So the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is demanding that Poland’s Association of Folk Artists stop giving out what it calls the “People’s Oskar.”

Waldemar Majcher of the Association of Folk Artists said Monday the dispute is the result a misunderstanding. But he also questioned Hollywood’s demand.

Majcher said the “People’s Oskar,” was named after Oskar Kolberg, a 19th-century Polish ethnographer who wrote some 10,000 Polish folk songs. Still remembered and respected in Poland, Kolberg died in 1890.

In its 10-year history, the “People’s Oskar” — a metal plaque with an engraved image of Jesus — has been awarded to individual artists, museums, folk festivals and even a bread fair.

Last week, Majcher said, he received a letter from Polish lawyers representing the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences protesting the use of the name “Oscar” in its Polish spelling “Oskar.”

The letter from Wardynski and Partners — which Majcher read to The Associated Press — demands the Association of Folk Artists stop using that name and said the academy had obtained protection of the “Oscar” trademark in Poland in a law adopted in 2000.

The letter said the “verbal trademark Oscar … is inseparably associated with the Academy Awards.”

“The letter gave us a scare, but we are receiving plenty of encouragement from people,” Majcher said, adding that in some ways members of his association are impressed that “such a big institution got interested in our modest project.”

He said a team of lawyers is preparing a response defending the use of the name People’s Oskar.

Do następnego razu… (Till next time…)

Article source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/PolishBlog/~3/Mlsso5CCCes/

In September 1851, an apostle, a mission president, a missionary and two converts came together to translate and publish the first edition of the Book of Mormon in German.

Elder John Taylor had just supervised the translation of the Book of Mormon into French. He planned to return home when he received a letter from Brigham Young asking him to remain in Europe another year. He recorded in his journal, “It immediately occurred to my mind to go to Germany.”

Elder Taylor, who would become the third president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, came to England to find a member who could assist in the translation, but had no success. What he did learn was that George P. Dykes, a Scandanavian missionary, knew the German language, and he sent word for Dykes to meet him in Hamburg.

They met there in September 1851. Elder Taylor, who had come by way of Paris, introduced Dykes to German school teacher George Viett, who joined the church in France, and the translation work began. The trio also engaged in missionary work and baptized a man named John Miller, who joined in the translation team.

The work went well at first. Elder Taylor asked some of the best professors in Hamburg to review their work, and only a few corrections were made.

But when threatened with arrest, Elder Taylor left Germany with the translation only half done. But he had planned ahead. Before initially going to Germany, he had asked President Young to send Daniel Carn, a German convert in the United States, to Germany to be a mission president and assist in the translation work. Elder Taylor met Carn in London and sent him on to Hamburg. He arrived in April 1852. President Carn, Dykes, Viett and Miller finished the project in May.

The first German edition and the second printing of the French translation were published side by side, because those were the two main languages spoken in Hamburg. Separate copies of each language translation were also printed.

Many additional German editions of the Book of Mormon were printed over the next century. Jean Wunderlich, Max Zimmer and Immo Luschin helped prepare revised editions from 1959 and 1979. Luschin, who spoke several languages, served in the German army before joining the LDS Church. Before his death in 1998, he served as a translator and president of the Bern Switzerland Temple.

Counting the first edition in 1852, a total of some 39 different printings have appeared. The most recent revision took place in 2003.

Source: Information for this article came from Gilbert W. Scharffs’ article, “Das Buch Mormon: The German Translation of the Book of Mormon,” Maxwell Institute, 2002.

Email: ttoone@desnews.com Twitter: tbtoone

Article source: http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865550546/Book-of-Mormon-translation-German.html

Nokia Lumia 800 app: RAC Traffic Windows Phone review

One thing we’re shamefully inept at when compared to our European neighbours is speaking languages other than our own.

You only have to walk down a German straße or a Dutch straat and ask a random passer-by in English how they think the weather will turn out and you’ll probably get a startlingly articulate reply in their second tongue. Meanwhile most of us can’t even ask for a drink in another language without collapsing into nervous giggles.

Apps like Babylon Translator might be a bit of a plaster over our gaping ignorance, but they sure are useful. Acting as a powerful multi-lingual pocket-assistant, it should certainly be considered by any Nokia Lumia 800 owners about to set off on their holidays with a poor grasp on the local dialect.

