Themes of community, family, and mental illness in the book In Cold Research Paper

Themes of community, family, and mental illness in the book In Cold Blood by Truman Capote - Research Paper Example The clutter is portrayed as a well to do family of six who started from a humble background. At the time of the murder, Clutter was said to have graduated into a successful farmer and a generous employee who is admired by many people in his community. Capote in writing his book brings out certain pertinent ideas on the American living that are artistically captured in creatively organized themes. This paper examines the themes of community, family, and mental illness as portrayed in Capote’s In Cold Blood and how they are intertwined in describing a true American Countryside life. Community The role of the community in a Native American countryside life is pleasingly analyzed in Capote’s book by examining the organization of the community and the role played by the community members to each other in their bid to co-exist. Holcomb village is pictured as a middle class American village characterized by people of different caliber. According to Gibson, the Clutter is said to be one among the other members who can be graded as successful members of the Holcomb community and his status earns him a lot of respect from the whole community and in the whole state as a generous employer. The family is highly regarded as having started off from a humble background to their then state. ... e community members respect the Clutters because of his kindness despite his status despite the material wealth he owns as compared to the surrounding neighborhood and this is evidenced in the shock and sympathy with which the whole village receives the news about their murder. Capote describes a friendly community as one where the members live in harmony with each other regardless of one’s social status and the Clutter’s death is a revelation to the security threat in the region that a long time has co-existed in a peaceful environment. (Capote) This is contrasted with the Smith’s community, which is rather brutal, and each one is not concerned about the welfare of the other. Smith’s father is an example in this case who continuously batters his wife to an extent that they divorce. Moreover, the situation in the Smith’s village is expended when the Smith’s family is torn apart due to constant quarrels, he runs away from home and finding no f riends to confide in, he engages himself in crimes influenced by the bitter experiences and neglect he had been subjected. No one cares about him despite the ordeal he undergoes, Guest further asserts that his beating and humiliation by cottage mistress result from his maturity malfunction. Out of loneliness, Smith is most likely lured into criminal offenses, in order to avenge his bitter experiences, that lands him in and out of detention several times. Smith’s coincidental meeting with Dick who takes advantage of his situation is probably augmented by lack of care and intervention by the surrounding people and family friends. Even after he has landed into bad company the community members are still silent about this and no one intervenes to offer comfort or counseling to their troubled fellow. This only accelerates

Defining A Therapeutic Relationship Between Patient And Nurse Nursing Essay

Defining A Therapeutic Relationship Between Patient And Nurse Nursing Essay In this assignment the author is going to explore what is a therapeutic relationship, by defining it and describing what elements and skills are necessary to uphold an efficient therapeutic relationship with a patient. The assignment shall explore how Multi disciplinary teams contribute to achieving a therapeutic relationship. It further will explore what governs a therapeutic relationship according to the code of practice set by the nursing governing body, the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC), putting into consideration what is expected from nurses as health professionals. Being Self aware is a crucial attribute in order to maintain a therapeutic relationship, so the writer shall give a brief definition of what self awareness is ,and explain the significance of being self aware within a therapeutic relations and relate it to an incident that happened in practice that made them more self aware. The therapeutic relationship is fundamental to the care of a patient and was described in the 1950s by famous psychotherapist Carl Rodgers .Rogers defines it as a helping relationship, A relationship in which one of the participants intends that there should come about, in one or both parties, more appreciation of, more expression of, more functional use of the latent inner resources of the individual (Rodgers 1961). Other authors have come up with various definitions but they are all closely linked to that of Rodgers, Jane Stein-Parbury (2000) suggests it is unilateral because the nurse maintains most control and it is usually short or average duration, with the patient facing a non threatening situation. However (Stuart 2001) defined a therapeutic relationship As a mutual learning experience and a corrective, emotional experience for the patient (cited in Cutliffe and Mckenna 2005.P.304) For a therapeutic relationship to work effectively, certain elements need to be upheld and followed, such as showing warmth towards your patient, being respectful by showing the patient that they are individual and a unique being. Dignity of the patient puts the patient at ease and they feel more valued and may in turn open up more to the nurse which aids their treatment. Demonstrating professionalism assures the patient that they are in capable hands and will effectively build trust about your capabilities. Carl Rodgers highlighted that the three core components of a therapeutic relationship are empathy, which is defined as: a continuing process whereby the counsellor lay aside her own way of experiencing and perceiving reality, preferring to sense and respond to the experience and perceptions of her client. (Mearns and Thorne, 2005, p.41) Where there is lack of empathy expression, patients may be left with a sense of isolation, which have an effect on their treatment plan. The sec ond crucial element that was highlighted by Rodgers as being essential is having unconditional positive