Serving Hohenwald, Lewis County Tennessee Since 1898
Serving Hohenwald, Lewis County Tennessee Since 1898
Sorted by date Results 51 - 75 of 191
“We are the Cubs from Den 3/And no one could be prouder/If you cannot hear our shout/We’ll yell a little LOUDER.” That chant from my Cub Scout pack-meeting days comes to mind as I explore the issue of moderation-challenged speakers, or, as the prestigious American Psychiatric Association clinically labels them, “bozos who wouldn’t know an indoor voice if it bit them on the rear.” Surely you could name some loud talkers. Maybe you ARE a loud talker. When you overhear people whispering...
When I was a young adult living under my parents’ roof, my late father always made sure I had Beanee Weenees, Vienna sausage, potted meat and other such snacks to take to my graveyard-shift factory job. Of course, I appreciated the display of paternal love; but Chris van Tulleken, author of “Ultra-Processed People,” would probably be aghast. Granted, van Tulleken is not alone in sounding alarm bells about today’s ultra-processed foods -- groceries characterized by arm-long lists of additiv...
“Because I could not stop for cataracts, they kindly stopped for me.” Someday I hope to find time to luxuriate in the collected works of poets such as Emily Dickinson – on paper, not as an audiobook -- so my ears perked up when my recent eye exam revealed the early stages of cataracts in both eyes. (There’s a tiny hemorrhage in each of my peepers as well, but cataracts have center stage for this week’s column.) Don’t worry. The optometrist estimated I have five to 10 years until the cataracts w...
Maybe it’s a good thing that my teenage dream of becoming a TV programmer never materialized. Analysts have regarded the over-the-air free TV networks as dinosaurs for years, but now even the cable channels and streaming services are watching over their shoulders for asteroids. Oh, the new Golden Age was nice while it lasted – with companies trumpeting ambitious 5-year plans for special-effects-heavy prestige projects, offering new life to niche programs dumped by the traditional networks and...
It’s difficult to wrap my mind around it, but this will be my 20th Father’s Day as a father. All of those third Sundays in June have blurred together, but I certainly have warm memories of son Gideon’s everyday march toward adulthood. (He marched. I hopped -- because of %$#@ plastic toys on the carpet.) Ah, the embarrassing anecdotes I can someday share with my theoretical grandchildren! Once upon a time, Gideon made a journal entry about a visit to the farmers cooperative where I work. The entr...
I shudder to imagine how Aunt Marie (God rest her soul) would react to today’s explosion of expectations for tipping. Even back in pre-inflationary times, Aunt Marie (who always worked hard for her money) was prone to greet hints for gratuities with a cranky, “I’ll give ‘em a dadgum tip, alright!” (With the understanding that she meant a teeth-jarring tip upside the head.) Unless you’ve been living in a cave, you know that more and more venues and occupations are pushing for tips and that bare-m...
I still remember one of the houses that my parents ALMOST bought back in 1970. The domicile was memorable because it was right next door to the Hi-Way 50 Drive-in Theater and filled my young mind with impractical daydreams of watching free movies from across the fence. Impractical, because (a) I couldn’t lip-read and (b) my allowance didn’t allow for enough string to run between a speaker and a tin can. Seven years later, my father did take me to the same drive-in to watch “Star Wars.” And in...
Meme: “A cultural item in the form of an image, video, phrase, etc., that is spread via the internet and often altered in a creative or humorous way,” explains dictionary.com. Some people are mere passive consumers of memes. Others eschew newfangled social media altogether. (“If I can’t get my memes through Bazooka Joe comic strips, shortwave radio and smoke signals, I don’t need them! Do you like that contrarian position? Check yes or no on this piece of notebook paper and pass it back…”) M...
Sometimes it’s difficult to approach news items with the proper balance of bemusement, curiosity and wariness. (Sometimes it’s difficult to approach news items at all, when there are shouts of “When are you going to carry out the garbage?” and “That lawn isn’t going to mow itself!” But I digress.) According to a story at thehill.com, After School Satan Clubs have been growing like the Dickens since their establishment at the beginning of 2020. The clubs are associated with the Satanic Temple (“f...
As Mother’s Day approaches, it is appropriate that we discuss the physical characteristics, personality traits, coping mechanisms, etiquette rules, life ambitions, etcetera that we inherited from our mothers. Let’s discuss it in hushed tones, though. We don’t want Uncle Sam salivating over a new type of inheritance tax. (“Who needs Chinese loans? We’ve got dimples, lasagna recipes and heirloom Tupperware! KA-CHING!”) I inherited my soft spot for stray animals from my mother. And when confro...
“An allergy season so bad you don’t need allergies to feel miserable,” blared the headline in the Wall Street Journal. My own symptoms are relatively mild, but they do exist. I feel your pain. Especially if we get in a tug-of-war and you pull an entire Costco display of apocalypse-size Kleenex down on top of both of us. Even though we all know someone gulping down over-the-counter antihistamines or scheduling a doctor’s visit, statistics for allergy sufferers are probably vastly underst...
My brother the former Babe Ruth Leaguer remains deeply skeptical of Major League Baseball’s newly instituted pitch clock. He is not alone in regarding the sport’s leisurely pace as an integral part of its charm; but many analysts cheer any attempt to trim the bloated runtime of modern games. “Field of Dreams” leaves older fans misty-eyed, but if you can erect a skyscraper on the field in the time it takes to play a double-header, “America’s Pastime” is not going to hit a homerun with younger...