It’s pretty easy to use, too. Open Babylon Translator up and you’ll be greeted by a Term search field, along with a larger results field and four language tabs. This means you can type in an English word and get a translation in four languages simultaneously – handy for those awkward hostelling moments.

There are issues here, however. While it’s simple enough to get a direct translation for languages using the same alphabet, try translating a word into a language that uses another character set, such as Japanese or Chinese, and you’ll get a completely useless direct translation. There’s no romanisation feature here, so rather than getting a ‘Konnichiwa’ – the Japanese for hello spelt out in phonetic English – you get the original Japanese characters for the word.

There’s also a niggle that can’t even be explained away under the banner of the more difficult languages. While you get the precise translation for words as long as they’re in the Latin alphabet, you don’t always get extra help. Babylon Translator will also pull in extra information on each word from a variety of sources, including language guides and Wikipedia. The only trouble is, many of these are written in the native language, which means they’re very little help for English speakers.

More useful is the full text translation tool, which lets you type in whole passages of text and have it translated into any one of the more than 75 languages on offer here. Well, we say that, but again the app has trouble with non-romanised languages. While we’re picking fault, Babylon Translator could also use a pronunciation function that doesn’t just show you how the translations are written, but actually speaks the words to help with your pronunciation.

There is a handy currency and measurement translator here, but the important part is undoubtedly the language translation element, and on that front Babylon Translator isn’t quite firing on all cylinders just yet. Still, it is handy as a rudimentary translation tool covering a number of European languages – especially considering it’s free on the Windows Phone Marketplace.

Our advice is to download Babylon Translator and keep an eye on those update notification – a few decent updates could raise it to greatness.

Article source: http://www.noknok.tv/2012/02/22/nokia-lumia-800-app-babylon-translator-review/

With all the new developments and increasing accessibility of electronic translation tools such as machine translations, some have argued that these technologies will eventually replace the human translator. Are human translators really essential for the language translation process, or can their labor be simplified and processed by a machine?

 Researchers have been working for decades in order to establish computer systems capable of translating from one natural language to another. These systems do so by essentially deconstructing the components of the text such as the punctuation marks, recognized idioms, single word terminology, and sentence structure and then reconstructing these elements in the target language by applying specific linguistic rules and “learning” from already existing translations.

 This all sounds promising, but we are forgetting that languages are filled with ambiguities and complex rules that not even a computer can successfully resolve. As all translators know, the process of translation involves much more than simply replacing the source word with the target language word. This process involves using cultural, grammatical, syntactic and semantic knowledge in order to interpret the real meaning and ensure that it makes sense to native readers.

Translation is often noted as one of the oldest vocation in human history. Since the beginning of time, humans have sought ways to communicate across cultures and language.  Today global trade is at its pinnacle and the amount of content being produced for global audiences is massive. Never before has there been such a content demand driving the need for low cost, automated translation. 

 With open source initiatives, Google influence and new technology, why haven’t we perfected machine translation?  Or, have we?  

 How exactly does it work?

MT is the process by which computer software is used to translate text from one natural language to another. In order for any translation, human or machine, to be successful, the meaning of the text in the original source language must be fully restored in the target language.

Although this sounds straightforward, it is actually much more complex as translation is not simply word‐for‐word substitution. The machine must interpret and analyze all the features of a text including grammar, semantics, syntax and culture in order to effectively convey the meaning and intention of the text as a whole.

 Different models and their applications

1. Stand alone- pure machine translation which is set up on a series of rules that you enter to “train” your engine to understand your corpus -a large body of reference content that the machine learns from.  There are several  methods  or MT engine types including:

•   – Rule-based model – A rule based machine translation system consists of collection of rules called grammar rules, lexicon and software programs to process the rules. It is extensible and maintainable. Rule based approach is the first strategy ever developed in the field of machine translation. Rules are written with linguistic knowledge gathered from linguists.
•  - Statistical model – Statistical machine translation starts with a very large data set of good translations which have already been translated into multiple languages, and then uses those texts to automatically infer a statistical model of translation. That statistical model is then applied to new texts to make a guess as to a reasonable translation.
•  - Hybrid model– The hybrid model leverages the strengths of statistical and rule-based translation methodologies.  The approaches differ in a number of ways:

 - -Rules post-processed by statistics: Translations are performed using a rules based engine. Statistics are then used in an attempt to adjust/correct the output from the rules engine.

•  - -Statistics guided by rules: Rules are used to pre-process data in an attempt to better guide the statistical engine. Rules are also used to post-process the statistical output to perform functions such as normalization. This approach has a lot more power, flexibility and control when translating.