regard towards patients or client which is a label given to the fundamental attitude of the person-centred counsellor towards her client. The counsellor who holds this attitude provides care for the individual irrespective of what beliefs and values the individual (patient) may hold. (Mearns and Thorne,2005 p 64). In other words unconditional positive regards is being non judgmental towards a patient regardless of what the care provider believes or values themselves. Unconditional positive regard should ideally commence on the onset the relationship between patient and nurse. Other elements that constitute a therapeutic relationship include, maintaining confidentiality, and treating people as individuals at all time, good record keeping (NMC 2008). For Therapeutic relationships to be successfully applied and implemented, nurses have to acquire certain skills to achieve this. To instate a strong therapeutic relationship a practitioner should consider their interpersonal communication skills with the patient. There are two forms of interpersonal communication skills, which are non-verbal and verbal communication. Non-verbal communication skills are a very effective way to convey a message, empathy and active listening. Egan formulated a communication tool which aids to effective non-verbal communication skill, the skills are summarized by the acronym SOLER, meaning sitting squarely with an open posture, leaning forward to show your interest maintaining eye contact at all times showing that you are relaxed, not fidgeting nervously. Argyle (1994) suggested the main forms of non-verbal communication as, facial expression, gaze, body movement, gesture, partial behaviour, clothing and behaviour. (Cited by Rana, Upton, 2009, ). Verbal skills are too, an essential part of interpersonal communication, these include techniques such as paraphrasing; this is where by a nurse rephrases what has been stated by the patient into their own words, i.e. by saying in other words. (Jane Stein -Parbury). Other methods of active listening are to parrot what the patient has said; this shows you have clearly heard what they have said. Practitioners should also be able to know when to use open and closed questions in the appropriate manner and time, for this skill can easily perceived as uncaring and unprofessional when not adopted carefully. In conclusion to what has been talked about, nurse and patient should reflect on what they said. Heron (2001) stated that a there are six tools of a clients needs. Herons model has two basic categories, authoritative and facilitative. These two categories further breakdown into a total six categories to describe how people intervene when helping. Authoritative Interventions are Prescriptive, which is giving advice, Informative where you provide information to guide the other person, Confronting- you challenge the other persons behaviour in an unaggressive attitude. Facilitative Interventions include: Cathartic-you help the other person to express and overcome thoughts or emotions that they have not previously confronted. Catalytic- You help the other person reflect, and they become more self-directed in making decisions. Supportive- You build up the confidence of the other person by focusing on their competences, qualities and achievements. A multi disciplinary team (MDTs) is important in the care of a patient. A multi disciplinary team is a group of professionals from different disciplines, who have a role in contributing to an assessment of an individuals needs. This should include two health professionals, i.e. nurse, clinician or therapist, as well as a representative from social care services, i.e. a social worker (NHS 2010). Chan (2004) argued that the main mechanism is to ensure truly holistic care for patients and a seamless service for patients throughout their disease trajectory and across the boundaries of primary, secondary and tertiary care. Multi disciplinary teams ensure a continuum in patients care and can be 24 hours. Different professions bring different type of care to the patient. MDTs can however come to conflict, if they demonstrate allegiance to their profession. Junor, Hole Gillis (1994) states that multidisciplinary team working is known to maximise clinical effectiveness, Multi disciplinary teams have enabled health professionals to adopt the clinical care pathways where different teams within the organization outline anticipated care, place an appropriate timeframe, to help a patient with a specific condition or set of symptoms move progressively through a clinical experience to positive outcomes. In a multi disciplinary team within a healthcare setting, one may expect to work with doctors, social workers, psychologists, occupational therapists, health care assistants (HCAs) and other related professions. A therapeutic relationship within nursing follows the code of professional code of practice which was set by Nursing and Midwifery Council [NMC], which acts as the governing body for nurses and midwives in the United Kingdom which was formed in 2002 by parliament. Its main objective is to safeguard the health and wellbeing of the public,(NMC 2008).The NMC outlines that Nurses should always uphold the patients respect at all times, it states that nurses should always treat people as individuals and respect their dignity. Nurses should respect patient confidentiality, and uphold it at all times, breach of confidentiality can lead to serious consequences for health professionals (NMC 2008) including disciplinary actions such as suspension or being struck off the NMC register. Consent is very important in patient care; its the opening avenue for any care that follows. NMC states the every adult must be presumed to have the mental capacity to consent or refuse treatment. Patient care is a lways going through different multi disciplinary teams therefore accurately record keeping is crucial, it should be factual ,not falsified, and clearly legible (NMC 2010), these are some of the factors that insure accurate information is passed on to different care givers to maximise effective care for the patient. Nurses endure different feelings and emotions when interacting or treating patients, which calls for them to be more self aware, Duval and Wuckland defines self awareness as a state in which one is aware of oneself as an object, much