Author: Steve Ainslie

Yesterday the I felt a little light-headed when I bent down to pet Wiggles. I thought that was strange, but figured it might be from leaning over. Then a few hours later, I got up from a nap and the room was spinning. Sh*t. I recognized the feeling immediately and knew what this was –…

Ever since my wife died in 4 years ago, I’ve considered myself as a loner. I’m retired. I’m a homebody. I spend most of my time alone. Or so I thought. It’s not accurate. My perspective was skewed. I have not been alone. I’ve been part of a family of my own creation. At first,…

I setup some alerts with Petfinder to email me when a Chihuahua for adoption is listed by a rescue organization in my local area. The system is good, but not granular enough to rule out dogs that are not quite a good fit. I’m not complaining – the rescue organizations do the best they can…

This week, in my limited exposure to the news, I’ve been warned of “potential disasters and existential crises” caused by: These were six I was able to bang out off the top of my head. If I opened Google News, I could list dozens more. The thing is, I can’t do anything to address any…

Last week at the grocery store, as I was scanning my groceries, the checkout guy came up to my self-checkout station to swipe his card while saying, “Hi Sir, I just wanted to make sure you got your senior discount.” My discount was 5%, plus no charge for a dozen eggs. I thanked him while…

If you plan to rip someone off, I suggest avoiding the rich people. It’s clear that stealing from the poor and middle class is perfectly acceptable in the US. For examples, look at the price gouging from oil companies, food manufacturers, retailers and pharmaceutical companies in the past 3 years who took advantage of Covid…

Almost as good as never buying something, is returning something that doesn’t meet my needs. My latest shopping misadventure was with an inflatable e-collar for my dog Wiggles. She had injured her dew claw. The vet gave her antibiotics and said, “Don’t let her lick it or it will get infected from the bacteria in…

I haven’t drank alcohol in 19 years and I don’t socialize much, so I often forget how prevalent drinking is for many people. When I hear stories about shootings at parties, out of control revelers trashing neighborhoods, fights happening outside of bars in the wee hours of the morning, fatal car crashes on weekends or…

I use ad-blocker software on all of my devices. I don’t want to see ads for things I’ll never buy. I don’t want my personal data to be tracked, analyzed and resold. I don’t want my screens filled with promotions for drugs, political donation solicitations, and crappy clothing made by a no-name Chinese manufacturer. I…

I have been browsing Petfinder every evening looking at dogs for adoption in my area. I’ve narrowed my preferences down to small, short-haired, dog-friendly, playful, house trained (or on the way to it), no health issues, no special needs, and under 4 years old. Based on what I’ve seen in the past week, I should…