 2. Integrated- Machine translation with human post-editing – Integrating machine translation with a (human) translation based workflow can increase your productivity significantly and even improve the results coming from machine translation.

• How good is it?

Machine translation quality is getting better.  The quality varies considerably by language pair, translation engine and the degree to which the engine is trained.  Training the engine costs money and requires a lot of sample content to build a corpus. Although it is possible to get the machine to a very high level of output, the cost to achieve 100% human level quality, in most cases, is an expense that outweighs the effort.

Machine translation is coming into its own as a practical aide to translation. On its own it is still not suited for publication without human revision and post-editing. More commonly, it is used by companies that are looking for an instant gist of a document or to get a non-human translation for documents that only require a ‘good enough’ translation.

Why haven’t we mastered it?

Most of Americans speak only one language, English. And most of us have forgotten the rules of grammar – proper tenses, prepositions and punctuation.  We speak and write from habit.  Without knowledge of another language we may not know that there are many differences in the grammar.  Some have additional gender rules, cases, classifiers, formal and informal structure and other elements that differ from English.  

Google Translate and other free online translation tools can be great for instant, informal translation. When expectations are properly set, particularly for low-value text, unedited machine translation can be quite useful. However, when a user overestimates machine translation capabilities, the results can be confusing at best.

For instance, when one online machine translation tool apparently mistranslated a common Chinese word as “Wikipedia,” Chinese menus began popping up everywhere with English translations for menu items like “stir-fried Wikipedia” and “barbecued Congo eel with Wikipedia and fermented bean curd.” Though odd, the error is relatively harmless. However, when the text has important implications in law, finance or marketing, the results can be terribly costly.

You have a need for it. How do you buy it?

So you’ve determined you have a need for machine translation.  You’ve concluded that the content requiring translation does not warrant the high-price, 100% perfect human translation, and that you are fine with lower quality.  So, how do you go about setting this up or buying it?  Here are four ways to get started ranging from free to very expensive.

1. Do it yourself via the Internet.  You can run machine translation through a web-based tool like Google. Typically the number of characters allowed is limited and the quality varies by language pair and subject matter.

• Pros.  it’s usually free                    
• Cons. Limited number of words you can translate at a time
• Quality:  Low to medium  (BLEU score range)
•  
• 2. Build your own.   Moses open source code is available to anyone to build a translation engine.  (include url to site) This undertaking is not for the faint of heart and requires not only skilled engineers and linguists, but lots and lots of content to train the engine.
• Pros.  A very cost-effective way to manage high volumes of translation in-house.            
• Cons.  Time consuming and an upfront investment required in engineering and talent to get started.
• Quality:  Low to 100%. It’s really dependent upon on how well you train your engine and control your content.
•  
• 3. Buy a commercial tool.  Companies like Systran and WordMagic offer translation software by language pair.  Features of the software allow you to train the engine and customize. They are typically rule-based.
• Pros.  A very cost-effective way to get started for in-house use.               
• Cons.  Time consuming and an upfront investment required in engineering and talent to get started.
• Quality:  Low to 100%. It’s really dependent upon on how well you train your engine and control your content.
•  

4. Contact a Language Service Provider.  An increasing number of language service providers are offering this service in conjunction with their own tools and will work with you to build and train the engine.  Often, the output is matched with human editing to achieve the desired level of quality required.  

• Pros.   Expertise and consultation provided across many languages and subject matter. Hybrid and human editing services also available.  
• Cons.  Upfront investment required, although most likely less than if you build your own.
• Quality:  Medium to high.  Again, this is heavily influenced by how well the engine is trained to your subject matter, but an agency can help to make this possible and bring the value of its own tools and content.

In the end, machine translations offer an attractive package for users, ensuring instant turnaround times and a systematic and consistent approach when handling translations. However, we must consider that while the process of human translations is much slower in this sense, only humans can determine the suitability of a translation for a particular audience, culture and make linguistic and style choices based on experience instead of a database.

Article source: http://www.b2bmarketing.net/blog/posts/2012/02/22/translation-new-millennium-i-translator

Today I wanted to tell you a little more about taxes in Poland, since the system is slightly different than in USA.

An individual pays tax on his income as a wage earner or as a self-employed person. The tax for an individual who meets the criteria of a “permanent resident” in Poland will be calculated on his income in Poland and abroad. A foreign resident who is employed in Poland pays tax only on his income earned in Poland.

