An old experience with animal abuse that still stings

One of the cruelest cases(of animal abuse) I have ever seen involved an Albuquerque vet. We, Nancy, Sarah and I, delivered him a little cat on a rainy weekend afternoon, expecting him to euthanize it. It had been hit by a car, was still alive, but not by much. Oh no, he said, we can save this guy. But I will need some money up front. So I gave him $50, pointing out that he was not mine and I didn't have much and that that was a lot at the time. Oh, don't worry, we will find his owner, the good doctor said. I stopped by the next day to see how the patient was doing and the staff let me in to see him, laying still, eyes open, breathing laboringly, a liquid dripping into his leg. A couple of days,maybe a week of this later, they called to tell me that the owner had come to claim her cat and wanted to even up with me. She was in tears in the waiting room when I got there; the vet, bless his benevolent heart, wanted almost $300 from her on top of my $50, the cat still wasn't moving, she was't really even sure it was her cat, and she didn't know what to do. To help things along, the vet was storming in and out of the waiting area mumbling in a too-loud-and-angry voice that he wasn't running a charity operation and he was tired of being taken advantage by people who thought he was, blah, blah, blah. Somehow we made it through this ordeal, firgure out between us how we would pay the vet's bill -- outrageously expensive in my mind for the time -- and my new friend took her cat with her, rushing to her own vet, who immediately said the cat had no chance of living, that its injuries clearly indicated the need for euthanasia, which he did, ending the little cat's misintended misery.

Now this is indeed the worst vet story I have ever run into. Most every other veterinarian I have met has had a wonderful approach to animals and their lives, and, most of the time, their owners, too. With their help I have managed to keep quite a few little furry ones alive and still stay somewhat solvent in the process. As a group, I love them, have a great deal of respect for the profession, wish I were one, and am always happy when I hear that someone I know wants to become one. But this one, and he and I and my late cat friend's owner all know who he is, is something else. Deliberately to maintain the life of an injured animal requiring the grace of death is beyond belief. I certainly felt victimized by this man. I am sure the cat was, too.

A Day In the Life: Mrs. Puglisi's 100 National Standards

A Day In the Life: Mrs. Puglisi's 100 National Standards: "100. All children should be integrated, rich, poor, black, white, restricted by disability, glasses wearing, free thinking, Republican household, Democratic, representing every color, creed, view, and from such a base learn about self and others to the best of our ability to mix ourselves together within community, neighborhood, nation, to think of such things as more important than writing a bunch of standards and thinking that was the same as doing all of the above."

A Day In the Life: Mrs. Puglisi's 100 National Standards

A Day In the Life: Mrs. Puglisi's 100 National Standards

Oh, the ways we humans find to amuse ourselves ...

I was dismayed to read an announcement at the Sportsman's Warehouse in Albuquerque this morning that $80 and a certain lack of maturity would get two people and their guns admission to a fun-filled weekend of holiday-season slaughter here in New Mexico. For 40 bucks apiece, you and a good friend could frolic for three fun-filled days over the weekend of Dec. 11, 12, and 13 trying to be the big guys able to kill the most coyotes. The winners, bless their malignant hearts, get to split a pot that is made up of the total in entry fees minus the store's costs prorated against the number of dead coyotes they manage to show up with. That should get you in ripe fever ready for the Holidays. ("I killed the most coyotes, I killed the most coyotes, I'm the big guy, tra, la, la, ..." sung to "Deck the Halls with Boughs of Holly.) The notice did not indicate where this debacle was to occur; for that information one had to inquire at the checkout registers after joining up. As for me, I kind of like coyotes, along with most other living things, and I don't think it is "sporting" to compete to try to kill the most of any species. I am sure it brings bad kharma. I will probably say a quiet prayer for the coyotes and hope that they find some other place to hang out while the "sportsmen" have their demented fun. I will also hope the hunters' guns all jam. I have never been a big fan of the store but this morning will be my last visit to the Warehouse.

Another big thanks to the Postal Service

I bet you Sears is just as grateful as I am that the Post Office was able to deliver the store's 24-page tool sale circular to me on this past Friday (April 3). Surprise! The week-long sale for Sears' Craftsman Club members had ended only a week before the bulletin's arrival. I also bet Sears would have liked it a lot more if the sale notice had arrived when it could have done some good, maybe even contributing a little revenue to offsetting the cost of sending out the brocure. I bet you they would. The company even mentioned next to the postage meter stamp on the brochure that it would love it if the document could be delivered between March 17 and 19, a few days before the sale was to begin. I have no idea how much the brochure cost to print and mail, but I am sure it was no little sum.

My household has been going through a recent phase of mail delivery that involves us receiving only one or two pieces of mail each day for most of the week, followed by a day in which the box is stuffed with everything it can hold. I figured all along that this large load was mail that didn't get delivered when it should. My assumption has been that our mail has been handled during this lighter period by carriers who don't like handling heavy loads, or perhaps by newcomers to the profession or others who for some reason can't manage more than a few pieces of mail at a time.

If I were Sears, I would be pretty irked by this kind of service. A lot of marketing money went into preparing the sales brocures and mailing them off to all us tool fanatics. (It would be interesting to ascertain how many Sears sales brochures failed to get to their addressees on time. Maybe mine was an isolated case? Or were they all late?) As a Craftsman-tool-club-card-carrying junkie, I certainly am bothered. Because of this tardiness, I missed one of Sear's larger tool sales this year.

If I were a Post Office official I would be equally irked, in fact so irked that I would make a real serious attempt to find out why this is happening. Then I would make an equally serious attempt to fix it. And I would take those steps before announcing brand new ways the Post Office can do even less work, like cutting out a day of public service while simultaneously raising postage once again.

File this one under consumer relations ...

Take a look at this for a dynamite technique for sending your customers down the street: http://www.gadling.com/2009/02/24/united-crew-its-time-to-serve-drinks-to-the-idiots-in-coach/ It brings to mind the old adage, phrased in the vernacular of East Baltimore, "If you can't say something nice, don't say nothing at all." Or, in other words, make sure your public address system is turned off before you start mouthing off things you may regret.

Another good, simple, quick assist to help strengthen customers' allegiance:

This incident occurred a few weeks ago in, of all places, a Super Walmart. I had, and still have, a new kitten and was in need of an extra bowl or two to keep him in water and food while he acclimated to our place and the new routines. So while shopping for my weekly routine items, I took a look at the pet section of the Super Walmart, but what I wanted wasn't there. The store had just undergone a complete remake of its product layout and I thought maybe the item I desired had gotten left behind or just wasn't carried any more.

Just in case, though, I asked a young man stocking nearby. He asked for a description -- a plastic, two-dished container that the last time I had bought had cost maybe two or three bucks -- and said he would be back after checking "in the back." While he was gone I looked around, found a few items I could use. It wasn't more than a few minutes and the employee arrived carrying an entire box of the things, enough for a couple of animal rescue outfits, asked me how many and what colors I wanted, waved his magic Star Trek automatic price-scanning sidearm and gave me a current reading on this week's price. I was impressed. And pleased. So was Binford.