as one might be aware of a tree or another person (cited by Rana and Upton 2009. p142).For a nurse to be self aware they need to treat each patient as individuals and present themselves appropriately. Patients have a plethora of beliefs and values, which always come into play in any given care setting. Beliefs can be associated with patients religion and culture, such as that of Muslims, to only eat halaal meat, a nurse has to be aware of this dietary requirement and honour it. Equally beliefs also play a vital role in the treatment of a patient, so a provision to fulfil this should be met at all time, i.e. providing a chapel in the hospital. Values of a patient are crucial when in care. Downie, R. S. 1990 stated that values are preferences based on beliefs about objects, persons, or situations and are accompanied by feelings of approval or disapproval. Patients of a different culture will most certainly have different values based on what they were brought up on. On any given care setting, the way in which nurses present themselves to patients is of utmost importance, their body posture is a critical aid to supplement being self aware, and nurses can use SOLER (Egan 2001) to ensure they achieve this. In practice, the author recalls an incident when a 92 year old lady was referred to their practice for assessment on every Wednesday of the week. On arrival the lady would engage in social activities with fellow patients. The staff provide the lady with a menu relevant to her culture of West Indian background, The staff fulfilled their role in being self aware on her values and diversity, During the meal, staff began to talk about a holiday abroad and how the food made their bowel move rapidly, and how they really found the food disgusting. The lady did initially try to express her frustration of the conversations the staff were having whilst she was trying to enjoy. She eventually stopped having her meal as she found it not appetizing anymore, staff recorded that the patient had poor dietary at dinner time, and they were not self aware that they were the catalyst for the poor intake of her food. Had the staff been more self aware of their presentations, they would have considered that different cultures have different table manners. In conclusion an effective therapeutic relationship is accomplished by good verbal and non verbal communication. Respecting individuality, beliefs, values, this promotes good recovery and openness between nurse and patient. A therapeutic relationship is not just between a patients and nurse but can, and often extends to other multi disciplinary teams. The therapeutic relationship can never be stated as fully complete, but can be made more effective, because different patients have different opinions i.e. different experiences in previous care, and different values and beliefs.

Proctor & Gamble Essay -- Business Management Analysis Essays

Proctor & Gamble   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Founded in 1837, Procter & Gamble is the #1 U.S. makers of household products and a recognized leader in the development, manufacturing, and marketing of a broad range of products including Crest toothpaste, Tide laundry detergent, Ivory soap, Pampers diapers, and Dawn liquid detergent. Procter & Gamble has operations in over 70 countries and employs over 100,000 people worldwide and markets to nearly five billion customers in over 140 countries.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Procter & Gamble?s purpose or mission statement states exactly why Procter & Gamble is so driven in providing quality products and services to consumers all over the world. Procter & Gamble?s purpose is as follows: ?We will provide branded products and services of superior quality and value that improve the lives of the world?s consumers. As a result, consumers will reward us with leadership sales, profit and value creation, allowing our people, our shareholders, and the communities in which we live and work to prosper www.pg.com/jobs/company_culture/purpose.jhtml.? Procter & Gamble?s company culture, think globally, act globally, focuses on a variety of core values: leadership, ownership, integrity, passion for winning, and trust. Procter & Gamble works well with the national cultures of Italy and Japan because Procter & Gamble thrives on diversity. Everyone at Procter & Gamble is united through Procter & Gamble?s values and goals. Procter & Gamble is such a giant in the household industry. The company sees diversity as advantage. Procter & Gamble?s diversity covers a broad range of characteristics, such as race, sex, personal, religion, cultural heritage, etc. Within the company, Procter & Gamble creates an advantage from their differences. Outside Procter & Gamble, the company is very sensitive to other national cultures because of their unique culture found within. Every company has its own unique culture. Most organizations don?t deliberately try and create a culture. The culture of an organization is created unconsciously, based on the values of top management. Procter & Gamble?s principles are derived from the company?s Purpose and Values. The core principles of the company are: ?  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  We Show Respect for All Individuals ?  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The Interests of the Company and the Individual are Inseparable ?  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  We are Strategically Focused in Our Work ?  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Innovation is th... ...octer & Gamble needs to institute changes that will help them become faster. A better public corporate image of Procter & Gamble could also raise awareness that Procter & Gamble is home to many household products, even those environmentally safe. The recent Dawn commercial is a great example. Dawn is used to clean off oil spill animal victims. The general public is not aware of many of the products Procter & Gamble market and produce. Better advertising would be beneficial. Procter & Gamble uses their diversity successfully as a global company. The people that work for them are their greatest asset. Procter & Gamble believes tat it is important to develop and support a diverse workplace. Now the company needs to broaden its corporate culture outside of the United States more than it has in the past for continues future success. References 1). www.cyborlink.com/besite/hofstede.htm 2). www.geert-hofstede.com/hofstede_italy.shtml 3). www.geert-hofstede.com/hofstede_japan.shtml 4) www.geert-hofestede.com/hofstede_united_states.shtml 5). www.pg.com/jobs/company_culture/core-values.jhtml 6). www.pg.com/jobs/company_culture/purpose.jhtml 7). www.uvt.nl/web/iric/hofstede.htm

