Arkansas Times

October 01, 2009 News » The Observer

The Observer, Oct. 1

by Arkansas Times Staff

The mortgage crisis isn't just affecting people. Fifteen cats in Heber Springs are homeless because their owner's house was foreclosed on.

There were 16 cats at the house, living on a screened-in porch “so they could get some air,” the FuRR (feline rescue and rehome) e-mail from Gloria B. Lane that went out over the weekend says. (Probably gave the upside-down homeowner some air as well.) One cat, a 13-year-old, is being taken in by FuRR person, but the rest are being boarded in a Heber Springs vet (at FuRR expense) until they can be adopted out. The cats — who include Ozzie, a 20-pounder, and Zoey, an 18-pounder, both 8 years old — are “big, fat, healthy, lovable pets,” the e-mail says.

“This is not the first time we've worked on placing cats from a foreclosure … sigh,” Lane writes. Number to call in case you're interested in putting a fat cat right-side up again: 416-7547.

Speaking of pets, Les Garlinghouse's Red Bone, Mojo, has gone on to hound heaven. A native of Izard County, she'd retired to North Carolina. She was 13 and a half.

Garlinghouse says Mojo once treed a raccoon in New Jersey during their time there and that he took the opportunity to tell the Yankee children who'd gathered around about hounds and how they live for tracking scents. He talked about “Where the Red Fern Grows” and those dogs, but the literature lesson didn't impress the parents of the kids, who'd come out to get rid of the dangerous dog.

Garlinghouse, suspecting, correctly, that the shaking treed raccoon was rabid and not just quaking at the sight of Mojo, convinced the parents to send the raccoon away with animal control instead of Mojo.

The raccoon disposed of, “Mojo and I casually walked away. It was then that we noticed my ‘Cotham's in the City' T-shirt. On the front in big bold letters it reads: “YEA I'M FROM ARKANSAS” and on the back in the same fashion it asks the question “WHAT ABOUT IT?”

Those Jersey kids are still talking about Mojo, that good ole Arkansas hound, what do you bet?

Now up in Eureka Springs it would take more than a slobbering hound to get the attention of the residents. The Observer was there over the weekend, enjoying the blue sky and sweater weather and sights. Lotsa motorcycles, the overflow from Fayetteville's bikes, broads and brews or whatever it's called chopperpalooza. Lotsa tourists (Do the tourists come stay in these cute houses so they can look at the other tourists in the cute houses? Our new-to-Eureka friend asked), lotsa cars, lotsa buzz. (Lotsa houses for sale too, in case you want to get in the B and B business.) We ate on a patio bridging a creek down on Main Street and watched an ice-damaged red bud tree fall down right in front of us. No problem! The cook, in a black apron that touched the ground and a wife beater, ran out with a hacksaw and took the tree apart, limb by limb, while we ate our sandwich. Maybe he was a butcher before he was a cook. Luckily, it was early and business hadn't heated up. He'd just gotten the tree down when a party of 8 showed up.

The Observer was walking in to the grocery store last week when we saw local punk-rocker Ace Spade pull up in his infamous hearse. He got out of the death-mobile wearing big black boots, black jeans, a black T-shirt with cut-off sleeves and black spiked hair shooting toward the sky. In his hand, he held a crumpled-up shopping list.

According to this guy's image, you would think that he subsists on the carcasses of decaying rats found outside the grittiest bars in town, or that he feasts on the souls of yuppies who unexpectedly wander into his shows.

But now we understand that even goth punk-rockers have to go to the grocery store. The thought of Ace strolling through the isles of the local Kroger and picking up a tub of I Can't Believe It's Not Butter was, well, hard to believe.

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