IN THE NEWS: Talk about the big time! A couple readers let us
know that the September issue of Ladies Home Journal contains an
article about Jamie Himes Dana and her dog, Rex.

Debbie Anthony tells us she received the issue in her Monday
mail and the story, “Soldier’s Best Friend,” is two pages long and
includes a picture of Dana and Rex.

The magazine is on newsstands now and we bet we’ll be getting a
few copies to peruse.

Thanks to Debbie for letting us know, and to Ginny Eppley of
Smethport who also gave us a heads up.

‘NEIGHBORS’: A reader asked us to print a poem which appeared
recently in Country magazine. They credit Robert Brenner of Toledo,
Ohio, one of their subscribers. We liked it, too.

“Old-fashion neighbor is a word

almost antique. Now folks live side by

side and may seldom ever speak.

Whatever happened to those wondrous

years when people used to care, and in

the joys of life and hardships, too,

your neighbor used to share?

“Why, I recall when Ma was sick,

I guess she had the flu. The

neighbor ladies all joined in to clean

our house, and they sent in our dinner,

too. The time my dad got hurt and

couldn’t work at all, the neighbors

found some food to spare, and with

their help and the love of God,

we made it through the fall.

“Now, we’ve organized our love

for our fellow man – it’s all worked out

by a computer plan. A dollar here, five

dollars there, and you get a pin that

says you care. God help me to be an

old-fashion neighbor still without the

need to show the world my pin. Let my

deeds speak out to my fellow man if

they care what I have been.

“Tell them I tried as I passed this way,

knowing that I should not walk by

again, and with the fervent hope that

of my many wrongs, not

caring was never one of them.”

TODAY’S QUOTE: “The growing enmity in Washington and state
capitals is reflected in a hundred angry talk radio programs and
thousands of bitter blogs in which the object is not enlightenment
of the subject but destruction of the opponent.”

That’s the word today from Alan Greenblatt, staff writer,
Governing, 2005.