Download or read book Making Rounds with Oscar written by David Dosa and published by Hachette UK. This book was released on 2010-02-02 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A remarkable cat. A special gift. A life-changing journey. They thought he was just a cat. When Oscar arrived at the Steere House Nursing and Rehabilitation Center in Rhode Island he was a cute little guy with attitude. He loved to stretch out in a puddle of sunlight and chase his tail until he was dizzy. Occasionally he consented to a scratch behind the ears, but only when it suited him. In other words, he was a typical cat. Or so it seemed. It wasn't long before Oscar had created something of a stir. Apparently, this ordinary cat possesses an extraordinary gift: he knows instinctively when the end of life is near. Oscar is a welcome distraction for the residents of Steere House, many of whom are living with Alzheimer's. But he never spends much time with them -- until they are in their last hours. Then, as if this were his job, Oscar strides purposely into a patient's room, curls up on the bed, and begins his vigil. Oscar provides comfort and companionship when people need him most. And his presence lets caregivers and loved ones know that it's time to say good-bye. Oscar's gift is a tender mercy. He teaches by example: embracing moments of life that so many of us shy away from. Making Rounds with Oscar is the story of an unusual cat, the patients he serves, their caregivers, and of one doctor who learned how to listen. Heartfelt, inspiring, and full of humor and pathos, this book allows readers to take a walk into a world rarely seen from the outside, a world we often misunderstand.
Download or read book Making the Rounds with Oscar written by Dr David Dosa and published by Hachette UK. This book was released on 2009-10-29 with total page 189 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The extraordinary – and true – story of a cat with a remarkable gift In the summer of 2007 Oscar the cat made headlines around the world. Why? Because he knows when the patients in the Rhode Island hospice where he lives are going to die. Oscar curls up on their beds, keeps them company and enables the families to be with their loved ones at the end. Dr David Dosa's job is to respond to people's medical needs, treat them for their ailments and communicate with their families. Oscar takes care of the rest. He is a steady companion and, because of him, patients don't die alone. Can a cat really predict death? Is he smelling something or responding to behavioural clues? Is he helping guide souls to heaven? Oscar's warm and profound story is heartfelt, sometimes even funny, but always inspiring.
Download or read book Making the Rounds with Oscar written by David Dosa and published by Headline Review. This book was released on 2011 with total page 248 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An otherwise ordinary cat, Oscar has the uncanny ability to predict when people in the Steere House nursing home are about to die. Dr. Dosa tells the stories of several patients and examines end-of-life care as it exists today.
Download or read book Under One Roof written by Barry Martin and published by St. Martin's Press. This book was released on 2013-10-15 with total page 271 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Sometimes people aren't who you think they are. Everyone knew what was going on in Ballard, Washington: developers were building a giant shopping mall, but a house belonging to a feisty octogenarian named Edith Wilson Macefield was in the way. They offered her a million dollars. She told them to take a hike. Everyone knew that Barry Martin, head of the construction project, was involved in the push to get her out of the house so that the project could proceed without further delay. Everyone was wrong. When Barry took the job as construction supervisor for the shopping mall that was being erected around Edith's little house, he determined to make things as easy for her as he could. He didn't expect that she'd ask him to drive her to a hair appointment—but he did offer to help, after all. And it was in that one small gesture that an unlikely friendship was sparked, one that changed them both forever. The story of Barry Martin and Edith Macefield is a tale of balance and compassion, of giving enough without giving too much, of helping our elderly loved ones through the tough times without taking away their dignity. In the end, Under One Roof is a tale of grace, and one from which all of us can take solace and strength. From Barry and Edith we have much to learn about love and letting go and, just possibly, about seeing through fading light to find great joy.
Download or read book From Rubble to Redemption written by Jim Jenkins and published by Called Writers Christian Publishing. This book was released on 2021-08-04 with total page 181 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: On September 11th, 2001, Jim Jenkins woke up to the nightmare that was 9/11. A few days later, he was headed for Ground Zero in his official capacity as a US Navy Chaplain. Deeply affected by what he experienced there, Jim has decided to share his story with the world as we approach the 20th anniversary of 9/11. Through his encounters with the victims’ families, political leaders like Rudy Giuliani, and celebrities like Elton John, Jim saw God show up in very unique and amazing ways during his time serving at Ground Zero. Jim’s primary message to America is that we must never forget. But Jim also wants his fellow Americans to know that God can bring redemption out of the rubble.
