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A recent New York Times article talked about starting our days online. I admit, I hit the computer within the first hour of being awake. Quick read of new e-mails, doing my online devotions, checking weather, clicking www.thebreastcancersite.com and all its tabs, and making sure the online banking is all in order. Pretty much routine for all of us today.

What struck me in the article was the dad who said he uses text messaging to wake up his kids so he doesn’t have to go upstairs to wake them? Huh????

Dad, you are missing out on some special moments with your kids. A text message versus a warm touch and smile from dad…what do you think creates the most special memories for your children?

My daughter is grown now but I made it a rule to be with her every morning unless I was traveling. I went to her room until she decided she didn’t need me doing that anymore (enter her own alarm clock), but we still had breakfast together. While she was in college, I e-mailed her each morning just to start her day with a hi from home.

Sure, cell phones are the new alarm clocks and there is nothing wrong with teaching a child the responsibility of setting and using an alarm. Texting a good morning message to your child if you are on the road or they are away at college is a great use of the available technology.

But using it to replace a few minutes of your time with your child sends a wrong message in my opinion.

“My child, you are not important enough for me to take time to walk up the stairs to be with you as you start your day.”

I never got any thanks from my daughter for the college morning e-mails or the breakfasts with mom. But I’m pretty sure when I’m gone, or heaven forbid, old and senile, she will remember those times and know that she was loved deeply.

Jon and Kate, we are over you. Move on, get back under the radar. You’re not special anymore. If you would have succeeded at your marriage and raising eight kids, you’d be special. More so if you could have done it without TV fame. You didn’t do either. We are over you!

Pfizer–how about letting them do business? We need their products, we need jobs, we need capitalism. We don’t need government on this mission to take over commercial America.

On that note, government needs to stay out of health care, at least the insurance side of it. How about you let the insurers develop products that meet the needs of those who can’t afford large group plans? The small businesses that want to provide something affordable for their employees. A private product. Government already takes care of the uninsured with Medicare and Medicaid. Revamp those rules if need be, stick to them and enforce them. But stay out of private business!

That’s all for tonight!

As a child, before I was a quasi-news junkie, I adored Walter Cronkite.

“And that’s the way it is,” his famous tagline.

Maybe it was his deep, calm voice that attracted me. Who knows, but I felt like I’d lost a favorite uncle earlier this summer when he died.

And now this week with the passing of Sen. Ted Kennedy, I am struck by the exodus of American icons in the last year.

This site lists some who died earlier this year. Ed McMahon, Bea Arthur, Karl Malden, Robert McNamara…and of course Michael Jackson and Farah Fawcett on the same day.

Tim Russert in 2008, famous for his “Meet the Press” hosting, was the beginning I think of this string of icons leaving us. He was too young, of course, and while it’s never easy, losing Walter Cronkite at age 93 was less shocking and a bit easier to accept.

Maybe this strikes me because it points to my own mortality. These are people that have always been in my stream of consciousness. Part of the society around me…my familiar culture.

Sen. Kennedy’s death seems to close the Kennedy family legacy. Granted there are many descendants of that lineage who continue to work to serve America. But for most of us–across ages–JFK, Bobby and Ted all mean something. And today that chapter closes.

I love the dynamics of our culture and the new things and icons we add. But it’s hard to say goodbye. Even to these people I never know. It signals a door closed that cannot open again, which always nicks at my heart.

Our Kooper, full of vim and vigor!

Only northerners head to Fort Lauderdale in August…and while hubby and I have been in Florida six years now, I guess we are still northerners at heart. We just spent a long weekend there.

For the past few years we travel mostly with our dogs. The two older ones are gone now, and the new guy at just nine months is full of “vim and vigor” as my dad used to say. All that means when we travel, we look for pet-friendly lodging and restaurants.

Easier to find now than it used to be, but still proved to be a challenge in the “Venice of America,” Fort Lauderdale. We stayed at the Hilton Marina, billed as pet-friendly; however, as soon as hubby told them we had a dog, we felt snubbed. The friendliest hotel staff was a bellman as we checked out. Disappointing.

Many of the restaurants we called did not allow dogs. Not even at their outdoor seating. One place said another dog bit someone once so no more dogs. We have heard similar stories at home, and that most likely means that their insurance companies told them no more dogs. Understandable, but people — control your dogs!

Don’t ruin it for the rest of who do. We keep our dog on a leash and we monitor him the entire time we’re out. We don’t want him to disturb anyone who doesn’t want to be disturbed. If your dog isn’t social and won’t behave, even on a leash, leave it at home!

And to hotels and restaurants who claim to be pet-friendly, make sure your staff know to treat guests with pets as well as they treat guests without. I’m not sure we’ll use Hilton Marina again, even though it’s a lovely property.

Have you ever gotten a reverse 9-1-1 call? How about one that tells you to lock your doors and stay in your house because criminals are on the loose in your area?

That happened last weekend in my quite hometown state of North Dakota. Most of the time, life is quiet and stable there. So last weekend when law enforcement in the rural western part of the state, caught two escaped convicts from an Alabama prison, I shouted, Woo hoo!

The takedown happened near the city where I was born, in Stark County. That is an especially rural area, and while I’m sure there is crime, the officers there don’t spend most of their days looking for killers and thugs. It’s just not part of life up there.

