When I started this blog [Note - this was originally written for posting at the Miss Otis blog site], I named it after our beloved family dog, Otis.  Unfortunately, she is no longer with us.  (Wait, you named a girl Otis? - ed.  Yes, I named a female dog Otis, but that’s another story for another day.)  But we were luck to have her for 16 years, she was a sweet, sweet girl and we loved her very much.  It’s been almost two years since she died, and I still can’t find the words to express how much I miss her every day.

Our kids are old enough that they remember Otis, and they are starting to make more and more noise about getting another pet.  Unfortunately, they’ve started pushing for a cat.

For months now we’ve been having occasional discussions with Jordan about her intense, little girl dream of getting a cat.  “Mommy and daddy are really not ‘cat’ people, honey,” we explain.  “We’ve never had a cat, and have always had dogs.  And right now we’re not really sure we have enough time to raise a puppy and give it all of the attention and love that a dog needs.”

Round and round it goes, with Jordan managing to get acknowledgments from us that a cat would not be as burdensome from the standpoint of time and monitoring like a puppy.  And then, heading into the Independence Day weekend, Christine shocked me by asking, out of the earshot of the kids, if maybe we should go to the animal shelter and see about getting a cat.

Again we went back and forth, but eventually our thinking was that Jordan would be an excellent pet owner, and she really loves animals, so maybe this would make sense.  So, on the Friday before Independence Day, we took a family trip to the Princeton animal shelter to find out about adopting a kitten.

It turned out that there were 3 kittens at the shelter, with another 20 or more on the way from a recent cat-hoarding discovery.  All the rest of the cats were full grown, but the kittens were all out of their cage and playing when we went in to visit.

After a lengthy discussion with one of the shelter volunteers, we made the decision to fill out an application to adopt the grey kitten with black stripes.  All three kittens were domestic short hairs, and the other 2 were black and from the same litter.

On leaving the shelter that day, our understanding was that by early the following week, after our references had been checked, we would likely be making arrangements to pick up our new kitten.

But as we sat down to lunch at home after the animal shelter visit, Christine shocked me yet again by telling me that, if we were going to get one cat, maybe we should just get 2 so they would have each other for company.  I half-joking asked if maybe we should just take all 3 of the kittens and be done with it, but Christine was serious, and after another discussion, I called the shelter and amended our application to request 2 kittens.

The kids, of course, were excited about all of this, and I was ok with our decision.  Cats are not my thing, but I don’t dislike them.  And if we had a cat or two in the house, I’m sure I would find some redeeming qualities to enjoy.

But by Sunday night following Independence Day, Christine was ready to surprise me again by telling me she was having really serious doubts about the entire “cat” concept.  Never having had cats, we were both a little concerned about having a “cat odor” house.  And Christine realized that with swim lessons, swim meets, and other things going on, she wasn’t even sure if there was an evening of the coming week when she would have time to pick up the cats from the shelter.  So was it really a good idea to do this?

Then we had to consider the ramifications of telling the kids that, despite the shelter visit , application, adding a second cat, etc., we changed our minds and are now NOT getting a cat, much less 2 cats.

Heading into Monday we figured we had a little time to think things over and make a final decision.  But when my cell phone rang at 9:10 a.m. and it was the shelter telling me our application had been approved and we could make arrangements to pick up the cats, I was in a little bit of a bind.  So I told the lady at the shelter the truth - we’d been thinking very hard over the weekend about the whole thing, and I wasn’t really sure what our final decision was going to be.  Perhaps that’s a not uncommon thing for animal shelters to deal with, for various reasons, as she seemed unfazed and told me to call them when we decided.

That night and the next morning, we talked things through again, and Christine did a nice job of easing the kids into the possibility of not getting a cat so that they were not on the verge of melting down if we decided that we should not get a cat.

And then on Tuesday, Christine called the shelter to tell them we changed our minds and were not going to be adopting a cat after all.

So all of this is good from Otis’ perspective as a dog, right?  We’re still not cat people and life is good?

Largely, yes.  But I was then greeted with Christine’s revelation that maybe the thing to do is to wait until the end of summer, after we’ve taken vacation, maybe even after school starts, and we adopt a puppy.

So now Christine’s unstoppable force of wanting a small, hypo-allergenic dog that won’t shed meets my immovable object of getting another “real” dog, with a solid “thump” to its chest when you pet it, and that’s large enough to pull a wagon or act as a horse for a 2 year old.

We’ll see where it all leads.  If there is such a thing as a 30-35 pound non-shedding dog that has a tail and doesn’t have long fur/hair that requires grooming beyond basic and occasional brushing, I’d sure like to have that in my back pocket as a bargaining position.  Maybe I better start doing some research....

