My '06 Honda Civic went out of warranty Tuesday. I had been hounded by Honda to extend both by mail and on the phone. I just didn't think it necessary. This morning, I drove to eat breakfast and noticed a rattle I had not heard before. I'm thinking...uh oh...what now? I've had little things go wrong with this Civic such as a windshield pump motor going out, and some other minor things. I started thinking back to my '88 Pontiac GrandAm. Three weeks out of warranty and the automatic transmission going out.

People seem to get upset over the least little things these days. I had to go to the doctor recently for a semi-annual checkup. There were only 3 people in the waiting room when I arrived. Stunned by that, I asked the receptionist what the deal was. She replied, "The economy. People are starting to neglect their health now because of money woes." Things really are getting bad. But, I digress...one of the three women there got upset because she had been waiting "at least 15 minutes and going to be late for a hair appointment." She was furious. I felt like telling her if she ONLY knew how many times I had come to this doctor's office to wait 3 hours before seeing the doctor.

There is a company in my area that has always prided itself with its motto of "Once employed, always employed." A German company, their feeling was it was too expensive to lay off employees who they had invested thousands of dollars on training. Well, not any longer. Last week that company laid off 57 of it's employees, an 18% reduction of its workforce.

Many that follow this blog know I have a beagle named Ralph. Ralph "adopted" me back in April of 2008, about the same time I started up this blog. He played a prominent part in my blog novel, "Diary: Alone on Earth" also. It seems that Ralph has become afraid of squirrels. About a month ago, I noticed he had a nice scratch on his nose. Concerned it could have been a snake bite, I took him to the vet. Vet said he had not been bitten by a snake. Most likely, he rubbed it against the fence or something. That may be the case. But, now, instead of wanting to go in the backyard and bark and run and chase squireels, he wants to follow me into the house. I made him go back outside and play. About two minutes later, he is jumping up on the back door, yelping and wanting in the house. There was one nice sized squirrel on the back deck that Ralph wanted no part of now. It appears his days of chasing squirrels has come to an end. The squirrels of Lakeside Court have had enough of Ralph's barking and chasing. One squirrel in particular has had enough!

Everyone have a great weekend.