Download or read book Sideways written by Rex Pickett and published by St. Martin's Griffin. This book was released on 2010-04-01 with total page 372 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A raucous and surprising novel filled with wonderful details about wine, Rex Pickett's Sideways is also a thought-provoking and funny book about men, women, and human relationships. The basis for the 2004 comedy-drama road movie of the same name starring Paul Giamatti and Thomas Haden Church. Sideways is the story of two friends-Miles and Jack-going away together for the last time to steep themselves in everything that makes it good to be young and single: pinot, putting, and prowling bars. In the week before Jack plans to marry, the pair heads out from Los Angeles to the Santa Ynez wine country. For Jack, the tasting tour is Seven Days to D-Day, his final stretch of freedom. For Miles--who has divorced his wife, is facing an uncertain career and has lost his passion for living-the trip is a week long opportunity to evaluate his past, his future and himself.
Download or read book Oscar Wilde written by Matthew Sturgis and published by Knopf. This book was released on 2021-10-12 with total page 865 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The fullest, most textural, most accurate—most human—account of Oscar Wilde's unique and dazzling life—based on extensive new research and newly discovered materials, from Wilde's personal letters and transcripts of his first trial to newly uncovered papers of his early romantic (and dangerous) escapades and the two-year prison term that shattered his soul and his life. "Simply the best modern biography of Wilde." —Evening Standard Drawing on material that has come to light in the past thirty years, including newly discovered letters, documents, first draft notebooks, and the full transcript of the libel trial, Matthew Sturgis meticulously portrays the key events and influences that shaped Oscar Wilde's life, returning the man "to his times, and to the facts," giving us Wilde's own experience as he experienced it. Here, fully and richly portrayed, is Wilde's Irish childhood; a dreamy, aloof boy; a stellar classicist at boarding school; a born entertainer with a talent for comedy and a need for an audience; his years at Oxford, a brilliant undergraduate punctuated by his reckless disregard for authority . . . his arrival in London, in 1878, "already noticeable everywhere" . . . his ten-year marriage to Constance Lloyd, the father of two boys; Constance unwittingly welcoming young men into the household who became Oscar's lovers, and dying in exile at the age of thirty-nine . . . Wilde's development as a playwright. . . becoming the high priest of the aesthetic movement; his successes . . . his celebrity. . . and in later years, his irresistible pull toward another—double—life, in flagrant defiance and disregard of England's strict sodomy laws ("the blackmailer's charter"); the tragic story of his fall that sent him to prison for two years at hard labor, destroying his life and shattering his soul.
Download or read book Plan B written by David Kord Murray and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2011-09-20 with total page 262 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Why has Facebook been so limber, evolving so successfully even after a number of stumbles, while Myspace stalled and lost ground? Why was Wal-Mart able to expand so successfully into new offerings, such as groceries, while H&R Block dramatically failed to expand into offering financial services? The answer, David Murray reveals, is that Facebook and Wal-Mart both started with business models that empowered them to effectively adapt their plans as they executed them. The failure of detailed strategic plans that have taken a great deal of time and money to develop is one of the worst problems in business, and it’s ever more urgent as the pace of change in business continues to accelerate. Murray, author of the acclaimed Wall Street Journal bestseller Borrowing Brilliance, argues that valiantly sticking to even a well-thought-out Plan A is the road to disaster. The greatest success comes to those who know how to construct and implement an adaptive Plan A that has within it the means of evolving into a superior Plan B by responding to problems confronted, discoveries made, changing market conditions, and the competition. Writing in a lively, engaging voice and using a series of specific examples drawn from companies including IBM, Intel, Facebook, American Express, and Kaiser Permanente, as well as from the art of war, including the Battle of Gettysburg and the D-Day invasion, and even from the space program, Murray presents powerful methods for constructing a plan that has the mechanisms for adaptation built in. Drawing on a wealth of research, he explains why we are fairly good at short-term predictions but why, in our ever more rapidly changing business world, even the best laid plans will eventually go astray. He then introduces the best techniques for creating an optimal original plan that takes into account our limited ability to predict, showing that vital to this process is that it be constructed so that we are alerted in time to make the right changes. In a brilliant discussion of strategy and tactics, he shows that the core of this adaptability is making sure that your strategy and tactics are well aligned with one another and that you have established the right metrics for measuring results. He then details precisely how to adapt throughout the execution process by constantly monitoring and assessing results, developing worst-case scenarios, and recognizing unanticipated opportunities. Plan B is an essential guide to harnessing the forces of change to achieve long-lasting success despite the most vexing challenges.
