You can’t imaging how demoralizing it is for me to sit in the office and see all the dog enthusiasts flocking to The Bee to cast their votes in the Bee’s King and Queen Dog Contest. It is a cat’s duty, you see, to keep canines from rising above their station, and to have my own employer sponsoring a contest that suggests that dogs can somehow aspire to be royalty is almost more than I can bear.

I have to admit, however, that the contest is bringing out some creative campaigning on the part of aspiring royalty’s human owners. Besides the signs touting their canine favorites springing up on lawns around town, last week one brown delivery vehicle was spotted at several stops in town with the following slogan written in the dust across its back door: “Vote for Canine Willie — King.”

The sun has grudgingly reappeared this week after what seems like weeks of rainy, cool weather. If your tomatoes seem slow to green up, the weather –– and the soil –– might have something to do with it. At Tuesday’s Sandy Hook Organic Farmers’ Market, we asked the people from Fort Hill Farm in New Milford how they managed to have such ripe, red beauties to sell. “We’ve got some big open fields and a lot of sand in our soil so it gets really hot. The tomatoes love it but we find going barefoot is impossible because our feet get burned.” So it’s more sunshine and hot weather we need, so bring it on. Maybe next year we’ll start a few plants in the sand box.

Will Michael, aka “The Connecticut Naturalist” who broadcasts weekly shows on the local environment over Public Access Cable Channel 21, has written The Bee with the good news that “Senator Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut has jumped on board the CT Naturalist Television series!” Apparently, the senator is featuring the half-hour nature show in the Connecticut section of his website. Here’s a link to the page: lieberman.senate.gov/learning/heros.html. Mr Michael is the Bethel resident and Western Connecticut State University student who has videotaped the cicadas, salamanders, butterflies, and frogs. Come fall, we’re hoping for crickets and katydids.

The Rev Gregory Wismar and his wife Priscilla became grandparents again this month when Leah Grace Rojas was born at Danbury Hospital. What with the other births that are expected shortly, the Wismars expect to have eight grandchildren, all ages 5 and under, around the tree this Christmas. Pastor Wismar says it doesn’t matter what his children expect to get as Christmas presents, he plans to give them all diapers.

Lorraine VanderWende stopped by The Bee on Tuesday to drop off one of the 2004 Newtown Woman’s Club’s pewter ornaments — showing a view of Fairfield Hills — that will be sold at the Labor Day Parade. Lorraine said she had a difficult time getting out of her house because the phone kept ringing, bringing birthday greetings from her friends. We can’t say which birthday she celebrated, but we can reveal that Lorraine shares her August 17 birth date with Robert DeNiro and Sean Penn.

Bob Hickey can be found having breakfast at the Sandy Hook Diner almost every morning before 8 am, his “If it’s icky, call Hickey” truck parked out front. But Tuesday his truck seemed to be there an extraordinarily long time. At 11 am the riddle was solved when Bob’s truck was loaded onto a flatbed truck and hauled away.

Two residents of The Homesteads at Newtown assisted living facility are in need of Good Samaritans to provide rides. One wants to visit her husband who is a resident at the Jewish Home for the Elderly nursing home in Fairfield, the other needs to go to a doctor in the Bridgeport area. If anyone can help, call the Homesteads at 426-8118.

Mike and Lorraine Hurley are asking fellow Newtowners to send good thoughts and prayers in the direction of their daughter Maura Hurley Kuehling, her husband Robert, and their 18-month-old daughter Grace. Their residence in Port Charlotte Florida was destroyed by hurricane Charlie, but the family is safe and unharmed. Still it will take prayers, time and patience to help heal their lives as they sort through the devastation, reorganize and begin rebuilding.

Did you notice the “man of steel,” standing in front of Canaan House earlier in the week? Superman himself arrived just in time for the surprise 50th birthday party for town zoning enforcement officer Gary Frenette. Asked for his observations on having lived for a half-century, Gary said, “It’s another day. It just seems a little strange…I don’t know where the time went.” Several of the office staff in attendance at the brief party commented they had not seen such a celebration in recent memory. Besides a delicious cake, the guests were treated to a slide show featuring photos of Gary through the years including several shots that displayed a bright shock of strawberry blonde hair — a feature lacking in some of the more recent poses.

While the cat’s away, the mice will play? Being of a sensitive feline nature, I’m not sure how I like that image but it does seem as if our local contractors are working overtime here before everyone gets back in town and school starts. Wherever I wander, I see road paving machines on local streets such as Currituck and Schoolhouse Hill, utility companies are trimming trees, landscapers are working at the Soldiers and Sailors Monument, a new space for the Newtown Congregational Co-op Nursery School is underway, an ADA handicapped accessible ramp is going in at Edmond Town Hall, and a new building project is going gangbusters at Nunnawauk Meadows. Something about making hay while the sun shines? I like that a little better.

Well, this cat’s going away for now, but I’ll be back next week, so be sure to …

Read me again.