old ladies :)

Dog was just seeing if the facial flesh was still tender enough to eat.

she's awesome! and Pickles is adorable! This 80th birthday celebration is motivation to live a healthy life so I can do this for my 80th. (it's not as cute do celebrate your 31st like this)

Thanks David, this is the first thing to make me smile on Slog in a while.

Now let's get the comments back to telling each other to fuck off.

@4: Fuck off.

What an old freaky-deaky.

i love her

Her husband did the same thing for his birthday at the Children's Hands-on Museum.

When my family celebrated my great-aunt's 80th Birthday, she kept forgetting what day it was. She said the cake tasted like ash, and the ice cream was too cold. Your dog looks like Kurt from Glee.

I guess I'm a morose son of a bitch. Other sloggers thought this was such a happy and uplifting little story. And I guess it is insofar as the old lady sounds happy and this is what she wanted to do. But I couldn't help but think, doesn't she have a family of her own? no kids, siblings, nephews or nieces, husband/wife/life partner? Is she all alone on her birthday and her only way to celebrate is to walk around a park by herself telling strangers that it's her birthday? If she likes dogs so much, why doesn't she have her own? Is she living in an assisted living home complex where she can't have a dog and has no friends or family to visit her? This depressed me severely.

aw, cheer up @10 - the dog park is a happy place for dog lovers, whether or not they have one of their own. i'd totally spend the alone portion of my birthday (or any day) there - it wouldn't be due to not having a family or friends to spend another part of the day with. it's a happy and endearing story.

Maybe her family is a bunch of hateful people and she doesn't want to be around them. I've seen very few hateful dogs, many fewer than the hateful I deal with regularly. My dogs don't judge me, play games or depress me like my family does. They just want a bowl of food and some ball throwing and they love me unconditionally. This old lady knows what's up.

@12, I hate to break this to you, but you wouldn't believe the terrible things your dogs say about you behind your back.

@5280-

Thanks for re-affirming my belief in Sloggers. 20 minutes for the reply tho, you're slacking. Try putting down the bong for 5 seconds.

how the fuck did somebody build a time machine to 50 years from now? tell me, how did i look on my 80th birthday?

love,
#1 dog hag.

I agree - this seems extremely sad to me. Even if she was given a less than stellar biological family (as I was) you can create a family of your choosing (and fill it with spectacular, loving, inspiring people) and spend time with them. While Pickles could put a smile on nearly anyone's face, I hope I have SOMEbody to celebrate 80 years with. Or maybe the sadness isn't for her at all; it's the thought that I very well could be completely alone at 80. Sads.

Happy Birthday from afar little lady! I truly hope you have a beautiful day.

Awwww, this is a great story David, Jake and Pickles.

Now for some more good news (I'm not sure why Dan didn't post this update I sent him) but the CLAY GREENE case has been settled. Just in time as it turns out, Clay is now in a nursing home and never thought he would get this small amount of justice.

http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/201…

The last line of this article says it all:

"Marital status played a role in what options were available to them".

Clay and Harold thought they had all of the right paperwork in place for just this kind of emergency and Harold still died alone without Clay by his side.

Rest in Peace Harold and Happy Trails to you Clay.

@10 & 16: don't be such crepe hangers. Isn't it conceivable that she had other plans on the day, as well? We should all hope to be as spry and open to life as she at 80.

Also, just confirmed with Jake, and she wasn't there alone—she was with someone, and just lacked her own dog.

@17, as I commented on Sunday's Morning News:

...I still feel sad and empty about this. About all the settlement will do is pay Clay's living expenses for now, and nursing-home bills later if needed (which Medicaid would have done eventually anyway), and that just means some other services will be cut somewhere else. The emotional trauma is irreparable, and the home they built together along with all their treasured memorabilia from a lifetime of work are gone forever. Nothing about criminal charges for those who profited from the sale of their possessions. This is truly lipstick on a pig.

Except that the nursing-home expense is right now. No mention of what the lawyers' percentage was (no disrespect intended; they have bills to pay too, and the entity that arranged representation seems awesome and praiseworthy). Nursing home charges can exceed $7000/month. Hospital procedures and extracurricular activities may be extra.

Rob @20, I didn't see any of the posts on Sunday since SLOG was messed up so I didn't know that this had already been reported. One of the articles I read stated that the attorney fees were about $300,000. of the settlement. It said Clay misses his cats so much that he plans on leaving whatever is left when he passes to Animal Charities.

Thanks for the info, @21. It actually wasn't in any Sunday news items on Slog; Kim in Portland in a comments thread gave this link.

The $300k remaining for Clay's benefit will likely be depleted all too soon. I would love to give my annual charitable donation to LGBTQ legal aid, animal-welfare or shelter charities active in the area where Clay and Harold lived, or near where Clay now lives in a care facility, in honor of their relationship, their losses, and Clay's enduring concerns. Maybe the Bilerico Project or Kate Kendell can help with this. If I can gather any useful info, I'll SlogTip it and cc Dan.

Oh, Pickles!

Some winter apparel for Pickles, to make the other dogs jealous:
http://www.etsy.com/shop/BeanTownHandmad…

There's a lady who wanders Lafayette Park in San Francisco who always asks to kiss my dog.

awesome, just awesome