The car industry and the U.S. auto manufacturers have been in the news a lot recently with the apparent / likely collapse of Chrysler and General Motors.  Cars have also been an interest closer to the home front for us as we start thinking about whether we’re at the point of needing to plan to replace at least one of our vehicles.  My beautiful wife’s 2001 SUV has performed exceedingly well, but as we move past the 100,000 mile plateau, we’re aware that the car won’t last forever.  Similarly, my 2003 wagon has been a model of modern engineering and long-term performance through my long highway commute.  I’ve now passed 200,000 miles, with the overwhelming majority of those being cruising miles at highway speed.

So as we started thinking about cars in a more personal way, I started reminiscing about cars I have owned and/or driven throughout my life.  The old commercial used to say, “Sooner or later, you’ll own General,” for General Tires.  I’m not sure that’s actually been the case for me despite the many tire brands I can recall having purchased, but I’ve certainly driven or owned a variety of different makes of cars.

Some families perhaps have an established loyalty to a particular car maker.  My Uncle Don and Aunt Judy drove Lincoln-Mercuries and Pontiacs for years, and still have a Lincoln in their garage.  They also managed to beat Pontiac to the punch in switching to a Buick before Pontiac’s demise.

My grandmother drove Oldsmobiles as far as I can remember, and my grandfather drove at least a couple of Chevrolets that I can recall.

In our household, there didn’t seem to be quite the same car maker loyalty, for whatever reason.  My earliest memory of my mother’s car was her Ford Cortina wagon.  Mostly, my memory of the car is of the cigarette lighter, as I had to test whether the red coil that popped out really was hot.  The memory of the seared tip of my index finger tells me that it was.

After the Cortina, mom had a ’74 Super Beetle, which was with us for quite a while.  It was the car both my sister and I learned to drive in, and it made it until I graduated from high school in ’83.  I even got to drive it to school my junior and senior years, much to my sister’s dismay at the time.

Dad’s cars were company cars, but he and Papa were the company, so he had more flexibility than most when it came to choosing a vehicle.  I know he had a station wagon when I was little, but I’m not sure what kind it was.  My guess would be a Chevrolet, but I’ll have to confirm that with him some other time.  The first car of his that I have specific memories of is his first VW Bus.  He bought that I think not long after Mom’s Super Beetle joined the family.  The first Bus gave way to a replacement Bus a few years later, and was another vehicle on which I learned to drive.

In college, my sister, and then I, inherited a ’73 Plymouth Valiant.  My friends and I called it The Staff Car, as it was Army green inside and out.  It had been my Aunt Bab’s car, and it definitely looked like something a little old lady would drive.  There was no radio, and to get cool air circulating, you had to open the box vents under the dashboard.  Still, it ran great, and it wouldn’t surprise me if it’s still out there somewhere being driven by a high school student today.  It was over 10 years old and only had about 27,000 miles on it when it became my ride.

Upon preparing for college graduation, the Staff Car was replaced by a Honda Accord hatchback.  It was blue, and cute, and ran like a top.  Right until I came over a hill in Ohio, was surprised by a traffic signal, and wound up running a red light and getting hit by cross traffic.  Fortunately, the only casualty of the incident was the Accord.

To replace the Honda, another VW came along, this time a Jetta GLI.  It was a little quirky with its hand crank moon roof, but with the GLI engine it really had room at the top end for highway passing.  The miles started to pile up, and with 2 water pump replacements already having been done, I traded the Jetta for a Mazda Protege in order to have some reassurance that I could make long drives between upstate New York, Indiana, and New Jersey.

The Mazda was another car that ran like a top.  It’s only flaw was that it seemed to be invisible, as it was backed and/or run into four or five times in broad daylight.  The champagne color was great at hiding dirt, but apparently it hid the entire vehicle!  Still, none of the fender benders were serious, and the car was still with me when Christine and I were preparing to bring home our first child.

Like all expectant first-time parents, we sought out a vehicle that would protect our newborn like a tank.  Enter the Jeep Grand Cherokee!  It was sufficiently tank-like that it wiped out at least one deer with only minor damage to the front fender panel.  Then when we moved to New Jersey and my days of long, highway commuting began, the Jeep had to be eliminated in favor of something that had better fuel economy.

That brings us all the way to the current Subaru Outback, which has been humming along the northeast corridor for over 6 years now.  I’ve been extremely happy with the car and how it has performed, and was hoping that Subaru would bring their new diesel engine to the U.S. later this year so if I want or need to modernize, I could get even better gas mileage.  Alas, Subaru informed me Friday that there will be no diesel in their 2010 vehicle lineup.