An individual is a Polish resident if the center of life is in Poland , or if staying in Poland more than 183 days in a fiscal year. An employer is obligated to deduct, immediately on a monthly basis, the tax payable on an employee’s salary. A self-employed person must prepay income tax that will be offset on filing an annual return. The advance payment is determined on the basis of the return made for the previous year. In the event of a new business, the advance will be calculated on the basis of estimates made by the owner of the business.

Poland Individual income tax rates 2011:

Tax Base (PLN) Tax %

1 -85,528 18%

85,528 and over 32% of base exceeding PLN 85,528

Poland Capital Gains

In general, there is no special tax rate for capital gains in Poland. Capital gains are usually added to the regular income of an individual/company and based on the normal tax rates.

Despite this, if real estate is sold by an individual more than 5 years after it was purchased the capital gain is exempt from tax. Sale within 5 years from the date of purchase is taxed at 19%.

Individual’s capital gain from sale of shares is taxed at a final tax rate of 19%.

In Poland dividend and interest income for individuals is taxed at 19% rate.

Reporting Dates Payment Dates in Poland

The tax year in Poland is the calendar year ending on December 31.

An Individual -An individual whose income is from a salary only is not obliged to file an annual return.

The employer who deducts income tax from the employee transfers the tax to the tax authorities each month.

An individual who is self-employed is obliged to make 11 monthly advance payments.

Each advance must be made by the 20th day of any month for the previous month (in December, an advance is paid for both November and December).

The date for filing the annual return is April 30.

A Company -Payment of advances on tax is similar in the case of a limited company to that of the individual.

The company is obliged to file an estimated return to the tax authorities by March 31, and to pay the difference in the tax.

The latest date for filing an annual return is September 30 (for the previous year).

Poland Corporate Tax

Poland’s corporate tax for the year 2011 is 19%.

A company is a Polish resident if registered in Poland, or managing its activities in Poland.

I moved out of Poland while still in school, so I’m not sure how smoothly the whole process of filing tax returns is…

Maybe someone can share it with us?

Do następnego razu… (Till next time…)

Article source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/PolishBlog/~3/vYvNSB24LAg/

Article source: http://polish-interpreting.co.uk/2012/02/20/tax-laws-in-poland/

Article source: http://polish-interpreting.co.uk/2012/02/20/tax-laws-in-poland-polish-interpreting-services-and-interpreters/

The following pączki recipe is one that I have come up with by trying different ones in Polish cookbooks. This is the hard part of writing down a yeast recipe. I watched my mom so much that I knew what that dough should be like. If you have never made yeast dough before, just knead and add flour until the dough becomes easy to handle, but not tough.

A plate of donuts with steaming coffee, tea, or chocolate will delight everyone. Anytime from now until hot weather is good pączki weather, so try them now.

Good luck!

Prep Time: 45 minutes

Cook Time: 6 minutes

2 rises: 3 hours

Total Time: 3 hours, 51 minutes

Makes 2 dozen

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups warm milk (no warmer than 110 degrees)

2 packages active dry yeast (remember to proof yeast before you begin)

1/2 cup sugar

4 ounces (1 stick) room-temperature butter

1 large room-temperature egg

3 large room-temperature egg yolks

1 tablespoon brandy or rum

1 teaspoon salt

4 1/2 to 5 cups all-purpose flour

1 gallon oil for deep frying

Granulated sugar (optional)

Confectioner’s sugar (optional)

Fruit paste for filling (optional)

Preparation:

Add yeast to warm milk, stir to dissolve and set aside. In a large bowl or stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together sugar and butter until fluffy. Beat in eggs, brandy and salt until well-incorporated.

Still using the paddle attachment, add 4 1/2 cups flour alternately with the milk-yeast mixture and beat for 5 or more minutes by machine and longer by hand until smooth.  If too soft, add remaining 1/2 cup flour, but no more.

Place dough in a greased bowl. Cover and let rise until doubled in bulk, anywhere from 1 to 2 1/2 hours. Punch down and let rise again.

Turn dough out onto lightly floured surface. Pat or roll to 1/2-inch thickness. Cut rounds with 3-inch biscuit cutter. Remove scraps, and re-roll and re-cut. Cover and let rounds rise until doubled in bulk, 30 minutes or longer.