Rhetorical Style Analysis Paper Essay

Barbara Ehrenreich is the author of Nickel and Dimed on (not) Getting By In America. It is about how lower class people cannot make it in America because they do not make enough money to provide for themselves. If anyone could interest a reader it would Ehrenreich because of her style. At times she can be offensive with her hyperboles, satire and metaphors but I could not help my self from turning page after page. Ehrenreich paints a vivid picture in the reader’s head using a broad and appealing diction. She truly makes the reader feel like low wageworkers are isolated from the world because of the yearly income they bring in. What better way to test a hypothesis than go out into the field and do it? Well, that is exactly what Ehreneich does. It starts off by her wondering if single mothers can survive financially that depend on what they make at a minimum wage job due to a recent Welfare reform. So she goes out into the â€Å"shark eat shark world† to see if should could survive in America. In her journey she attempts to live in Key West, Maine, and Minnesota. See more: how to write an analysis of a research paper In chapter two Ehreneich moves to Maine, she lives in a small cottage and works at small cleaning service during the week. She says, â€Å"†¦Maybe it’s low-wage work in general that has the effect of making Feel like a pariah. When I watch TV over my dinner at night, I see a world in which almost everyone makes $15 an hour or more, and I’m not just thinking of the anchor folks. The sitcoms and dramas are about fashion designers or schoolteachers or lawyers, so it’s easy for a fast-food worker or nurse’s aide to conclude that she is an anomaly — the only one, or almost the only one, who hasn’t been invited to the party. And in a sense she would be right: the poor have disappeared from the culture at large, from its political rhetoric and intellectual endeavors as well as from its daily entertainment. Even religion seems to have little to say about the plight of the poor, if that tent revival was a fair sample. The moneylenders have finally gotten Jesus out of the temple.†(117-118) There are several words that paint a picture in the reader’s head like Pariah, Anomaly, and Plight. The word â€Å"Pariah† makes the reader fell as if the low wageworkers are isolated and casted away from regular society. This quote is extremely powerful it, she makes it seem like  almost nearly everyone has clenched a decent job but a few unfortunate few. Then again when she says that the fast food worker feels like an â€Å"anomaly†. In my mind I saw a nasty picture of middle class and higher-class people partying and the fast food worker sitting off in the corner like an outcast. The last section of the quote I found a bit offensive but it is true. I am not religious at all but to me it sounds like she is saying religion has a factor in what class you belong too. In a sense that is very true a poor family is not going to attend church in some rich neighborhood they do not belong to o. Her message is very true, class does matter and if someone happens to be in the wrong one they could be isolated. In chapter three Ehreneich moves to Minnesota to work at a Wal-Mart, she has the most difficult time finding a steady place to live. Eventually she has to move into a hotel that is too expensive for her budget. The reader can see she is in a dark place when she says, â€Å"What you don’t necessarily realize when you start selling your time by the hour is that what you’re actually selling is your life.† (187). There is a lot of truth in this quote and Ehreneich has experienced it herself. When I read this part of the book it was extremely emotionally because I have a friend that is my age with a kid. He is attending college and working a full time job. I do not know how many hours of sleep he gets a day but I know if he saw this quote he could relate to it. How much is an hour of sleep worth to him? Probably a whole lot since he has to study and provide for a baby. This also ties into the previous quote because a family like this could feel as if they were not â⠂¬Å"invited to the party† which would cause an isolation feeling from the world. Again in chapter two back into the small cottage and the maid job. Ehreneich says, â€Å"I dust a whole shelf of books on pregnancy, breastfeeding, the first six months, the first year, the first two years — and I wonder what the child care-deprived Maddy makes of all this. Maybe there’s been some secret division of the world’s women into breeders and drones, and those at the maid level are no longer supposed to be reproducing at all. Maybe this is why our office manager, Tammy, who was once a maid herself, wears inch-long fake nails and tarty little outfits — to show she’s advanced to the breeder caste and can’t be sent out to clean anymore.†(82) Wow, if this does not  bring our Ehreneich’s idea of isolation I do not know what does. Maids do not make a whole lot of money that is why she was working this job in the first place. To say they are not suppose to have children is a horrible thing but it brings up the idea of isolation because maid’s probably have trouble providing for themselves so why should they bring someone else into a life of struggle? Ehreneich’s words leap out of the page and come to life. Words like â€Å"breeder† and â€Å"drone† hurt to read because these people are so much more than that. I have had friends that have had children at a young age, they are not maids but they are in a similar situation. This quote hit close to home to me. Nickel and Dimed on (not) Getting by in America is truly a powerful and emotional book. It opened my eyes. Her overall message that people cannot make it on a minimal wage job is true, they are isolated from the rest of the word. It seems as if in these last few years that the gap between rich and poor has grown to far to cross. How can we change this?