Download or read book Remembering the Music Forgetting the Words written by Kate Whouley and published by Beacon Press. This book was released on 2011-09-06 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the author of the much-loved memoir Cottage for Sale, Must Be Moved comes an engaging and inspiring account of a daughter who must face her mother’s premature decline. In Remembering the Music, Forgetting the Words, Kate Whouley strips away the romantic veneer of mother-daughter love to bare the toothed and tough reality of caring for a parent who is slowly losing her mind. Yet, this is not a dark or dour look at the demon of Alzheimer’s. Whouley shares the trying, the tender, and the sometimes hilarious moments in meeting the challenge also known as Mom. As her mother, Anne, falls into forgetting, Kate remembers for her. In Anne we meet a strong-minded, accidental feminist with a weakness for unreliable men. The first woman to apply for—and win—a department-head position in her school system, Anne was an innovative educator who poured her passion into her work. House-proud too, she made certain her Hummel figurines were dusted and arranged just so. But as her memory falters, so does her housekeeping. Surrounded by stacks of dirty dishes, piles of laundry, and months of unopened mail, Anne needs Kate’s help—but she doesn’t want to relinquish her hard-won independence any more than she wants to give up smoking. Time and time again, Kate must balance Anne’s often nonsensical demands with what she believes are the best decisions for her mother’s comfort and safety. This is familiar territory for anyone who has had to help a loved one in decline, but Kate finds new and different ways to approach her mother and her forgetting. Shuddering under the weight of accumulating bills and her mother’s frustrating, circular arguments, Kate realizes she must push past difficult family history to find compassion, empathy, and good humor. When the memories, the names, and then the words begin to fade, it is the music that matters most to Kate’s mother. Holding hands after a concert, a flute case slung over Kate’s shoulder, and a shared joke between them, their relationship is healed—even in the face of a dreaded and deadly diagnosis. “Memory,” Kate Whouley writes, “is overrated.”
Download or read book Live Fast Die Young written by Lawrence Frascella and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2005-10-04 with total page 400 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The complete story behind the groundbreaking film Rebel Without a Cause is vividly revealed in this fascinating book as provocative as the film itself. The revolutionary film Rebel Without a Cause has had a profound impact on both moviemaking and youth culture since its 1955 release, virtually giving birth to our concept of the American teenager. And the making of the movie was just as explosive for those involved. Against a backdrop of the Atomic Age and an old Hollywood studio system on the verge of collapse, four of Hollywood's most passionate artists had a cataclysmic and immensely influential meeting. James Dean, Natalie Wood, Sal Mineo, and director Nicholas Ray were each at a crucial point in their careers. The young actors were grappling with their fame, burgeoning sexuality, and increasingly reckless behavior, and their on- and off-set relationships ignited as they engaged in Ray’s vision of physical melees and psychosexual seductions of startling intensity. Through interviews with the surviving members of the cast and crew and firsthand access to both personal and studio archives, the authors reveal Rebel's true drama: the director’s affair with sixteen-year-old Wood, his tempestuous “spiritual marriage” with Dean, and his role in awakening the latent sexuality of Mineo, who would become the first gay teenager to appear on film. This searing account of the upheaval the four artists experienced in the wake of Rebel is complete with thirty photographs, including ten never-before-seen photos by famed Dean photographer Dennis Stock.
Download or read book Really Important Stuff My Cat Has Taught Me written by Cynthia L. Copeland and published by Workman Publishing. This book was released on 2017-10-03 with total page 177 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A book that will delight every cat lover, full of wise and unforgettable life lessons, each paired with the perfect photo. Cats are the ultimate savants, possessing intelligence, poise, and sass in equal measure. They know when to play it cool, and when to pounce; when to fly solo, and when to cuddle up. Entertaining, unpredictable, and just a bit wild, cats encourage us to explore, take chances, and live on the edge—just as if we too had nine lives. Cynthia L. Copeland, author of the bestselling Really Important Stuff My Dog Has Taught Me and Really Important Stuff My Kids Have Taught Me, now turns her attention to our mysterious feline friends. Every page of this full-color gift book is a joyful reminder of what’s important in life. Like Confidence: “Insist on a seat at the table.” Curiosity: “Have more questions than answers.” Adventure: “Sometimes you have to leap before you look.” Individuality: “You’ll be remembered for what sets you apart.” Kindness: “Recognize the power of your purr.” And Solitude: “Find your own square of sunshine.”
Download or read book The Earth My Butt and Other Big Round Things written by Carolyn Mackler and published by Candlewick Press. This book was released on 2003 with total page 258 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Feeling like she does not fit in with the other members of her family, who are all thin, brilliant, and good-looking, fifteen-year-old Virginia Shreves tries to deal with her self-image, her first physical relationship, and her disillusionment with some of the people closest to her. 10,000 first printing.
Download or read book A Gift from Bob written by James Bowen and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2015-10-13 with total page 192 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Bob Fever has swept the globe, with A Street Cat Named Bob vaulting its way to #7 on The New York Times bestseller list in its first week on sale. With rights sold to 27 countries around the globe and a top spot on the British bestseller list for more than a year, this book has been a smashing success around the world. As Street Cat Bob and James spend a cold and challenging December on the streets together, James once more draws strength and inspiration from his extraordinary cat—learning important lessons about the true meaning of Christmas along the way. From the day James rescued a street cat abandoned in the hallway of his sheltered accommodation, they began a friendship which has transformed both their lives and, through the bestselling books A Street Cat Named Bob and The World According to Bob, touched millions around the world. In this new story of their journey together, A Gift from Bob, James looks back at the last Christmas they spent scraping a living on the streets and how Bob helped him through one of his toughest times—providing strength, friendship and inspiration but also teaching him important lessons about the true meaning of Christmas along the way. Readers who fell in love with Dewey and Marley, as well as the hundreds of thousands of fans who read A Street Cat Named Bob and The World According to Bob, will be eager to read the next chapters in the life of James and Bob.