Heat oil to 350 degrees in large skillet or Dutch oven. Place pączki top-side down (the dry side) in the oil a few at a time and fry 2 to 3 minutes or until bottom is golden brown. Flip them over and fry another 1 to 2 minutes or until golden brown. Make sure the oil doesn’t get too hot so the exterior doesn’t brown before the interior is done. Test a cool one to make sure it’s cooked through. Adjust cooking time and oil heat accordingly.

Drain pączki on paper towels or brown paper bags, and roll in granulated sugar while still warm. Note: You can poke a hole in the side of the pączki and, using a pastry bag, squeeze in a dollop of the filling of choice. Then dust filled pączki with granulated sugar, confectioners’ sugar or glaze.

Smacznego!

Do następnego razu… (Till next time…)

Article source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/PolishBlog/~3/RWUTZ7uxSIU/

Sajan Inc. 
 

Sajan Inc.
Latest from The Business Journals
Sajan completes sale of technology Sajan reports wider net lossSajan names new CFO

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, a River Falls provider of language translation software, swung to a profit for the fourth quarter on the sale of intellectual property and an increase in revenue.

Article source: http://www.bizjournals.com/milwaukee/news/2012/02/21/sajan-reports-fourth-quarter-profit.html

Article source: http://polish-interpreting.co.uk/2012/02/21/sajan-reports-fourth-quarter-profit/

Sajan Inc. 
 

Sajan Inc.
Latest from The Business Journals
Sajan completes sale of technology Sajan reports wider net lossSajan names new CFO

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, a River Falls provider of language translation software, swung to a profit for the fourth quarter on the sale of intellectual property and an increase in revenue.

Sajan (OTCBB: SAJA) reported net income for the fourth quarter of 2011 of $226,000, or 1 cent per share. The company posted a gain of $550,000 on the sale of patents. In the same period a year ago, Sajan posted a net loss of $420,000, or 3 cents per share. Fourth-quarter revenue increased 15 percent to $5.1 million from $4.4 million.

Sajan said it ended the year with net income of $67,000, which compares with a net loss of $3 million in 2010. Earnings per share broke even in 2011 from a 20 cents per share, the year before. Revenue was up 31 percent to $20.9 million from $16 million in 2010.

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Article source: http://www.bizjournals.com/milwaukee/news/2012/02/21/sajan-reports-fourth-quarter-profit.html

REDMOND, Wash., Feb. 21, 2012 /PRNewswire via COMTEX/ –
In recognition of International Mother Language Day, Microsoft Corp., a strong supporter of language preservation, today highlighted the company’s Local Language Program (LLP), which enables the development of custom language translation. LLP enables 1.7 billion people worldwide to access technology in their own language, while striving to preserve those local languages and cultural identities.

In many parts of the world, technology has transformed the way people and businesses share and use information, improved the way children and adults learn, and helped governments address social and economic issues in ways never before imagined. Languages play an important role in the integration process in all aspects of life, education and the local economies.

“Providing technology in a native language is critical to helping people access the tools they need to create better economic opportunities,” said Anthony Salcito, vice president of Worldwide Education at Microsoft. “Language preservation and support also help preserve cultural identities for the next generation of learners.”

Microsoft’s services and products focusing on the importance of language and culture through the LLP include the following:

Localized versions of Windows and Microsoft Office are available in 37 languages.

Nearly 100 languages are supported by Language Interface Packs through free downloads for Windows, Office and Visual Studio.

The Microsoft Terminology Collection provides uniformity of meaning to IT terms translated to the local language.

Microsoft Translator allows users to translate text and Web pages in 37 languages.

Microsoft Tellme, a speech recognition platform, works across multiple platforms simplifying everyday tasks.

The Microsoft Language Development Center works on many services, such as speech synthesis technology for under-resourced languages. In addition, through extensive research and development, it creates language opportunities for people worldwide with disabilities.

For people to experience the benefits of technology, they must have access to the technology and the skills to use it. In Spain, the Local Language Program has developed Windows and Office in Basque, Valencian, Catalan and Galician. Now, citizens throughout the country have access to technology in their native language and not only Spanish. This impact can provide greater economic opportunities to generations young and old.

“We loved the fact that Microsoft offers software in Valencian because it gives our students the ability to use their native tongue in a modern context,” said Francisco Masquefa, director of the Albal Institut in Valencia, Spain. “The availability of these the programs in our native language shows that Microsoft is truly committed to helping local communities sustain cultural traditions — while supporting advancement through technology.”