So as I started to think about my vehicle future, I also started to think about my vehicle past.  And it occurred to me that, while I really have liked and been happy with my Subaru, and my wife’s Acura has been a rock-solid vehicle, there’s still something about a Volkswagen that elicits a different, more emotional response and feeling of familiarity in me.  It’s a little like Tom Hanks in “Sleepless in Seattle” when he’s talking about how he knew his wife was the one for him.  He was just taking her hand to help her out of a car, and it felt like coming home.

That’s at least a little like the feeling I get when I checked out the Volkswagen Jetta TDI Sportwagen.  There’s a certain level of familiarity and comfort to the whole layout and feel of the car that just feels and looks “right” to me.

I feel a little guilty even thinking about a different car.  My Subaru doesn’t deserve to be thrown over after all the faithful service it’s given me.  And our hope is that it will give us at least another year or so of solid performance.  With continued maintenance, there’s no reason that it won’t.  But when the time comes, I know I’m going to be tempted to switch.

I tweeted earlier this week about identifying with Homer Simpson in the episode where he finds his long-lost brother, who it turns out is an automobile tycoon.  The brother decides that Homer is somehow representative of the “common man” and what such a potential customer wants in a new car.  So he puts Homer in charge of designing the kind of car HE wants the car companies to make.  Of course, Homer winds up with a wildly impractical design that bankruptcy the company.

But there’s a part of me that understands the desire to be able to take the various parts of cars you’ve had that you really like and somehow make the “perfect” car for you.  My summary of the car specs would include the Subaru all-wheel-drive system, a VW air-cooled diesel engine, and the seating capacity of a Mazda5, with either a third row, or even better a rear-facing flip-up third seat in a small to mid-size wagon.

And of course, the cockpit and main body would be done by VW.  Just so it would feel like home.

UPDATE:  I received an email from Uncle Don commenting on the brief recitation of the history of family cars.  He adds the following valuable contribution that is both automotive and, in its own way, romantic:

Your Dad's first auto (purchased with his own W.F. Lilly earnings) was, I think, a navy blue Buick Skylark station wagon.  Of course, this information is suspect since it comes from a grey-hired old man who wears glasses and doesn't hear too well.  At any rate, it was a sharp vehicle and snowed Marianne Schlosser so that she was wiling to change her name to Lilly.

Thanks for the additional history!

"The Princess Bride" is one of our family's favorite movies.  I remember seeing it when it came out with my roommate.  Hilarious then and now.

I bought the DVD several years ago, figuring that eventually the kids would watch and enjoy it.

Apparently that time has come.  In a big way.

As my parents pretty much always have Princess Bride in their in-car DVD system, the kids watch it whenever they visit and we take their car as the whole family transport vehicle.

So on Sunday, after Gammy and Papa's latest visit, my son, who is 4 going on 5 in February, sat down at lunch, picked up his green plastic cup of milk, turned to me, and said, "So, dad, is down to you, and it is down to me.  You drink from your cup, and I drink from mine."

Then he and his big sister decided to act out the rest of the scene, commenting on how they switched cups when each other's backs were turned, then they laughed until they suddenly "dropped dead."

It won't always be so easy for them to amuse us so greatly.  It's nice that they do it so naturally now.  We're blessed.

There are a few slightly unusual foods in any family's repertoire.  One of my favorite breakfasts as a kid was cinnamon toast and hot cocoa.  My sister and I would dip the toast in our cocoa and devour the soggy toast.  I have no idea how that became a breakfast hit for us, and I have never met anyone else who thinks it sounds good.  My kids still won't even agree to try it.

Another odd food item that I never questioned is putting grape jelly on the top of a grilled cheese sandwich.  As my kids now know, my dad (Papa) did not like cheese as a boy.  So to get him to eat a grilled cheese sandwich, his mother (Nana) put grape jelly on the top after she grilled the sandwich.  My guess is it was some of her homemade grape jelly which all the grandchildren hoarded as one of our special Christmas gifts.  In any event, my dad learned to like grilled cheese sandwiches, and eventually cheese.  But more importantly, he passed on the tradition of putting grape jelly on top of a grilled cheese sandwich.  I was probably in college before I realized that the rest of the world didn't eat them that way.

Tonight at dinner, I grilled some pork chops that had been marinating in a sauce my lovely wife made for some kabobs that we grilled on Mother's Day.  I forgot to baste the chicken kabobs with the extra marinade, so I figured I would throw some pork chops in so it wouldn't got to waste.

Of course, grilling dinner meant having to face the now familiar complaint from our 7 year old that she HATES things that are grilled.  I'm not sure why she keeps pointing this out to me, because it hasn't changed the likelihood of whether something will be cooked on the grill, and she winds up eating it when we tell her the alternative is for her to simply be hungry and stop complaining about it.  So onto the grill went the pork chops.

