That gave me a chuckle. I thought I was the only one who did stuff like that. (grin) DonnaR/CA

Leslie, my son was bitten by a tick last summer. It took them some time to figure it out. He was looked at by local doctors and of course this is Hicksville as far as healthcare. They finally sent him to one of the best hospitals in Missouri and he was diagnosed. By that time,the infection had eaten into the bones in his neck and he had to have surgery to clean that out,and they had to put plates in. He was very ill and nearly died. After he was sent home he was on an antibiotic drip twice a day for 6 weeks. It was a horrible time for all of us,and I still get shaky thinking how close to death he was. Those ticks can be dangerous!!!!

As everyone knows, beagles make excellent watch dogs and really horrible guard dogs. A man and his 3 or 4 year old son were walking by down our alley. My beagle started braying and spiking up because they had stopped to look at her. We went out and the man was laughing at her, and so was the kid. He asked his kid if he wanted to see the puppy and picked the kid up. Well as soon as the kid was up higher and she could see him better, she bolted. She was terrified. Came to stand behind my legs and bark and shake with her tail between her legs. The man and his son left, and I'll be darned if she didn't spend the rest of the night trying to 'track' the man and his son. She kept going back to the spot where they stood, sniffing the fence and following it all the way to where it meets the neighbors fence, over and over. I can't help but laugh at her, cause I know if she ever finds anything she's been trying to track, she'll tuck her tail and run the other way. She'd be the worst hunting beagle ever, I think. But she tries to do her job, thats for sure.

Been a while since I checked this forum but this thread reminded me of how I saved a marriage. In 2002 friends of mine moved from Illinois to Florida. The home they built in FL was ready but the home in IL was still on the market. SO they moved anyway hoping the IL house would sell quicly. Most of their posessions were moved but some furniture was left in the old house for staging. Months later the house sold and the husband flew back to IL to pack up and move what was left. The small U-Haul he rented was not quite big enough so he weeded out what he thought was unimportant (basement furniture, odd pieces in the garage, etc.). The day after he put those items out on the curb, I went by on trash day doing my weekly "Pearl diving" (my kids call it garbage picking). I took home a square game table about 20" square with a swivel top. Needed to be refinshed and I was in the process of packing for a move to Florida so I put it in my basement. That table made it to Florida in 2003 and then moved back to IL in 2005 when I moved back. Never did get it refinished. Anyway - was talking to the guy who threw it out ( we all remained friends thru the years and emailed each other regularly) and he was telling me that he and his wife were having marital problems since their move from IL. He said she had never forgiven him for throwing out her Aunt's table - it was the only thing she had to remember her favorite Aunt. Well guess who had that table? I had the extreme pleasure of telling him that I had it and he could pick it up on his next visit back to IL. You would have thought I pulled him from a burning building - which I guess is what he felt like. Needless to say he made the trip to IL in record time and table is safely back in his home. Neat story huh?