for the gym. I would be too late for Zumba class which began at 5:45 p.m.

However! Somehow I took the exit automatically and my car homed toward the gym. And I soon saw why.

Everything was charmed!

First, I scored this great parking space that miraculously opened. Second, this handsome gentleman waited something like a minute and a half to hold the door for me. Why, thank you, kind sir! He smiled at me as if to say, Welcome to L.A. Fitness!

As I walked in the sound system was just kicking in with the title theme to "Flashdance."



I am sorry, if they cannot play Leonard Pennario that is the next best thing. It cracked me up.

Next what happened was, I was walking toward the locker room and there were these tables set up promoting some concern or other, I do not know what, but they had this big boxer that wore a sign saying "Pet Me." This was the dog boxer...

... not the other kind.

This being a gym I must make that clear!

I could not believe my luck. I had assumed the boxer would be a blind person's dog, one that you could not pet. So I hugged the boxer dog and petted him as he looked up at me with his sweet serious eyes.

No one was in the locker room. I dressed in comfort in my Zumba clothes. I was a half hour late for the class but what the heck, there was still a half hour to go. Zumba was fun. I looked skinnier than I had looked last week. As class was ending and I was leaving I thought the teacher called over to me, "You sneaked in when I wasn't looking!" But I do not know this teacher. I thought: She could not be talking to me.

I did some weights and then I went to the locker room to get my stuff. And the teacher appeared! She said, again: "You sneaked in!" Then she said: "I was so happy to see you! I always love when you come to my class."

I stood there in my conspicuous neon Zumba clothes, smiling, delighted.

What a wonderful hour at the gym!

No wonder my car led me there!

When I left I hoped to pet the boxer again but he was gone. I wondered for a second if I had dreamed him.

Everything was just too perfect, you know?

You've got to wonder.

Adventure at the vet

Today Howard took me to the vet! Well, me and the cat. Which, by the way, I was able to mention the cat in the paper. It is news!

In the waiting room it was like "All Creatures Great and Small." The small was our sweet tabby and the great was a gigantic Labrador. He was named Diesel and he was like a zoo animal. Howard snapped the above picture of me and my new friend Diesel.

Here is a selfie Howard took of himself and the cat.

What a joyous day this was. Our orange tabby was pronounced very healthy! And he has a microchip proclaiming that he is ours.

At first he did not want to come out of the carrier. He got all stiff and they had to drag him out. But they weighed him and listened to his heart and admired his teeth and, most importantly, gave him treats. They said he is really a big kitten. He is about 9 months old.

We were guessing he was young by the way he chases his tail and pounces on things and whips around the house and sticks his paws under doors and down drains. And sure enough.

Now all he needs is a name and surely that will come to us.

My friend Susan at work suggested Cheezit. I was kind of pushing Frampton because at first, when he got to our house, he was kind of exhausted for a day or two. But then, like Frampton, he came alive.

Of course the biographer of Leonard Pennario should not have a cat named Frampton because of how Pennario hated rock music. Prudently Howard said no to that name.

There is also Tigger which is what the cat was called at its foster home before he joined us. And Tiger, suggested by my little nephew Georgie, which was funny because I had been thinking that name, too.

Long story short, right now the cat is documented at the vet as Orangey because that was the orange tabby cat who acted in "Breakfast at Tiffany's" ...



 ... and "The Incredible Shrinking Man."

The good news is, Orangey, or whoever he is, is ours.

And he is fine!

The great dogs of my past

What a beautiful day today! I walked down by the river.

It is fun to walk by the river when it is a little bit chilly. There are not too many people and so you hear the birds and not boom cars. I heard the birds and the water lapping up on shore. Summer sounds!

Next weekend is daylight savings time which, I hate losing that hour. But my mother is gladdened by the idea that  when it stays light later we can sit on the back porch and have our coffee after dinner. We sit out there and sip our coffee and admire the landscape and I share stories of Leonard Pennario.

And we can welcome Annie and Spike.

Spike is the white cat that visits my mother. He is a guard and he guards the perimeter. Spike will walk around making sure there is no evil afoot. He is a force for good! He is nice to me but it is my mother he really cares about. There was one day when Spike walked right past me and up to my mother. He said a kind of "Meow?" as if making sure she was all right, then proceeded on his rounds.

Annie is the dog next door.

My mother might be yelling at me about something and then suddenly her face will soften and get all mushy and that is when I know that Annie is behind me, walking up the walk.

This harks back to the days when I was a kid. When dogs could roam free! I got to write about this on Facebook the other day because a dog chewed through his leash and was found unattended in Delaware Park and everyone was going crazy.

I was thinking: Come on!

This dog chewed through his leash and headed for the park. So what?

Dogs used to go where they pleased all the darn time and nobody said a thing.

We used to have Stacy from up the block. This was when I was a kid. Stacy was an ancient black Lab, so old she was walking sideways. She could hardly stand up! She would kind of amble from yard to yard and everyone fed her and loved her. It takes a village to raise a dog!

There was another dog we only knew as Big White Dog and it used to terrorize my sister. She would dread running into Big White Dog on her way to school.

That was the breaks, back then. No one thought to contact Big White Dog's owner, whoever that may be. Instead my parents counseled my sister on how to deal with dogs.

Then we had Baron next door. Baron was a big German shepherd and had a big long fenced-in run in the hard. Now and then Baron would escape. No one knew how he did it! Until once I saw him do it. What he did was, he climbed up one side of the chain-link fence, and then down the other side. It was that easy!

Once my dad opened the door and Baron was outside. As if in a dream we heard my father say, "Oh, Baron! Come on in." Baron loped into the house and looped all around, running from bedroom to bedroom. We were all laughing and screaming. We could not believe our luck, that this big dog was running all over our house.

Growing up my mother had German shepherds in the family. They had Rex I and Rex II. And Pepper. If the dog was a girl it was Pepper. Boy dogs were Rex. My mom's parents got the dogs when they were puppies. I never knew until recently what a German shepherd looks like as a puppy. Adorable! See above.

The great dogs of my past!

I feel their presence, on beautiful days like this.