So I have to believe that the ongoing training law enforcement officers are required to take  prepared them for this event. These two criminals (and their two accomplices) were in prison for murder and attempted murder – they are not nice guys! They got through seven states without getting caught.

A rancher, one of those who received the reverse 9-1-1 call, heard his horses get skittish and called authorities. They caught all four good-for-nothings, but not without gunfire exchange…started by the convict imprisoned for stabbing someone, i.e., atempted murder, who came out shooting!

In these “tough economic times” (which by the way I’m sick of hearing everyone whine about–be proactive, take action and stop looking for handouts!), cities, counties and states should not make cuts to law enforcement and education. Those essential services protect us every day and prepare our children for the future, empowering them to continue making the United States greater.

If you want law enforcement officers prepared for any situation, even those that don’t happen frequently where you live, tell your city and county commissioners, and your state legislators. Make sure where you live officers are adequately trained, equipped and compensated so they can afford to stay in that profession, looking out for the rest of us.

I have to ask…will those N.D. law enforcement agencies get the $5,000 reward?

I traveled recently for the first time since airlines added the checked baggage fees. Paid $15 per bag each way, on top of the nearly $500 ticket! But anyway…

What annoyed me more were the other travelers who in their “brilliance” [and that is laced in sarcasm] decided their gynormous bags were in fact carry-on size so they could skip that little extra fee! Annoying because THEY ARE NOT CARRY-ON SIZE. [yelling intentional here]

More annoying is that the AIRLINES SEEM TO ALLOW IT! What kind of b.s. is that? They all post those cute little boxes by the check-in kiosks so we can make sure our carry-on bags fit there. Yet airline staff ignore all those who walk by with bags two and three times bigger than that box.

One very overweight woman had two “carry-on” bags, each so big she could not even lift them into the overhead bin. And yet…none of the airline staff said a word.

Come on! Either enforce your rules or skip the extra fee. It’s not fair to those of us who do play fair, who go along with the system and pay the stupid fee.

For you passengers, if you really cannot afford the extra fee, maybe you can’t really afford to travel by air. If you can, then do the rest of us a favor and check your bag or pack lightly enough that you can board with one-count-em-one carry-on and a purse or briefcase.

It’s a matter of courtesy and safety.

I’m a bit of a nerd…not smart enough to be a geek-nerd; just sort of weird. Ask anyone who knows me. They’ll tell you. And they luv me anyway (I think!). I luv me, too!

As a kid my favorite thing to do in the summer was to play school. See, told you? A nerd!

Thankfully the neighborhood kids and my younger sister and brother went along with me. We often set up the classroom in Lisa Poe’s garage back in southern Indiana and I was always the teacher.

So it made sense that for as long as I could remember I planned to be a teacher when I grew up. Funny how dreams and plans change.

I never became a teacher, although even today I toy with the idea. If the state I live in didn’t keep laying them off left and right, I would do it! It really is what I should have done all those years ago.

Plus it pairs nicely with my other dream–writing! My career has always included writing but I mean the book-writing-and-selling type writer. That one I’m still working on.

So what’s your dream and what are you doing to pursue it? My absolutely, positively dream job(s) would be a writer on the Ellen show or a writer with Cirque du Soleil.

I don’t really see myself moving to Paris…but haven’t ruled out Europe so who knows. But L.A. doesn’t seem so outrageous!

Besides money, what is really the difference between “Octo-Mom” and Angelina Jolie? There’s a rumor that Jolie is pregnant for the 7th time, on top of all the adopted children.

Call me crazy, but I don’t see how either one of those women can really mother that many children. But since Jolie has money and presumably staff, i.e., hired mommies, nobody questions her sanity.

I’m not suggesting either Octo-Mom or Jolie are sane, but I think it’s unfair and a mistake that nobody investigates Jolie as mother.

I’m feeling quite intelligent today and since I don’t have a politician’s ego, I actually think about doing the right thing (trying to at least). As opposed to simply getting votes.

So it occurs to me that like many businesses, U.S. government at all levels, has made a classic operations mistake. It expanded its “business” beyond what it does and knows how to do best. Its core mission.

Isn’t the core mission of government to serve taxpayers? And by serve, wasn’t the intent things like police, fire, education, transportation, military? Those are the things government does best–better than private can do.

Yet somewhere along the line (and my guess it was during an election year) government stepped outside its core mission. Someone thought, we’re doing so well with all that, why not do more? And of course that person won said election and the push was on for all elected officials to expand government services and assure re-election.

Private businesses that expanded their business lines when the economy was booming, are scaling back now, returning to their core mission…to what they do best. Government must follow that example.

Is there a cost, a human cost to doing that? Absolutely! Votes will be lost. Some taxpayers will need to step up and meet their own needs. For those truly unable to provide for their needs, government can and should be there.

It’s clear there is no more revenue to be had for a while. Just as government is after private businesses to change their models, it must find ways to cut its costs and that means services outside the scope of government’s core mission. If it could do and did those things well, perhaps deficits and budget shortfalls would not scream at us from every corner.

We need today’s elected officials to be brave leaders. Leading means doing it right, and sometimes that means tough decisions. It requires visionaries who can see beyond today or tomorrow, and instead of slapping “band-aids” on the economic business, they force the rehab that keeps us “clean and sober” for generations to come.