Rescued

Sienna

Rescue

An article in the local newspaper a day or so ago told about a dog rescued from an abusive home. She'd been tied up so tightly that her leather harness and chain cut all the way to the bone. Now she is the friend and helper of a man who has acute Parkinson's disease. The man says she is the child he never had.

Although the road can be bumpy, I have nothing but good things to say about rescuing a dog or cat that otherwise would be thrown on the trash heap. About 17 months ago, we also took in a rescue dog, a 50-pound Labrador Retriever/Shar-Pei mix named Sienna, who was found wandering somewhere in Pinellas County, Florida. She had four puppies in tow. The animal shelter to which she was taken weaned the puppies and fully intended to euthanize Sienna, who was big and could be wild when she was excited. But then, as now, she loved people, other dogs and even cats. An animal rescue group stepped in and said, "No way."

At first, our relationship was rocky. Sienna had been bounced around so much to this home and that and to more than one shelter that she had developed extreme separation anxiety. We tried to teach her to go into a dog crate so that we could go to church or a movie and not worry. She was having none of it and salivated so much when locked up that there were literally pools on the kitchen floor when we arrived home. Our previous dog, also a rescue, had readily gone into the crate, so what was wrong with this one?

Our vet said tranquilizers might help and gave us a prescription. They were to be used "as needed," which, for a while, was every time we left the house. We had a routine. We put soothing music on the radio. We tossed one of Ed's dirty t-shirts into the crate, along with a stuffed lamb we called "baby" and a bone to chew on. We also purchased one of those stretchy shirts, which, when strapped tightly in place with Velcro, is said to reduce anxiety. We bought a rubber toy, called a Kong, and put peanut butter inside.

All this made only a marginal difference in the puddles of saliva.

A friend who trained dogs for urban search and rescue teams suggested putting the crate in a bathroom, leaving the cage door open. He said to feed Sienna every meal in the crate, also with the door open, so she'd associate it with pleasure. When we got ready to go away, he suggested we lure Sienna into the bathroom and shut the door, saying, "We'll be back."

The first time we tried that she chewed off about two feet of the door frame in an effort to escape. Who knows what she would have done to the sofa had she been loose in the rest of the house. When we were at home, she never attempted to chew anything that wasn't one of her toys.

One night when we went to a movie, Sienna ripped the door through to its hollow core. Ed nailed up a metal sheet to cover the hole. We dreaded coming home, wondering how many wood chips and how much saliva we'd find in the hall outside the bathroom.

Our dog-trainer friend said to be persistent. We were, and we were generous too with praise when she deserved it and plenty of love. Gradually, over about eight months, the saliva became less, and the chewing stopped. We let the tranquilizer prescription run out and, finally, put away the stretchy shirt. We moved the crate back into the kitchen and began shutting the door with her in it when we left. Sienna was usually asleep when we returned home. There was no whining or barking, no chewing and no salivating.

We won, and we think she did, too.

Unintended Consequences

How they got there, nobody seems to know, but the fact is that Burmese Pythons have overtaken the Everglades. Some experts think there may be as many as 100,000, and they have no natural enemies. Instead, they are eating alligators, wading and songbirds, deer, raccoons, rats and mice - and changing the balance of nature.

The most popular theory is that several years ago a couple of people decided they could no longer cope with the snakes they were keeping as pets and turned them loose in the Everglades. When the two pythons found each other, the rest is history. I suspect that more than two people were involved and more than two snakes.

If south Florida had below freezing temperatures of some duration in winter, the pythons, which can grow to be more than 15 feet long, might die off. But temperatures less than 32 degrees typically occur only on a few winter nights and last only a few hours - not long enough to kill off large numbers of these huge snakes.

Attempts have been made in the past by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission to conduct python hunts in the Everglades, but serious control won't happen if just a few uniformed guys hunt down and kill a few big snakes. The area where they can be hiding is vast, 1 1/2 million acres in Everglades National Park alone, and the snakes apparently are smart at eluding humans.

This weekend, a hunt for amateurs has been organized, with a prize of $1,500 going to whoever kills the most pythons. So far, 500 have signed up to take part. I hope they are alert enough to dodge the alligators. 

A New Taste

While living on Montserrat, we became acquainted with an unusual vegetable grown there, the "christophene." Pear-shaped with a bumpy, pale green or ivory-colored skin, the christophene is a member of the gourd family, like squash or melon. It is bland tasting and can be somewhat bitter unless cooked.

Christophene or Chayote

The christophene is a vegetable with many names: In the United States, when you can find them, christophenes are called "chayotes." Names in other parts of the world are "mirliton" or "cho-cho." Originally native to Mexico and Central America, christophenes are now grown in South America, Australia and New Zealand as well as Florida. A part-time neighbor of ours in southwest Florida grows them abundantly in the Orlando area and shares them with us when he and his wife drive down for a weekend of fishing.

These vegetables can grow sprawling on the ground like pumpkins or cantaloupe, or vertically on a fence or trellis.

Eating christophenes raw is rare, but here is a recipe I like. It is from the Montserrat Cookbook, published in 1973 to benefit the Montserrat Old People's Welfare Association.

