October 31, 2003 - From Ms. Mary to CO:
The little bear you let me adopt -- Patriot Bear SIR as he is known around here -- has fit in so well it's hard to believe he has been here only a week. He has taken charge of the top of the bookshelf by making everyone's position official and assigning them various ranks, which gives him great pleasure without causing any trouble because nobody remembers from one day to the next whether they were a general or a private or anything in between. He doesn't remember either, so Patriot Bear SIR gets up every morning and reassigns ranks in whatever order they come to his mind. And, my goodness, what a trooper he is; he still maintains his magnetic salute. He and TaraBear are quite attached to each other; it seems they bonded well during the long journey from Florida to California in my carryon bag. Sometimes TaraBear forgets to say "SIR" after addressing Patriot Bear SIR, but everyone ignores the error because she doesn't do it on purpose, and she is a very small bear with a warm heart and cute little mittens on her cold hands (paws actually, but the Beanie Baby Namers at the Beanie Baby Birthplace kept their paws off the original saying and stuck with "hands").