Which then brought the added complaint from Miss I-Hate-Grilled-Food that she also hates pork.  And of course, that really isn't going to get her very far, as she typically is a good eater when we have things like pork roast.

Well, tonight she decided to try to hold out on eating grilled pork chops.  Admittedly, I probably overcooked them a little.  I'm funny about not wanting my pork on the medium rare side.  Flavor was good with the marinade, but the chops were a touch toward the dry side.

After our daughter finished everything else on her plate, we had to figure out an approach to getting her to eat at least some of her pork chop.  My lovely wife thought that applesauce would be perfect.  A little applesauce, a little pork chop, all in one delicious bite.  It worked well for her, as she made her way quickly through her pork, and then shared some of the applesauce with our 4 year old, who was delighted to make little pork chop and applesauce sandwiches and tell us how delicious it was.

No such luck with our daughter, who has never been a huge applesauce fan.

So what did my wife suggest?  Grape jelly.  Just dip a bite and eat it.  If you like it on a grilled cheese, it should work for a marinaded pork chop, too, she said.

Somewhat surprisingly, our daughter tried it.  Apparently the first bite tasted pretty good.  But by the second bite, she was done with that taste combination.

At that point, she asked for something a little more reliable, ketchup, and finished her pork chop, leaving her small pile of grape jelly undisturbed for the rest of the meal.

Having lost our beloved companion of 16 years last fall, a Hoosier mutt of mixed parentage, I am particularly touched by this story of a U.S. Marine and those who helped make it possible for another beautiful dog to find a loving home.  May they have many years of loving companionship.  Here's the story in case you don't click through:

A San Diego-based Marine major was reunited on Saturday with one of his closest war buddies—a 2-year-old dog named Nubs.

Nubs greeted Maj. Brian Dennis at Miramar Marine Corps Air Station when the fighter pilot returned from Iraq.

It was the first time the two were together since Dennis' family and close friends helped raise $3,500 to fly the dog to San Diego about a month ago. Nubs wasn't allowed to stay on base in Iraq.

Dennis, 36, of St. Pete Beach, Fla., had spotted the mongrel dog while on patrol in Anbar province and later nursed the animal back to health after finding him stabbed with a screwdriver.

He named the dog Nubs after learning someone cut the ears off believing it would make the dog more aggressive and alert.

I'll never understand what it would take for someone to be able to do the kinds of things to a dog that are described here.  Thank goodness for this Marine and the efforts of all those who helped him.

My seven year old was doing her homework, somewhat grudgingly, the other night.  One of the weekly tasks she has for spelling homework is to write something like a letter, story or definitions of some of the spelling words in her journal.  She has become a little bored with doing this, and has taken to begging us to let her do something easier, like spelling the words using different colored vowels and consonants.  As much as we try to tell her that we think it would be better to show the teacher she knows what the words mean and how to use them, she keeps trying to get us to approve something that won't make her think.

So this week, getting frustrated with what has become a weekly discussion, I noticed one of her spelling words was "divine."  "Hey," I asked, "do you know what that word means?"

"No.  And I don't care."

"Hmmm.  It actually has a few different meanings...  Hey, there's a story about Grandma Schlosser's blueberry pie in the family cookbook.  You want to read it with me?"

"Yeah!"

I went to the bookshelf full of cookbooks, and found my copy of "the taste of home:  a hoosier heritage."  My cousin is a chef in Oregon, and way back in 1992, just after our great grandmother's 101st birthday, she compiled a book full of family recipes contributed by numerous "good cookers and good eaters" in the family.  It is usually the book I turn to first when I am looking for something fairly simple to make and that will just hit the spot and taste good.

My mother's side of the family have always been good bakers.  There was probably never a family meal that did not involved at least 2 kinds of homemade pie.  And while my Grandma Schlosser's apple pies were legendary and always a favorite, her blueberry pie earned its own place in the family history, which my daughter was thrilled to learn.  As my cousin explains in the book:

We all fondly remember the day when our friends from Georgia, Charles Cobb, Sammy Foster, and John Hutchins, came to Grandma Straub's house to visit.  After the meal, Charles started eating a slice of Grandma Schlosser's blueberry pie, and asked (in his beautiful Southern drawl), "Who made this blueberry pie?  It's DEE-VINE!"  Well, we all cracked up, Grandma blushed, Charles got a second piece of pie, and it's been called "Divine" Blueberry Pie ever since!

"So what does 'divine' mean," I asked?

"It means delicious!"

Thanks, Sigrid, and thanks, Grandma!