Serving Hohenwald, Lewis County Tennessee Since 1898
Serving Hohenwald, Lewis County Tennessee Since 1898
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“Time Enough at Last.” The new year reminds me of that classic “Twilight Zone” episode starring Burgess Meredith as a put-upon bookworm. (No, he wasn’t reading on the wing of an airplane! Get your episodes straight, with “The Twilight Zone Companion,” for Pete’s sake!) True bibliophiles are all the same. Whether our preference is studying the rise and fall of empires or the rise and fall of heaving bosoms, we eagerly anticipate how many volumes we can absorb in the pristine, wide-open next...
I won’t hazard a guess as to whether it achieves immortality like “grassy knoll” or “hanging chads,” but surely the phrase “bomb cyclone storm” will remain in the public consciousness of those who endured its cruelties. We’ll laugh about this someday, but right now an awful lot of Americans have a “single digit” they’d like to give right back to Mother Nature. And we’re not exactly chummy with 2022, which on its way out is taunting us with, “Bet now you wish you had bought the extended warra...
As I write this year-end essay about 2022 trends in food and dining, I must confess that I’m playing catch-up. I have obligations and hobbies, so I wasn’t TECHNICALLY paying attention (i.e., giving a rat’s rump) as 12 months of decadent delights, culinary controversies and avocado abominations unfolded. (“Homo sapiens still ingest food? What about that crazy ‘opposable thumbs’ fad? How long did THAT last?”) Okay, I WAS narrowly focused on one aspect of food. I spent several months attempting to...
When writing advertising copy, I sometimes find myself desperately searching for a zinger of a tag line --and settling for trite admonitions such as “Make this the best hunting season ever” or “Make this the best summer vacation ever.” I despise such capitulations to deadlines, because listeners with terminal illnesses, maxed-out credit cards or fruitless marriage counseling sessions may perceive the sentiments as glib or clueless. Never is the situation more danger-fraught than at Christmas. A...
Saint Nick wasn’t the only man in a red suit that magical Christmas season 50 years ago. On Saturday December 23, 1972, I walked from my house to Sharp’s Drive-In Market and splurged on four 20-cent comic books. One of my selections was heavily influenced by an ad appearing in DC Comics: “Coming in December…DC’s Christmas gift to you! Shazam is coming!” I could scarcely wait to rush home and open my copy of “Shazam!” #1. Unfortunately, my gut reaction upon seeing the interior artwork was, “What...
It has been years since my family last dealt with the “pictures with Santa” pageantry, but Saint Nick impersonators remain an integral part of Christmas for Americans. Parents feel compelled to honor the tradition of dumping tiny tots in Santa’s lap, even if they’re not emotionally ready for the experience. I wish I hadn’t sold my Child Psychology textbook back to the college bookstore, or I would explain why kids who think nothing of sticking a fork in an electrical outlet or inviting...
“Do you mind if we have leftovers?” When my wife poses that question, I always answer, “No, that’s fine,” because (a) I genuinely enjoy leftovers, (b) I don’t want to cause extra trouble for her and (c) I can’t afford the airline tickets to transport a Tupperware container of six-day-old broccoli to all those “starving children on the other side of the world who would give their right arm for a fraction of the food you and your siblings are wasting.” Unless I redeem my “frequent guilt t...
Please pardon me, but I am always overcome by mawkish sentimentality at this time of year. I cannot contain my gratitude. I am thankful for a paycheck and sunsets and modern plumbing and mobility and rainbows and warm clothing and good friends and conjunctions and… I am thankful that I can do anything you can do better, I can do anything better than you – except get $%&# show tunes out of my head. I am thankful for eight-month tick-and-flea collars, because the traumatic monthly sprayings do not...
My cousin’s husband owns a funeral home, so I’m anxious to hear his take on a front-page article from the November 4 “Wall Street Journal.” According to the article, morticians are innovating ways to put the “fun” in funeral (including burial plot raffles and “open house” family events featuring food, live music and bouncy houses) – or maybe it was putting the “monument” in monumentally screwed up ideas! I get those mixed up. The article talked about undertakers enticing their potential custo...
Murphy’s Law being what it is, whether you’re talking about a surprise party, a romantic getaway or visiting an acquaintance in the hospital, good intentions don’t always pan out. The same goes for the intention to carry out a proper observation of Veterans Day. Sometimes work/family obligations, ill health or inclement weather stand in the way of attending a public ceremony honoring our nation’s veterans. “Maybe next year” is the lament of too many of us. Imagine my delight when a Google search...
I’m proud of my son Gideon for doing his civic duty and casting a vote for the first time. (This comes mere months after he did his civic duty and signed up for Selective Service. And, would you believe it, not one of the candidates for dogcatcher was remotely prepared to answer his questions about their position on reinstating the draft! What has become of the true statesmen???) It was an especially meaningful milestone because local early voting takes place at the multi-use building that forme...
“Were you raised in a barn?” I never had the legendary Mrs. Montgomery as a teacher; but she was a senior class adviser and I needed her input on a school program script, so I made the rookie mistake of assuming her wide-open door meant I could forego the formality of knocking. Thus, the piercing glare and the intimidating inquiry about sharing living quarters with cattle, swine and the occasional hobo (who was presumably condemned to a vagrant lifestyle because he insisted on CHEWING GUM IN...
