Thanks to the caring citizens living in Santa Clara County, the Girl Scouts will be sending more than 40,000 boxes of those irresistible Girl Scout cookies to U.S. military troops overseas. The American Red Cross (Santa Clara Valley Chapter) Operation: Care and Comfort Military Care Package Program sent the first shipment overseas the week of April 25.

The Girl Scouts partnered with Operation: Care and Comfort this cookie season, which ended in Santa Clara County on March 20. The partnership with the American Red Cross made it possible for anyone to purchase cookies and donate their purchase specifically to our troops in Iraq, Afghanistan and the Gulf. The Girl Scouts of Santa Clara County had a goal to send 10,000 boxes of cookies through community donations but they far exceeded that goal with help from the community.

More than 3,500 girls in Santa Clara County took part in making this sweet send off come to life.

Operation: Care and Comfort is an all volunteer program. Since its inception in April 2003, more than 100,000 pounds of care packages have been sent to the conflict regions. For more information about the American Red Cross Operation: Care and Comfort Military Care Package Program, visit www.operationcareandcomfort.org.

Linda Parriott

Girl Scouts of Santa Clara County

Julie DeMaria

ARC Operation: Care and Comfort

San Jose

Mayor shares a
letter from a
constituent

I received the following letter from a young citizen. It made me and each person I've shared it with chuckle. I thought your readers might enjoy it, too. Dear Mayor,

My name is Brad. I am 8 years old. I like to play outside. I am writing because I want to be the mayor. I think your job is an interesting job.

I go to school and do a lot of work. My favorite things are playing with friends, eating ice cream and playing outside on my green machine. A green machine is a bike squished down. Because you are the mayor, can you make more ice cream trucks? Can you cancel the round-abouts? What do you do every day? Do you have a dog? Because I have a dog. What do you do as mayor? What I do as a kid is do a lot of reading and lots of homework. How old are you? When is your birthday? Mine is Sept. 29, 1996.

About how many fans do you have? I have about 20 friends.

Sincerely, Brad

Mike Wasserman

Mayor of Los Gatos

Thanks, Mr. Mayor, and more ice cream trucks sounds like a good idea
to us.