How time flies when you're having fun. All good things must come to an end. Quit like a bad habit. My favorite cliches are coming to an end and so to is this column.

For more than a decade, I've had the privilege of trying to lighten-up Friday afternoons in the Express Lane.

O.K. It's technically not a full 10 years.

Yes, this column started in 1996. Yes, I wrote the column every week. But there were a few maternity leaves scattered during the decade. So, when you subtract the six weeks following each pregnancy, you lose three-quarters of year. Sadly, I don't remember where those nine months went, much less the 10 years.

When the column first started, I had only one child. Now, my husband and I are outnumbered, 3 to 1. We had two dogs at the time, but now have two different dogs. We didn't have any cats, yet have now owned a variety of cats, plus a host of other animals such as goats, cows and yaks.

I should note that when the column first started I would find myself with writer's block on a regular basis, usually weekly. After just a few months, I told the assistant editor at the time, Brent Cobb, that I wasn't writing a column that week. He threatened that if I didn't write the column on a regular basis, he would make something up and put it in as my column - each time I didn't have a column written. I've been dutifully writing every week with just those few exceptions noted above.

 Over the past 10 years, I've touched on subjects too numerous to count. But three seemingly-unrelated topics - cats, computers and large families - have one thing in common. They prompted the most emails and letters.

The subject of cats would seem like a fairly benign topic. But lurking below the surface are everyone's true feelings about cats. There are cat people and there are dog people, otherwise cat jokes wouldn't be so abundant

My personal favorite: Sure, I like cats. I've got one sitting on each side of my fireplace.)

In the interest of fair time and to keep all those cat people from writing me one last time, here's a bad dog joke: How can you tell if you have a stupid dog? He chases parked cars.

Many eons ago I wrote about watching my dog grabbing a hold of a kitten and shaking it. I tried to nurse the kitten back to health but failed. The point of the story was about my newfound sense of compassion for the kitten and cats in general.

Evidently, the critics of that column stopped reading at the "and the kitten went limp in the dog's mouth" and didn't continue on to my later transformation. They didn't understand why I "allowed" my dog to harm the kitten. This is like asking me to keep my farm cats from terrorizing the peaceful birds who live in our trees, politely asking the bunny rabbits to leave my garden alone or my kids to save one, solitary piece of their Easter candy until the next day. Sometimes, you just can't mess with Mother Nature.

 If cats can get people's blood pumping, than computers are enough to give people heart attacks, judging by their responses to computer-based columns.

Just like there will always be cat-or-dog people, there will always be PC-or-Mac people.

Those with PCs commended me when I finally crossed over the other side and wondered why it took me so long.

Those with Apple running through their blood offer up gentle advice to get technical work done, sympathize with the Macs short-comings and plead to stay true to my long Mac history. Whereas PC users seem to go with whatever model happens to offer the best memory/ speed/color, Mac users are nothing but devoted -- even as the computer locks up for the fifth time that day.

While I am currently using a PC for my main computer, I consider myself a short-term renter rather than long-use buyer of PCs. When I look into the crystal ball, I envision a shiny, new Mac sitting on my desk, while the dull, faded PC is used as a plant stand.

 

But the columns about living with, dealing with, experiencing daily life with a large family drew the most response, especially from those who either grew up with a lot of brothers and sisters around or who had at least a half-dozen children themselves.

Anyone with multiple children understood about the guilt of blank baby book pages.

As I pulled my five-year-old's book from the shelf the other day in a search for required kindergarten papers, I realized many, if not most, of the pages were blank. Flipping through the book, a stranger would think he never celebrated his second through fifth birthdays. Not even a quick picture of blowing out the candles graced the pages.

(I'm pretty sure we did observe those milestones, but now I have to go back and dig out pictures and try to reconstruct the scenes.)

These same parents are the ones who look on with jealously at those decorative, informative scrapbooks. The fact that I could find my son's birth announcement after only a 10 minute search wiped all shreds of envy from my mindset.

Even those parents with so few children that they can remember their middle names without digging out the baby books can sympathize about the daily rituals of raising small children. No two days are the same and there is rarely a dull moment.

And they offered up the same advice as those parents whose children reached into the double digits: Enjoy them while I can because they'll be grown before I know it.

And as they head out of the house to lead their own lives, maybe then I'll have time to finish those baby books.

So, thank you to everyone who has read my column over the past decade, for all of your comments when I'm pumping gas, for all of your observations when we pass in the grocery store, for giving me a chance to hopefully brighten your Friday.

 **-- Ronda Graff will continue to keep busy with her husband, six kids, two cats, two dogs, one cow and one yak…and any future animals.