Download or read book Dewey s Nine Lives written by Vicki Myron and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2010-10-01 with total page 353 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Dewey: The Small-Town Library Cat Who Touched the Worldwas a blockbuster bestseller and a publishing phenomenon. It spent more than seven months on the New York Timesbestseller list, nearly the entire time in the top five. It has sold nearly a million copies, spawned three children's books, and will be the basis for a movie starring Meryl Streep that is in the works. No doubt about it, this is one beloved cat. But he's more than just a bestselling franchise: Dewey has created a community. Dewey touched readers everywhere, who realized that no matter how difficult their lives might seem, or how ordinary their talents, they can - and should - make a positive difference to those around them. Dewey's Nine Livescontinues the formula that made Dewey so successful: inspiring, funny, and heart-warming stories about cats told from the perspective of 'Dewey's Mum,' librarian Vicki Myron. The amazing felines in this book include Dewey, of course, whose further never-before-told adventures and amazing legacy are chronicled, but several others who Vicki found out about when their owners reached out to her. Vicki learned, through extensive interviews and story sharing, what made these cats special, and how they fit into Dewey's community of perseverance and love. From a divorced mother in Alaska who saved a drowning kitten on Christmas Eve to a post-traumatic stress-disorder - suffering veteran whose heart was opened by his long relationship with a rescued cat, these Dewey-style stories will inspire readers to laugh, cry, care, and, most importantly, believe in the magic of animals to touch individual lives.
Download or read book Chicken Soup for the Cat Lover s Soul written by Jack Canfield and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2012-08-07 with total page 293 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From playful and hilarious accounts of life with cats to heartwarming tales of cat courage, healing and learning, each touching story in Chicken Soup for the Cat Lover's Soul celebrates the special bond we share with our cats.
Download or read book Autobiography of a Brown Buffalo written by Oscar Zeta Acosta and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2013-02-06 with total page 209 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Before his mysterious disappearance and probable death in 1971, Oscar Zeta Acosta was famous as a Robin Hood Chicano lawyer and notorious as the real-life model for Hunter S. Thompson's "Dr. Gonzo," a fat, pugnacious attorney with a gargantuan appetite for food, drugs, and life on the edge. Written with uninhibited candor and manic energy, this book is Acosta's own account of coming of age as a Chicano in the psychedelic sixties, of taking on impossible cases while breaking all tile rules of courtroom conduct, and of scrambling headlong in search of a personal and cultural identity. It is a landmark of contemporary Hispanic-American literature, at once ribald, surreal, and unmistakably authentic.
Download or read book Got Your Attention written by Sam Horn and published by Berrett-Koehler Publishers. This book was released on 2015-04-06 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A communication strategist shares her eight-stage process for connecting with any number of people with two-way interactions. Did you know: • Goldfish, yes, goldfish, have longer attention spans than we humans do? • One in four people abandons a website if it takes longer than four seconds to load? Imagine if there were ways, in a world of impatience and INFObesity, to quickly intrigue busy, distracted people and earn their interest, trust and buy-in. Imagine if there was a process for pleasantly surprising decision-makers and convincing them you're the right person for the job, position, project or contract. You don’t have to imagine it, Sam Horn has created it. Sam’s innovative techniques have helped her clients close deals and raise millions of dollars, and will be your “secret sauce” to getting funded, hired, elected, promoted or referred. “These accessible techniques transcend generations and read like a modern-day version of How to Win Friends and Influence People.” —Miki Agrawal, one of Forbes’s “Top 20 Millennials on a Mission” and founder of THINX “Sam Horn’s smart and snappy book will teach you how to get people’s attention—and keep it.” —Daniel H. Pink, #1 New York Times–bestselling author of To Sell Is Human “If you can’t get people’s attention, you’ll never get their business. Sam Horn’s new book shows how to quickly earn respect so people are motivated to listen.” —Terry Jones, founder of Travelocity and WayBlazer and chair of Kayak “A must-read for those in the workplace who want to contribute at their highest level and create more strategic networks.” —Betsy Myers, former executive director, Center for Public Leadership, Harvard Kennedy School “Horn offers innovative ways to initiate genuine conversations and meaningful connections that turn strangers into friends.” —Keith Ferrazzi, author of the #1 bestseller Never Eat Alone
