This holiday season, you may be crisscrossing the country by air. Rules change constantly, so my wife Tracy checked the latest and greatest TSA rules for what we could pack. She was reading some of the more bizarre items to me. I thought they would make a good laugh at[Read More…]
Tag: Opinion
LOOSE ENDS: Hurried holidays
Time feels as if it is speeding up. It is common knowledge that this general feeling, of being behind before one has even started, takes over as one ages. Unfortunately after the lengthy siege of various forms of the pandemic, the off-balance feeling that one gets that time is snapping[Read More…]
EDITOR’S COLUMN: The words of 2022
The word “gaslighting” had a 1,740% increase in lookups in 2022, prompting the folks at Merriam-Webster Dictionary to officially deem it the “word of the year.” Gaslighting is defined as “the act or practice of grossly misleading someone especially for one’s own advantage.” It stems from a 1938 movie called[Read More…]
Remembering Mike
Family man, loyal friend, and active community member are only a few of the words describing our community’s most recent loss of a good man. Mike Cook has always been a man behind the scenes in the community, offering his help to family, friends, and many strangers in his longtime[Read More…]
Christmas movies
As you have gathered from some of my other stories, much of my life has been influenced by movies. Seen on either TV repeats, VHS tapes, or now the almost extinct DVD. Tracy and I have most of the Star Wars character lines memorized. An off-hand comment often triggers a[Read More…]
LETTER TO THE EDITOR: Thanks from Michigan hunter
Dear Editor: On Wednesday, Nov. 2, 2022, I strayed northeast of my intended elk hunt drive instead of northwest as discussed in camp. My estimated time of arrival with my other hunters should have been 11:30 a.m. Instead, I continued to walk and hunt into the middle of the afternoon.[Read More…]
LOOSE ENDS: Zoom, Zoom
Traveling to see family during the holidays continues to be a number one priority for so many folks. This results in quite a few unexpected glitches — before, after, and in between travel of any sort. The gradual reopening of popular public destinations for both tourists and locals alike made[Read More…]
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR: Dec 1, 2022
Conservancy District’s lack of transparency troubling Dear Editor: The issues of water security for our community are too important to be decided behind closed doors. As a fiscally conservative citizen and owner of a local business and of water rights, I wonder what other Rio Blanco county citizens think about[Read More…]
EDITOR’S COLUMN: Comfortable history
History never repeats itself, but the Kaleidoscopic combinations of the pictured present often seem to be constructed out of the broken fragments of antique legends. ~ from the novel “The Gilded Age: A Tale of To-Day” by Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner, 1874 There’s something comforting about history, despite[Read More…]
My ancestor invented the Christmas card in England!
OK, I am stretching the truth a bit. Joseph Cundall was my first cousin five times removed and he didn’t design the first card. But he did print the first commercial Christmas postcard for Sir Henry Cole in London in 1843. So, I am almost famous! Old Joe recognized the[Read More…]
EDITOR’S COLUMN: Where have all the spoons gone?
… When I became the sole resident of my household for the first time in 30 years one of the tasks I tackled was a stringent decluttering of my kitchen, including the silverware drawer. No need to keep multiple mismatched sets of forks, knives, and spoons lying around for one[Read More…]
Guest Column: Thanksgiving
As children, we were treated to special fun in November and December. I don’t know what Freud would say about Sugar Plums dancing in my head, but I remember the build up of excitement starting at Thanksgiving. Family traditions and the anticipation of Christmas foods, decorations and toys are a[Read More…]
