Like most public radio listeners I look upon the twice-yearly pledge drives as a nuisance. A functional, necessary nuisance, but a nuisance nonetheless. I hate having my daily NPR fix interrupted by the pledge drive and spend much of my time during pledge week shouting at the radio in an attempt to get more people to pledge more money so you can get back to regular programming.

During the last pledge drive, however, I’ve discovered a new love for the constant talk and interruptions.

I work in a veterinary hospital. Usually we have the radio on in our surgical recovery area, both for our sake and because often music is calming to patients recovering from anesthesia. On the Tuesday of the spring pledge drive we had a dog that was howling during her anesthetic recovery. This is normal in some patients, but the consistent and regular howling…..well it starts to get to you after a while.
We discovered that this particular dog would stop howling if we spoke to her. A short conversation would result in a few minutes of very welcome relief. But we couldn’t spare someone from their regular duties to stand in front of the kennel and talk to the dog until she was completely conscious.
So we thought of the pledge drive.
We put the radio in front of the dog’s kennel, turned the volume up a wee bit, and viola!

Auditory anesthesia for the dog, peace and quiet for us. You have our sincerest thanks (and a small addition to my regular spring pledge).

Sincerely,

Margaret