Bite Me: A Love Story Chapter 3

3. The Samurai of Jackson Street TOMMY When he first arrived in San Francisco, Tommy Flood had shared a closet-size room with five Chinese men named Wong, all of whom had wanted to marry him. â€Å"It's horrible-like being packed into a take-out box of Kung Pao chicken,† Tommy had said, and although it wasn't like that at all, and Tommy was just trying to use colorful language which he felt was his duty as a writer, it was very crowded and smelled strongly of garlic and sweaty Chinese guys. â€Å"I think they want to pack my fudge,† Tommy had said. â€Å"I'm from Indiana, we don't go for that kind of stuff.† As it turned out, the Chinese guys didn't go for that kind of stuff either, but were, in fact, very much interested in getting green cards. Fortunately, only a week later, in the parking lot of the Marina Safeway where he worked nights, Tommy met a gorgeous redhead named Jody Stroud, who rescued him from his confinement with the Chinese guys, by giving him her love, a nice loft apartment, and immortality. Unfortunately, little more than a month after that, their minion, Abby, had them bronzed while they slept, and Tommy awoke one night to find that despite his great vampire strength, he couldn't move a muscle. â€Å"I'd rather be trapped in a take-out box of Kung Pao chicken,† Tommy would have said if he could have said anything, which he couldn't. Meanwhile, right next to him, sharing the same bronze shell, his beloved Jody drifted in a dream-state, a side effect of being able to turn herself to mist, a trick she had learned from Elijah Ben Sapir, her vampire sire. Between the dead sleep of daylight, and the floating in a dream-world, she could endure decades inside the statue. Tommy, however, had never learned how to turn to mist. There had never been time to teach him. So come sundown, his vampire senses came on like neon, and he experienced every second of his confinement with an electric intensity that nearly had him vibrating in his shell-an alpha predator pacing the cage of his mind and shredding his reason. Of course, he did the only thing he could do: he went barking at the moon mad. CHET He'd have to lick about a mile of kitty-butt to get the taste of meter maid out of his mouth, but Chet was up for it. He raked a couple of hind-leg kicks through the dust that was the meter maid's remains, and headed across the street and into the alley, where he curled up in the dark and set about blunting the human taste. It was only a little over a month since the old vampire had turned Chet, but already he was losing all sense of his former self. Time was, that he spent his days on Market Street, napping next to William, the homeless man who made his living with a paper cup and a sign that said, I AM HOMELESS AND MY CAT IS HUGE. Chet was indeed very large, and while much of his volume had been fur, he had achieved a weight of thirty-five pounds on a diet of semi-used hamburgers and French fries donated by passersby outside of McDonald's. Now Chet hunted the night, taking down nearly any warm-blooded creature he encountered: rats, birds, squirrels, cats, dogs, and even the occasional human. At first it had only been drunks and other homeless, and the first time he had drained one, his old friend William, who turned to dust in front of him, Chet yowled, ran, and hid under a Dumpster for the rest of the night and all of the next day. There was no regret, simply hunger and elation of the blood rush. It was beyond the satisfaction of the kill, it was positively sexual, something Chet had never known as a normal cat, as he'd been neutered by the animal shelter when still a kitten. But along with speed, strength, and senses far more sensitive than even a human-based vampire, Chet, like his human counterparts, found that he was physically restored to perfection. In other words, his junk was working. He found that soon after the kill he desperately needed to hump something, and the more squirmy and wailing, the better. Above the smells of bus fumes, cooking food, and urine-bathed curbs that pervaded the City, he caught the scent of a female in heat. She might be a mile away, but given his newly heightened senses, he'd find her. A wave of excitement undulated under the fur of his spine, fur that had mostly grown back since the humans had shaved him, mated in front of him, and drank his blood, which served to traumatize his little kitty consciousness before he was turned vampire, and motivated a whole new feeling he'd grown into as a vampire cat: vengeance. For since his metamorphosis, it wasn't just his senses that had expanded. His brain, which before had run a loop of â€Å"eat-nap-crap, repeat,† was now growing into a whole new awareness, getting bigger, even as Chet grew. He was a good sixty pounds now, and roughly as smart as a dog, where before he'd only been a little brighter than a brick. Dog. The hated. There was dog on the air. Coming closer. He could smell it-them-two of them. And now he could hear them. He arose from his butt bath and screeched like an electrified lynx. In response, the neighborhood echoed with a chorus of yowls from a dozen other vampire cats. THE EMPEROR â€Å"Steady, fellows,† said the Emperor. He laid his hand across the neck of the golden retriever and scratched under the chin of the Boston terrier, who squirmed in the great pocket of the Emperor's overcoat, looking like a frantic, black-and-white, bug-eyed kangaroo mutant. â€Å"Cat! Cat! Cat! Cat! Cat!