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Letter to the editor

Today's Letters: Christmas a good time to give bicycle as a gift

Christmas is coming, and people are being eaten alive by housing costs, car insurance, car payments, car repairs, gas, increasing prices at stores and other woes.

So if you don't know what to get the people on your Christmas list, it's a good time to buy them all bicycles, helmets, water bottles, bike lights, and one or two hefty bike locks. Go to the bike shop before Dec. 9 so the owner has time to order if your choice is out of stock.

Bike shop employees can provide suggestions if you need to learn to bicycle or if a tandem, recumbent, handcycle, or other bike type might be needed due to physical disabilities or to improve comfort.

Biking provides time to interact with your children absent electronic media because it's illegal to bike while wearing headphones. Bicycles are also transportation to work.

In addition, you'll be giving your children their first road lessons so they will be prepared for operating a motor vehicle. Educational material can be found at: www.floridabicycle.org/resources/freelit.html.

Kimberly Cooper, St. Petersburg

So many acts of kindness

I must tell someone how impressed I am with the kindnesses I experienced during a two-hour shopping trip to buy a large bed-topper and cover.

I am a small, but active, female senior citizen who was trying to place a large, awkward, heavy box onto a shopping cart. A kind young man - a customer - came to my rescue. After waiting in the checkout line for several long minutes, a kind woman allowed me to precede her.

In the parking lot, another woman with two or three children came to my assistance and placed the heavy merchandise into my vehicle. Overwhelmed with the experience of so much goodness, I gave her a big hug.

After I rolled the cartons out of the car, end over end, to my condo entrance, a resident (whom I had never met) took the heavy merchandise all the way to my second-floor door.

In the words of Louis Armstrong - "And I think to myself, what a wonderful world."

Bette Fennell, Treasure Island

Pack of aggressive dogs may be area's cat killers Nov. 18, story

Keep cats alive - inside

How sad that a mom has to explain what happened to the family cat when it could have been avoided. To me, the definition of "outdoor cat" is one owned by someone too lazy to deal with a litter box. The cat is let out to be exposed to infected feral cats, fleas, cars, sadistic kids and - pit bulls.

If you don't care what happens to an animal, don't take it on as a pet and then blame its death on something other than yourself.

Pat C. Martin, St. Petersburg

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[Last modified November 27, 2007, 21:53:07]