Older and Better with Shelly

So there’s a turtle who is 100 years old and his name is Diego. I would think by now many of you have heard about this famous turtle. He alone has saved his whole species. His whole tribe, his whole race. In the 1970's he was taken from the San Diego Zoo to his native Galapagos Islands. His job to become the stud that would save the turtle population on Espanola Island.   He was one of just a handful turtles left of his species. So he got to go to Galapagos Islands and was quarantined as part of a special reproductive program. What a beautiful place to have to go to. Over the past 44 years he’s given birth or spawned hundreds of little Diego's. Now I’m a city girl and I really don’t know if turtles mate or if they just reproduce on their own. I’ll do the research and get back to you on that. I wonder if Diego had to go into a little room and read dirty magazines, or was he just was able to do it on demand. So now, since his job is done, and he’...

I remember when I was a kid the telephone was scarcely used. It was meant for emergency situations. It was a treat if you even could afford one. My parents had what was called a four party line and entertainment for me was listening in on other peoples’ conversations. Of course I was too young to know what they were talking about at the time but just knowing I was doing something naughty was thrilling. I remember when my aunts would travel they would want to let my mom know that they got to their destination without an issue.   However, to make a long distance call was extremely expensive. So they would make a collect call through the operator and ask for the dog’s name or kid’s name, and then my mom would say they’re not home. That was the signal to let my mom know they had safely arrived at their destination. As people become wealthier they were actually able to have their own phone with their own line. My parents had a phone in the kitchen with only a 1...

So we bought a Roomba. We call her Dumba. Dumba The Roomba. It’s a girl you ask? With two male cats, possibly a male bird, and a husband, I need a female on my side. No one can clean as good, and be on time, and on budget, and not be a female. Roomba does it! All across the house she is doing her thing. You don’t have to nag her to vacuum. She doesn’t need any breaks, any tips and it doesn’t complain. She does her job. Doesn’t ask for a raise, and won’t talk on the phone while she's working. And she shows up on time, every time. Worth her weight in gold. She doesn’t even eat on the job. Doesn’t take long bathroom breaks either. She actually goes under and around the furniture, something I’ve been trying to get people to help me with for my whole life. Not even paid personnel understand that one. I figured at my age I was entitled to some help cleaning this house. A lot with two cats, one bird and one husband doing their best to make dust and crumbs etc. ...

I read a lot. I am a valuable source of useless information. It’s a dirty job but somebody has to do it. Well I noticed an article I just read about dead butt syndrome. That’s a new one for me. Apparently it’s a real thing and hundreds of Americans suffer from it. It comes from sitting on your butt all the time. I wish I knew about this when I was raising my kids. That may have scared them more than telling them if they don’t eat their vegetables they will get into trouble because there are kids starving in China. If I could have told my kids... If you don't get off your butt and do something your butt could be frozen! Now that could scare a kid. It even scares me. What about all these kids who incessantly play games on their phone. I’ve heard of kids going to parties and sitting next to each other all while still transfixed on their phones. We’re raising a generation of kids that do not know how to engage in conversation with each other. ...

So our beloved cockatiel died a few months ago at age 26. In the words of my son, our bird had a good West County life. However, my husband began missing his little friend. He was the only one in the house that actually listened to him and talked back. We have three cats so we really weren’t planning on acquiring another two-winged friend. But the house was so quiet. We missed his chirping.   Our bird was always happy to see us.   He loved it when we came home from shopping or dinner with friends. He could hear us pulling into the driveway and would start chirping before we even got our car into the garage. Unlike our kids, he always was welcoming to his parents. We enjoyed him so much that we decided to get another one, a cockatiel. So we decided to visit a pet shop. A friend had given us our first bird, so going through a pet store would be a whole new experience. After doing some research we found a shop that sold all sorts of birds. They...

I thought by the time women started designing fashions for other women the cruelty would be gone. When they first came out I realized pantyhose had to be designed by a man. I was so thrilled when people stopped wearing those disgusting things. I never could get a pair of pantyhose to fit my long legs. If they were long enough they were baggy. If you were lucky enough to get a pair that actually fit they would get a run the first time you would wear them. I would rather freeze to death in a pair of heels then wear those things. Enough said about that. I won’t talk about bygone days. Remember when those poor women had to wear the lace up girdles? In the movies they show their servants pulling them so tight the woman would lose about 4 inches or more in their waist. Studies show that those women suffered from lots of internal issues later in life. I had worn little panty girdles back in the day to hold my then thin tummy in. That seemed to work well. Then...

I have to admit the first time I saw Alexa she didn't look like she could become my best friend. In fact I couldn't figure out what she was at all. I was at my kids’ house and saw my son and my granddaughter talking to this thing on the counter in the kitchen. I thought they had both lost their minds. When she talked back to them I thought I lost my mind. I thought this was the stupidest thing that has ever been invented. Why do you need somebody to help you play your music? Has the world gotten so lazy that you can't put a CD on your CD player or turn the radio on? I forgot all about Alexa until my son, the main gadget guru in the family, got us an Amazon Echo Dot for Hanukkah, a few years ago. I thought what in the heck am I going to do with that round circle thing that when you plug-it in it lights up. I remember years ago when my brother and I got my mother a microwave and she refused to use it. She used it as a bread box for years unt...

An old cat lady, me? Nah! My mother told me cats were nasty animals that they were dirty and they scratched people. I had that fear my whole childhood… and beyond. When my kids were young, and we lived in an apartment, they begged me for a pet. Our bird had died and a lot of the people in the apartments had cats because they were inside animals. Dogs were not allowed. We were offered a baby cat when the kids were little, and we adopted her. We named her Sugar and she was a sweetheart, at least in the beginning. I figured I wouldn't get attached to this thing because my mother made me scared to death of them. I thought I could feed her and she would be the kids pet. Well I learned very quickly that you don't adopt a cat, they adopt you. And the more you don't like them the more they want you. Sugar became my cat very quickly. She slept with me, she followed me around, and, if anybody got to close to me, she growled and whacked them. Before lo...