† barked Bummer, with a spray of doggie slobber across the Emperor's palm. â€Å"Cat! Murder, pain, fire, evil, cat! Can't you smell them? Everywhere! Must chase, chase, chase, bite, bite, bite, let me go you insane, oblivious old man, I'm trying to save you, for the love of God, CAT! CAT! CAT!† Unfortunately, Bummer only spoke dog, and while the Emperor could tell that the Boston terrier was upset, he had no idea why. (Anyone who translates dog knows that only about a third of what Bummer said actually meant anything. The rest was just noise he needed to make. Human speech is about the same.) Lazarus, the golden retriever, having battled vampires on and off for the last two months, and being steady by nature, was much calmer about the whole thing, but despite Bummer's tendency to overreact, he had to admit, the smell of cat was tall in the air, and what was more disturbing, it wasn't just cat, it was dead cat. Dead cat walking. Wait, what was that? Not cat-cats. Oh, this was not good. â€Å"He's right about the cat,† Lazarus ruffed, nudging the Emperor's leg. â€Å"We should get out of this neighborhood, maybe go over to North Beach and see if anyone dropped a beef jerky or something. I could sure use a beef jerky. Or we can stay and die. Whatever. I'm good with it.† â€Å"Easy, men,† said the Emperor, alert now that something was amiss. He knelt down, his knees creaking like rusted hinges, and as he looked around, kneaded the spot between Bummer's ears as if he were readying to make doggy-brain biscuits. He was a great, woolly, thunderstorm of a man-broad shouldered and gray bearded, fine witted and fiercely loyal to the people of his city. He had lived on the streets of San Francisco as long as anyone could remember, and while tourists saw him as a raggedy, homeless wretch, the locals viewed him as a fixture, a rolling landmark, a spirit, and a conscience, and for the most part, treated him with the deference they might pay royalty, despite the fact that he was a raving loon. The street was deserted, but a half a block away the Emperor saw the three-wheeled cart of an S.F.P.D. parking enforcement officer, stopped behind an illegally parked Audi. The cart's rotating yellow caution lights chased themselves around the surrounding buildings like drunken, jaundiced Tinkerbells, but there was no officer in sight. â€Å"Strange. It's long past time when a meter maid should be working. Perhaps we should investigate, gents.† But before he could stand, Bummer leapt out of the Emperor's pocket and made a beeline for the cart, trumpeting himself into the charge with a staccato barking fit. Lazarus took off after the black-and-white fur-rocket, and the old man ambled along behind, as fast as his great, arthritic legs would carry him. They found Bummer on the far side of the Audi, snorting and snuffling inside an empty police uniform, and covered with a fine gray powder. The Emperor's eyes went wide. He backed across the sidewalk and stood against the fire door of one of the industrial lofts that lined the street. He had seen this before. He knew the signs. But when he had seen the old vampire and his companions board an enormous yacht in the Bay over a month ago, he thought his city rid of the bloodsucking fiends. What now? There was a crackling static noise from the police cart: a radio. Call it in. Alert his people to the danger. He rolled to the cart, fumbled with the door catch, and reached for the microphone. â€Å"Hello,† he said into the microphone. â€Å"This is the Emperor of San Francisco, Emperor of San Francisco, protector of Alcatraz, Sausalito, and Treasure Island, and I'd like to report a vampire.† The radio continued to crackle and distant voices ghosted through the ether, uninterrupted. Lazarus padded to the old man's side and barked furiously, â€Å"You have to push the button. You have to push the button.† Unfortunately, while the noble retriever understood English, he only spoke dog, and the Emperor did not get the instruction. â€Å"Button! Button! Button! Button!† Bummer barked, springing up and down in front of the police cart. He scurried around to the door and jumped in on the Emperor's lap to show him. â€Å"Yeah, that helps,† growled Lazarus sarcastically. Golden retrievers are not a very sarcastic breed, and he felt a little ashamed and, well, catlike, using that tone of voice. â€Å"Okay. Button! Button! Button! Uh-oh.† â€Å"Button! Button! Button! Uh-oh, what?† barked Bummer. A short ruff from the retriever: â€Å"Cat.† Lazarus boiled out a low growl and laid his ears back against his head. The Emperor saw two of them: cats, coming down the sidewalk toward them. But they didn't look quite natural. The light from the police cart was reflecting back from the cats' eyes like red coals. A screech, there were two more coming across the street. Lazarus turned to face them, snarling now. A chorus of hisses from behind. The Emperor looked in the rearview mirror to see three more cats stalking from behind. â€Å"Quick, Lazarus, in the cart. Up, boy, in the cart.