About Local Language Program

Microsoft is committed to helping people worldwide benefit from technology while striving to uphold local language and cultural identity. Representing this commitment, the Local Language Program is a global initiative that provides people access to technology in a familiar language while respecting linguistic and cultural distinctions. Through this program, Microsoft bridges languages, cultures and technology to empower individuals in local communities to create economic opportunities, build technology skills, enhance education outcomes, and sustain their local language and culture for future generations. More information on LLP is available at
http://www.microsoft.com/LLP .

About Microsoft

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq “MSFT”) is the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions that help people and businesses realize their full potential.

SOURCE Microsoft Corp.

Copyright (C) 2012 PR Newswire. All rights reserved

Article source: http://www.marketwatch.com/story/microsofts-local-language-program-bridges-languages-cultures-and-technology-2012-02-21

‘Improv’ prayers

This letter is in response to the Feb. 11 article headlined
“Priest who improvised prayers loses job,” on Page C3.

Does the Catholic church have its value/morals mixed up? I think
so. It’s leadership forced a priest to resign (fired him) because
he had said prayers not according to the new English-language
translation of the Missal, but kept priests on who had been
molesting young children for years and tried to hide what they were
doing.

So, as I see it, the Catholic church feels it’s wrong not to say
prayers according to the new English-language translation, “but” it
is less of an offense to molest young children.

I’m sure glad I got that straight.

David Fossati

Longview

Not worth the risk

This is still a democracy right? Longview is my hometown, and on
the whole I want there to be jobs in Southwest Washington, but this
mining proposal is fraught with very questionable, intractable
political and environmental considerations. Mount St. Helens is not
a “wherever,” it is a pristine environment, a gift which we should
be passing on to our children and not defacing for a pittance of 18
jobs; 18 jobs amounts to nothing, the economy will not improve, and
the environment will suffer.

If there is an accident, a spill, and the Cowlitz or the Mount
St. Helens lands are denuded, we will end up footing the bill.
Endangering or destroying the land is not how you improve an
economy. The unprecedented agreement on this issue between the city
councils of Longview, Kelso, and Castle Rock is an extremely
telling sign of the widespread opposition to this mining idea in
our community.

Endangering the Cowlitz watershed for a few bucks? So that the
real profit from the endeavor can be wired up to Canada?

Drew Furor

Longview

Against the Port Westward terminals

As a person who has worked in heath care as an RN for over 50
years, a voter, and an asthmatic, I wish to state, in the strongest
possible terms, my opposition to the ongoing development and
implementation of a plan to establish a coal depot at Port
Westward. The impact could be disastrous for our air and water
quality, the health of our population, and our agriculture and
fishing.

Coal trains, which have an average of 100 cars per train, blow
off one pound of coal dust per car per mile, 100 pounds per mile
from origination to the proposed depot, where the coal sits until
loaded onto ships, a process which also releases dust. Coal dust
contains many toxic metals, including arsenic, mercury, lead,
chromium, and beryllium, to name a few. This would blow onto the
soil, creeks, and rivers, including the Columbia. Do you want the
Columbia polluted, and the fish downstream and along the coastline
to be poisoned by these heavy metals?

We hear the term “clean coal.” There is no such thing. This is a
misnomer and an oxymoron.

One more thing. Coal shipped to China and burned inefficiently
in their plants comes back to us in the form of air pollution,
which it is already doing, including acid rain. Do we want to be
responsible for that eventuality? I don’t think so.

D. Rosalie Love

Clatskanie

Strolling

On Super Bowl Sunday I took a stroll around Lake Sacajawea to
enjoy the beautiful day with my two Yorkie dogs that my husband and
I have rescued. I was taken aback when a man who was walking the
lake, stopped when he reached me and said: “They make loony bins
for people like you who put their dogs in a stroller!”

I told him I’m sorry if he felt that way but Tiffany loves to go
for walks but, as a senior she has a very hard time, so she rides
in a puppy stroller, and Summer gets exhausted very fast and has to
take breaks. Yorkies have small legs and walk three times faster to
match our steps. Tiffany and Summer both love the fresh air, warm
sun and enjoy our walks around the lake.

If you see us, smile. Please don’t judge me or be rude!

Kimberley J. Lemmons

Longview

Article source: http://tdn.com/news/opinion/letters-improv-prayers/article_62151c08-59be-11e1-b739-001871e3ce6c.html