I didn’t watch all of them from the very beginning, but several significant TV shows debuted in the fall of 1972. “The Bob Newhart Show” starred Bob Newhart (who turned 93 on September 5) as psychologist Bob Hartley. Bob’s trademark stammer didn’t seem all that noticeable to me. I was just starting junior high school and being at a loss for words was par for the course around the ninth-grade girls. I imagined lying face-down on Bob’s couch to hide the zits. If Bob had added a P.E. climbing ro...
When does a 500th anniversary require an asterisk? If you’re a fan of trivia and myth-busting, you’ve doubtless heard umpteen repetitions of “George Washington didn’t really have wooden teeth,” “Napoleon wasn’t short,” “Lemmings don’t commit mass suicide” and “Ferdinand Magellan didn’t sail all the way around the world.” Sure enough, Magellan was killed two years into the three-year voyage to circumnavigate the globe. (That probably saved him from an ugly scene at home. Before he set sail, h...
Believe it or not, August 31 is the 25th anniversary of the traffic accident that robbed the world of the effervescent Diana, Princess of Wales. Diana was a distant, distant cousin (my great-great grandfather Tyree married Mary Ann Spencer a century before I was born); but even without that connection, I feel compelled to dedicate this week’s column to drawing a few lessons from her too-brief life. The philosophy “Seemed like a good idea at the time” sums up so much of her public career. In re...
“Anxious parents are no longer allowing their kids to go to slumber parties,” announced a blurb in the August 16 “New York Post.” Slumber parties are not usually one of the top subjects on my mind in the morning (“Got my keys, got my snack, got my wallet, got a great ‘is your refrigerator running?’ joke to share…”), so I was surprised to learn that 12.3 million parents participate in the #NoSleepovers movement online. (Boy, I’m old. I remember when Arte Johnson popularized “Blow in my ear and...
My family made a recent day trip to a neighboring state, so I decided this week’s column should be a tip of the hat to those oases of the interstate highway system, the state welcome centers. Whether you’re a vacationer, traveling businessperson, truckdriver or zip-across-the-state-line shopper, welcome centers are a great place to “stretch your legs,” “wet your whistle,” “get the lay of the land” and discover other activities that keep the quotation-marks industry trouncing the brackets indust...
“Memories/Light the corners of my mind…” – as sung by Barbra Streisand. While grocery shopping with my mother in the 1970s, I enjoyed peeking at the “Golden Age” Sunday comics in “Good Old Days” magazine and developing an appreciation of the cartoon antics my father remembered from his boyhood. In the early 1980s, as part of a school magazine fundraiser, my (then-future) wife wheedled her grandfather into purchasing a much-enjoyed subscription to “Reminisce.” I am overjoyed that these two maga...
According to the National Gardening Association, the number of households growing their own vegetables, fruit and other foods has tripled since 2008. (Coincidentally, the number of households stocking up on earplugs to keep from hearing neighbors brag about growing their own vegetables, fruit and other foods has also tripled since 2008. But I digress.) Since last year alone, multi-family community gardens have increased by 22 percent. Such gardens would spread even faster if organizers could...
According to the Washington Examiner, 2022 has handed New York City an alarming spike in citizen complaints about outdoor odors (“I hope you appreciate me doing my civic duty. It’s not easy to use a cellphone to make a 311 call and publicly urinate at the same time. Oops…sorry, graffiti.”) Mayor Eric Adams has promised a new garbage bin program, brand-new street sweepers and additional restrooms; but I wonder how committed he truly is. Adams is on the record opining that the main thing HE smells...
Trust me when I declare that I am not competing for sympathy against folks suffering from cancer, blocked arteries, diabetes or other serious ailments. I do nonetheless think that my body is out to get me. And not just with the chronic aches, pains and wrinkles that accompany normal aging. No, my body perpetrates fiendishly clever assaults on my comfort and dignity. (Misery loves company, so you may be yelling, “Too much information!” as this essay assaults your own comfort and dignity.) I am...
The front page of the July 8, 1947 “Roswell (New Mexico) Daily Record” seized the American imagination with the headline “RAAF (Roswell Army Air Field) Captures Flying Saucer.” That announcement added fuel to the saucer craze of summer 1947 (“Keep your raccoon coats, grandpa – we’ve got Martians!”); but to the disappointment of believers in extraterrestrial visitors, the military issued a retraction the very next day, asserting that the debris found by rancher W.W. “Mac” Brazel was merely a...
You’ve probably seen the screaming headlines about a Gallup survey revealing that Americans’ belief in God has hit an all-time low. I’m not here to quibble with the atheists, agnostics and alternate-spirituality practitioners who answered the survey. No, I’m just flummoxed by subsets of the supposedly pro-God respondents. You see, the survey also branched into questions about prayer. Of the 81% of Americans who conceded still believing in God, 28 percent said He hears prayers but cannot interve...
“Did you know that your rear passenger tire is a little underinflated?” I harbor a grudging appreciation for a potentially life-saving hint like that. I mean, it makes me feel like an IDIOT that I can stare at the tire, repeatedly kick it and still need a gauge to verify what someone standing 150 yards away in a hailstorm recognized immediately; but I do swallow my pride and express gratitude. Not so much with “Hey, you got your ears lowered” and other impertinent observations. I suffere...
Wow! Will this really be my 19th Father’s Day as a father? My biggest regret is that I’ve had to learn so much the hard way. To make life easier for other fathers and prospective fathers, I’m sharing reader-submitted pearls of wisdom: Resign yourself to the fact that the mother of your progeny will probably never admit that you deserved an epidural for the paper cut you suffered from the Lamaze brochure. Remember that whatever doesn’t kill you only makes you available to encounter the NEXT co...