† Lazarus was spinning now, trying to watch all of the cats at once, warning them off with bared teeth and bristled hair. But the cats came on, baring their own teeth. â€Å"Come now,† said the Emperor into the microphone. Something landed hard on the roof of the cart and Bummer yelped. Another thump and the Emperor looked back to see a large cat in the bed of the cart, coming up on two legs and trying to claw around the back window. The old man pulled the door shut. â€Å"Run, Lazarus, run!† Lazarus caught the first cat in his jaws and was shaking it furiously when the rest fell upon him. STEVE â€Å"There's nefarious shit afoot, Foo,† said Abby. â€Å"Bring portable sun and fry these nosferatu kitties before they nom everyone in the ‘hood.† Steven â€Å"Foo Dog† Wong had no idea what his girlfriend, Abby, was talking about, and it wasn't the first time. In fact, much of the time he had no idea what she was talking about, but he had learned if he was patient, and listened, and more important, agreed with her, she would mercilessly sex him up, which he liked quite a bit, and occasionally he got the message. He used the same strategy with his maternal grandmother (without the sexing-up part), who spoke an obscure, country dialect of Cantonese, that sounded to the uninitiated like someone beating a chicken to death with a banjo. Just wait, and all would become clear. This time, however, Abby, whose tone ran from tragically romantic to passionately dismissive, was sounding much more urgent, and the patience gambit wasn't going to work. Her voice in his Bluetooth headset was like having a malevolent fairy bite his ear. â€Å"I'm in the middle of something, Abby. I'll be home as soon as I finish up here.† â€Å"Now, Foo. There's a herd, or flock, or a-what do you call a bunch of kitties?† â€Å"A box?† Foo offered. â€Å"Fucktard!† â€Å"A fucktard of kitties? Okay, sure, that could be it. A pride of lions, a murder of crows†¦Ã¢â‚¬  â€Å"No. You fucktard! There's a bunch of vampire kitties about to eat that crazy Emperor guy and his dogs right outside on the street. You need to come save them.† â€Å"A bunch?† Steve was having a hard time getting his head around the idea. He'd only recently gotten his head around the idea of one vampire cat, but a bunch, well, that was more. He was just a couple of months away from having his master's in biochem at age twenty-one-he wasn't a fucktard. â€Å"Define a bunch,† he said. â€Å"Many. I can't count them because they're stalking the golden retriever.† â€Å"And how do you know they're vampire kitties?† â€Å"Oh, because I drew blood samples from them, ran it in that centrifuge thingy of yours, prepared some slides, and looked at the blood cell structure under a microscope, duh?† â€Å"No, really,† he said. She was flunking high school biology, there's no way she prepared blood slides. And besides- â€Å"Of course not, you douche nozzle, I know they're vampires because they're stalking a golden retriever and a homeless fuck who's hiding in the vaporized meter maid's cart. That's not standard kitty behavior.† â€Å"Vaporized meter maid?† â€Å"The one Chet ate-sucked her to dust. Come now, Foo, turn your sunbeam full-on and get your luscious ninja ass over here.† Steve had rigged the hatchback of his tricked-out Honda Civic with high intensity UV floodlights, which he'd used to flash fry a number of vampires, thus saving Abby and, for the first time in his life, having a girlfriend and someone who thought he was cool. â€Å"I can't come right away, Abby. The sun lights aren't in the car.† â€Å"Oh my fucking God, there's some little old guy with a cane coming out of the alley. Well, he's toast. Fuck!† â€Å"What?† â€Å"Fuck!† â€Å"What?† â€Å"Oh fuck!† â€Å"What? What? What?† â€Å"Oh-my-fucking-god-ponies-on-a-stick!† â€Å"Abby, you need to be more specific.† â€Å"It's not a cane, Foo, it's a sword.† â€Å"What?† â€Å"Come now, Foo. Bring the sun.† â€Å"I can't, Abby. My car is full of rats.† THE EMPEROR The Emperor watched in horror as the cats leapt onto the back of his noble captain, Lazarus. The golden retriever shook himself violently, dislodging two of the fiends, but they were replaced by two more, and three more leapt on top of them, nearly bringing Lazarus to the ground. But they weren't pack hunters, and as each maneuvered for the throat, another attacker was pushed off, his claws shredding both predator and prey as he fell. Blood splattered the windscreen of the police cart. Bummer bounced around inside the tiny cabin, barking and snorting, and throwing himself against the glass, covering everything with angry dog slobber. â€Å"Run, Lazarus, run!† The Emperor pounded on the glass, then pushed his forehead against it as he tried to squint back tears of anguish and frustration. â€Å"No!