Folks, “last one in is a rotten egg” applies to more than swimming pools. If you share sleeping quarters with a spouse or Significant Other, I urge you to expedite the toothbrushing process, throw on your PJs or nightie with breakneck speed and be the first person under the sheet. Because the first one in bed apparently has dibs on The Paranormal Pillow. I call it The Paranormal Pillow because it sounds classier than Memory Foam on Steroids. If one partner stays up late doing chores or che...
Right now, the land echoes with songs such as “Power in the Blood” and “Because He Lives,” but past performance assures me that the ditty waiting in the wings is (apologies to Alice Cooper) “God’s Out For Summer.” Yes, countless people (whether unchurched or nominally religious) are counting down the days until Easter goes hopping down the bunny trail for another year. Admittedly, these folks have endured four or five stressful months. Sure, there have been talking snowmen, Cupid and green bee...
“No wife of mine will ever have to work outside the home if she doesn’t want to.” I uttered that cocky, naïve declaration five years before meeting my wife and 11 years before getting married. Cold, hard reality forced us both to bring in paychecks and juggle household duties. (Well, we weren’t always home; sometimes we spied on the rich folks as they enjoyed the decadence of ramen noodles and milk crate furniture.) Today many couples are crunching the numbers and finding ways to survive...
Everyone should do it at least once in their life. Speak on the radio, I mean. While promoting my new book (search for my name on Amazon if you’re curious), I had the honor of being interviewed live (via telephone) on Nashville’s Super Talk 99.7. (Not that I haven’t broadcast live from a studio before. Forty-something years ago, my career as a DJ came to a screeching halt after a single comedy-of-errors weekend. In the weeks following that catastrophe, when the word “frequency” came up locall...
I am definitely a product of the great American melting pot, but on both sides of the family, a Scots-Irish ancestry is prominent (Some distant cousin with too much time on his hands traced my mother’s maternal grandmother’s line back to 1557 in Ireland. But come to think of it, if the distant cousin also had too much Guinness beer in his hands while researching genealogy, the family history may only go back to last August in Antarctica instead. No wonder we’ve never had any reunions.) Under...
I’m heartbroken that cartoonist Scott Adams recently self-destructed -- but hold the presses! This big, beautiful world still has plenty of comic strips to tickle our funny bones. Don’t believe me? I crunched the numbers and realized that on a good day, I read some 138 comic strips and panels! (On a GREAT day, I place some 138 comic strips and panels in a folder marked “Tomorrow,” put on my wife’s favorite mood music, go pantsless like Ziggy and…well, this being a family newspaper, never mind....
I just heard about a local business losing a major customer over a trivial misunderstanding. Most of us hate change and maintain loyalty to a brand or retailer through thick and thin. True, this veers into creepiness in extreme cases, such as refusing to outgrow your old pediatrician. (“But I don’t trust anyone else with my ED issues, doc. Do you happen to have a lollipop and the latest ‘Humpty Dumpty’ magazine to ease my mid-life crisis?”) And I know it’s difficult to relinquish trusted law...
I was saddened to hear of the death of Dr. Glenn Himebaugh, co-founder of the journalism department at my alma mater, Middle Tennessee State University. Although I hadn’t kept in touch with Dr. Himebaugh since graduation 40 years ago, I have to wonder what he thought of the current reality and public perception of the journalism field. Sadly, trust in journalism has been underwater in surveys for at least two decades. Whether you attribute it to bias, hubris or groupthink, newspeople (...
Who needs forensics and gunfire? My wife and I have been catching up on episodes of “The Mysteries of Laura,” the 2014-2016 NBC series starring Debra Messing. Forget murders and chases. The real reason the show resonates with me is because as Laura Diamond juggles the duties of a single mother and police detective, she’s understandably a slob with her car. Yes, my poor Altima gets woefully neglected inside and out. It’s a magnet for the abundant tree sap in my yard and the interior is home to...
Let’s face it: not everyone does Valentine’s Day well. A significant number of people are too unromantic, lazy, cheap or unimaginative to make the best of the occasion. Don’t despair if you fall into one of those categories. Some of the most prominent people in history have been romantic duds. For instance… Philosopher René Descartes, who declared, “I think, therefore I am going to break up with her before I have to buy a Valentine’s Day gift.” King Arthur, who fumed, “Isn’t it enough that I s...
Middle-class philanthropy may be dying. Citing a study released by the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy, “National Review” magazine says the share of American households donating to charity nosedived from 66 percent in 2000 to 50 percent in 2018. And only one-third of the decline was directly attributable to economic hardships, with the remainder coming from decreases in interpersonal trust, decline in empathy and an unfortunate “give until it hurts” loophole that lets pe...
According to a recent Wall Street Journal article, the demand for older models in the fashion and cosmetics industries is exploding. Sorry. Perhaps “exploding” is a trigger word. It might give some of the most seasoned models flashbacks of “the rocket’s red glare, bombs bursting in air.” That’s right. When I say “older,” I am not simply referencing hints of gray. Cosmetics juggernaut L’Oréal currently employs Helen Mirren (age 77) and Jane Fonda (age 85), and those celebrities are ju...
It’s an amenity that most consumers take for granted. It’s an amenity that most retailers/professionals grudgingly accept as a cost of doing business. But I simply must salute those businesspeople who provide the miracle of indoor plumbing to their patrons. When traveling or shopping, a restroom can be a lifesaver. We use the euphemism “when Nature calls,” but Nature doesn’t usually phone ahead. It shows up unannounced, kicking the front door in and toting two weeks’ worth of luggage. I...