Christophene Salad

2 raw christophenes, peeled, cored and grated

1/2 tsp. salt

1 medium carrot, grated

2 green onions, finely chopped

1 package lime gelatin

1 cup hot water

1 Tbsp. lime juice

1/2 cup cold water

Add salt to christophenes and let stand 1/2 hour. Drain. Dissolve gelatin in hot water. Add lime juice and cold water. When the gelatin is cool and just beginning to set, stir in the vegetables. Pour into a mold or pan and chill.

Finished

When we spent our winters on the Caribbean island of Montserrat, the shops were not fully stocked as we were used to in the U.S.A. That's because everything on the island, and I mean everything, except maybe chickens and some fresh produce, had to be brought in by boat.

All of us expatriates survived anyway. In fact, I think that doing without, changing plans, and making do taught us a lot about flexibility and tolerance, which retired people sometimes lack.

I remember how, one December, there was no brown sugar on the island - not in any of the five or six grocery stores. No one had seen any for a couple of weeks, and it was time to bake Christmas cookies.

When I first noticed the lack of brown sugar and asked a grocer about it, he said, "dat finished," the Montserrat way of saying, "we're out of that." I asked when there might be brown sugar again, and he said, "when de boat come."

The boat brought everything

Word spread quickly through the population of 11,000 when the container ship showed up.

"Necessity is the mother of invention" became my mantra. If I was planning to have some neighbors over for dinner, I learned that planning the dinner menu ahead of time would only lead to frustration because the Idaho potatoes or the raw carrots, both of which were imported, might be temporarily "finished." I learned to buy yams and local green beans - or whatever else was available - instead.

One time, we went to a drugstore to buy aspirin, and it was in such short supply that the pharmacist was parceling them out six to a customer.

As there was not much in the way of new furniture for sale in the shops, and what there was cost twice as much as it would have in the States, many people did their own re-upholstery. We did too, even though we didn't know what we were doing. A lot of the island's furniture was ruined in Hurricane Hugo, so that seemed the only answer.

We heard from a neighbor - we all learned from each other - that foam rubber sheets in various thicknesses sometimes were available, but only in one small shop in Plymouth, the capital. The neighbor said we could use this foam to bulk up a sagging seat or repair a lopsided chair back.

When I visited the shop, I was told the foam supply was "all finished," but the boat was expected in a week or two. That was optimistic. I kept calling or stopping by for several weeks, but the foam, called "sponge" by Montserratians, hadn't arrived, and we were due to return to the United States for the summer. At last, the sponge arrived on the island, but it was "in customs" for two weeks after that.

By the time we flew home to Indiana, I had finished just one chair out of the three I hoped to. I will have to say it wasn't too lumpy.

  

Snow, Florida Style

Some of our friends up north can't understand why we would go to Florida and, heaven forbid, live there all year. "Don't you miss the change of seasons?" they say. Well, we have our change of seasons, too, but the changes are more subtle than falling leaves and the onset of sleet storms.

In fact, we have our own version of snow in the form of "Mexican Clover," now blanketing lawns that aren't treated with herbicides. Alas, there has been on occasion a question sent to the local newspaper's plant guru, along the lines of "What are the disgusting lavender flowers that are cropping up in our yard, and how can we get rid of them?"

Mexican Clover

Dutifully, the guru outlines an eradication plan. As for us, we prefer to go natural.

                                                                       Do you agree?

Outdoor Decor

wardrobe for enjoying outdoor Christmas decorations

Although we've lived in the tropics and sub-tropics since the early 1990's, I find it a little difficult to get into the Christmas spirit when people are running around in shorts in December and temperatures in the daytime are in the 80's. We Floridians try, however.

A couple of weeks ago, one of the towns around here rented a snow-making machine and manufactured a good-sized hill so kids could go sledding for a day. Many of them had never seen snow, except maybe on television news. Several thousand people showed up to enjoy their fake winter.

A man in Cape Coral, a town near where I live, outdoes himself every year with his light show, which is synchronized with music. The crowds grow as the word spreads, to the point now that he has put on his website the best way to avoid traffic jams. The night we visited, we saw people setting up lawn chairs to watch the spectacle. A lot of the viewers were wearing shorts or Capri pants, and one was barefoot.

unbelievable

the minimalist approach

As for ourselves, we are minimalists, I guess. But we do accent our palm trees with spotlights and hang colored lights on the front of the house. And today we put up our inside - artificial - tree. So we are ready!

If Only...

Here's an exercise I used to give to my grammar and composition students at Indiana University/Purdue University, Indianapolis.

Change the meaning of the following sentence by where you insert the word "only."

She hit Bob in the eye.

Answers:

1. Only she hit Bob in the eye. (She was the only one who did any hitting.)

2. She only hit Bob in the eye. (Her sister had nothing to do with the fracas.)

3. She hit only Bob in the eye. (She didn't hit Bill, too.)

4. She hit Bob only in the eye. (She didn't hit him in the jaw as well.)

5. She hit Bob in only the eye. (the same as the preceding)

6. She hit Bob in the only eye. (He'd had the other one knocked out several years earlier.)

7. She hit Bob in the eye only. (the same as 4 and 5.)

What other sentences can you think of in which the placement of a single word changes the meaning?

Do you agree with me that 4, 5, and 7 mean the same thing? If not, why not?