It's Friday and lots of readers are still on their holiday breaks.
We're trying to take things a little leisurely here at Readlarrypowell.com, too.
It's our new lifestyle.
Not sure how long it'll last. Something's got to give on the insomnia front -- on the diet front, on the exercise front, on the financial front, on the 
writing front, etc. But, why put extra pressure on ourselves today when we already pressure ourselves year-round?
Please join me in a relaxing sigh: "Ahhhhhhhhh." Feel better? Once again. There.
I should have a new book out by next Christmas: "The Sighs of Texas: How To Relax When You're Tight As a Tick on a Fat Dog." This cat, Annabelle Bob, a Texas native blessed with the gift of relaxation, will write the foreward.
If I don't finish that book, don't fret. I'm prone to easy distraction. That, also, is my lifestyle.
SOME VIEWING AND READING TIPS: A loyal reader has a viewing tip, suggesting that we catch Dogtown, a new series about Best Friends Animal Sanctuary beginning Jan. 4 on cable's National Geographic Channel. Link up HERE. ... And The Los Angeles Times has a report on how cities are trying birth control to manage the messes made by urban wildlife -- pigeons and squirrels. That link is HERE. ... I'm trying to avoid ugly news stories this week -- reading them or writing them. Foolish idea in this world, but that's my goal. I have a feeling I'll be able to catch up on the world's ugliness pretty quickly in early 2008.
WHAT THIS DOG GOT FOR CHRISTMAS: This dog got left behind for Christmas.
The story comes from Terry Lynn Fisher, our tireless monitor of animal activities in the little town of Burns Flat, Okla.
She got a call "from a couple who asked if I could help with a dog the people across the street left behind before Christmas. They had watched the people move out and never really thought about the dog -- until they heard him crying in the snow one night.
"This big brown boy is as good as gold. House-broken, loving, gets along with the couples' three dogs and is very well-mannered."
The year-old dog -- probably a Lab or Lab mix -- has "that wonderful Lab temperament."
He's available -- ask about him via Terry Lynn at [email protected].
The Burns Flat animal shelter is "slowly filing up after Christmas," she writes, "I am begging everyone to look to see if there is any room anywhere to take one...two..three...They just keep coming and there is nowhere for them to go."
This brown dog, she says, "has a wonderful attitude. I don't want to see his attitude change because he was left behind."
AN ADOPTION AT YEAR'S END: Caroline Parkhill of A Different Breed rescue notes that "we typically don't' have an adopt-a-pet the weekend prior to New Year's Eve/Day." But this year, the fosters are so proud of their critters that they "wanted to show off their pets one more time."
You can see these adoptables from noon to 4 p.m. Saturday at A Different Breed's storefront in the Pepper Square Shopping Center on the southeast corner of Preston and Beltline in North Dallas.
WHAT HAPPENED AT THE DENTIST'S OFFICE: Referring to yesterday's report here at Readlarrypowell.com, there was no knockout pill administered at the dentist's office. No actual dental work other than some gum-probing with a device that looks like a thing you'd use to pick pecan meat from a stubborn hull. Why no dental work? Blood pressure was too high. I'm working on that. Lots of factors to defeat. Lack of money, fear of dentist, obesity, lifetime spent sitting at a desk, insomnia, poor nutrition, lousy exercise habits, etc. Didn't get this way overnight, can't repair it all overnight. OK, time to unwind. Just my luck. I'm a wind-up Baby Boomer in a digital world.