† He would not do it. He would not watch his companion slaughtered. Outrage filled the ancient, boiler-tank of a man and condensed to courage. He was fighting the door latch when half a cat hit the side window and slid down trailing gore. The door handle snapped off in his hand and he threw it to the floor of the cart. Bummer immediately attacked it and broke a tooth on the metal. Through the haze of blood spray, the Emperor could see another figure in the street. A boy-no, a man, but a small man, Asian-wearing a fluorescent orange porkpie hat and socks, tight plaid trousers that looked as if they'd been teleported out of the 1960s, and a gray cardigan sweater. The little man was brandishing a samurai sword, bringing it down again and again on Lazarus in quick snapping motions, but before he could cry out, the Emperor saw that the sword wasn't even grazing the retriever's coat. With each stroke one of the cats fell away, beheaded or cut in half, both halves squirming on the pavement. There was no spinning, no wind-up or flourish to the swordsman's movements, just grim efficiency, like a chef chopping vegetables. As his targets moved, he pivoted and stepped just enough to deliver the cut, then snapped the blade back and sent it to its next destination. The weight and fury removed from his back, Lazarus looked around and whimpered, which translated to: â€Å"Whaaa-?† The swordsman was relentless, step, cut, step, cut. Two cats came at him from under a Volvo and he quickly retreated and swung the sword in a quick, low arc that approximated a golf stroke and sent their heads back over the car to bounce off a metal garage door. â€Å"Behind!† the Emperor warned. But it was too late. The low attack had thrown the swordsman off-a heavy-bodied Siamese cat launched itself from the roof of a van across the street and landed on the little man's back. The long sword was useless at such close range. The swordsman arched in pain, even as the Siamese clawed its way up his back. He spun, then threw his feet out before him and fell hard on his back, but the Siamese took the impact and dug its fangs into the swordsman's shoulder. A half-dozen vampire cats came scurrying out from under cars toward the struggling swordsman. Lazarus, his fur matted with blood, caught one of the cats by the haunch and bit to the bone. The cat screamed and squirmed in the retriever's jaws, trying to claw his eyes. The others fell on the swordsman with fang and claw. The Emperor threw his shoulder against the Plexiglas door of the police cart, but there was no room to move, to gain momentum, and while the entire cart rocked and went up on two wheels under his weight, the door latch would not give. He watched in horror as the swordsman writhed under his attackers. The Emperor heard a steel fire door hitting brick and light spilled across the sidewalk and into the street. Out of the doorway ran a thin, impossibly pale girl with lavender pigtails wearing pink motocross boots, pink fishnet stockings, a green plastic skirt, wraparound sunglasses, and a black leather jacket that looked studded with glass. Before he could warn her, the girl ran into the street and shouted, â€Å"You motherfucking kitties need to step the fuck off!† The vampire cats attacking the swordsman looked up and hissed, which translated from vampire cat, meant: â€Å"Whaaa-?† She ran right at the swordsman, waving her arms as if shooing birds or trying to dry some particularly stubborn nail polish and screaming like a madwoman. The cats turned their attention to her, and were crouching, readying to leap, when her jacket lit up like the sun. There was a collective screech of agony from the vampire cats as all around the street, cats and cat parts smoked, then ignited. Burning cats made for the alley across the street or tried to hide under cars, but the thin girl ran after them, darting here and there, until each ignited, then burned and reduced itself first to a bubbling puddle of fur and goo, and finally, a pile of fine ash. In less than a minute, the street was quiet again. The lights on the girl's jacket went dark. The swordsman climbed to his feet and fitted his orange porkpie hat back on his head. He was bleeding from spots on his back and arms, and there was blood on his plaid pants and orange socks, but whether it was his or the cats' was impossible to tell. He stood before the thin girl and bowed deeply. â€Å"Domo arigato,† he said, keeping his eyes at her feet. â€Å"Dozo,† said the girl. â€Å"Your kitty-slaying skills are, if I may say so, the shit.† The swordsman bowed again, short and shallow, then turned and trotted across the street, down the alley, and out of sight. Lazarus was digging at the Plexiglas door of the police cart with the pads of his paws, as if he might polish his way through to release his master. Abby scratched his nose, nearly the only part of him not covered in blood, and opened the door. â€Å"Hey,† she said. â€Å"Hey,† said the Emperor. He stepped out of the cart and looked around. The street was painted with blood for half a block, punctuated by piles of ash and the occasional charred flea collar. Parked cars were sprayed in red mist, even the security lights above several fire doors were speckled with gore. Acrid smoke from burning cats hung low in the air, and on the sidewalk greasy gray ash spilled out of the sleeves and collar of the parking officer's uniform. â€Å"Well, you don't see that every day,† said the Emperor, as a police cruiser rounded the corner, the red and blue lights raking the building. The cruiser stopped and doors flew open. The driver stood behind his door, his hand on his gun. â€Å"What's going on here?† he said, trying to keep his eyes on the Emperor and not look at the carnage that surrounded them. â€Å"Nothing,† Abby said.