Columns

For many last week was spring vacation, a time to take a trip or just enjoy family. For me it was a whirlwind of activity I will never forget.I underwent surgery on Wednesday, as the result of falling off my…

Texans are very proud of their state. Before Alaska became a state, Texans would brag about how Texas was the biggest. Texans have a lot to be proud of and usually aren’t shy about sharing that pride. We Michiganders should…

April will arrive Saturday. It’s snowing again… I think we are paying for all of the nice weather we had at the end of February and the beginning of March. Actually February, my least favorite month of the year, went…

We all go down the rabbit holes of Facebook now and then. No matter how many times we proclaim we simply don’t go there, we do. We’re all familiar with things designed to get our attention and get us to…

By Scott SullivanEditorAwakeningsLawn Love has released this year’s click-bait poll ranking best and worst U.S. cities to have a hangover. Coming to dazed, dizzy and dehydrated in San Francisco beats Montgomery, Ala., respondents voted.Others preferred to enjoy D.T.’s and vomiting…

     A few years back I was starting to look for a new car.  I pulled into a dealership that had some makes and models that caught my eye and had a good rating for reliability, safety, and sipping (rather than guzzling)…

Editor’s Note: Because I’ve been laid up in a hospitalthe last couple of days (broke my hip) I pulled this oldy but goody columnfrom the vault. BY MIKE WILCOXPUBLISHER Saturday will be April Fools’ Day. It is also thebirthday of…

I’m curious to know who “They” are. “They” are supposed to be the authority on whatever is good or bad for us. “They” used to say that eggs are bad for us, now “They” say that the consumption of eggs…

 In the summer of 1958 Fred and Jane Ettawageshik and their two grade-school age sons, Frank and Tim, rented the Turner house next door to us, on the corner of Main and Blevins Streets. The Ettawageshik family came to Marion…

I was looking at some old columns for ideas and discovered that on March 21, 2012 it was 86 degrees.That has to be a typo, because I don’t remember it ever being that warm in the middle of March.According to…

By Scott SullivanEditorPit Bull Put Down“Allegiance” means a subordinate’s commitment to a superior individual, group or cause. It draws on the late Middle English liege, one who pays fealty to a lord, and appears often in Shakespeare’s writing. Shake a…

As any business owner will tell you, employees make a business successful. I couldn’t agree more, and I’m here to tell you I am fortunate enough to have one of the best groups of employees an employer could ever wish…

The Old Farmer’s Almanac says March is the most changeable month. I tend to agree with that, especially in this part of Michigan, where in just the past week we have had sunny springlike weather sprinkled with snow flurries. In…

If you are experiencing “Spring Fever”, there’s a place to go and get some relief. Kettles County Park, located just south of Gleason Road on South U.S. 131, has 3500 square feet of frontage on the St. Joe River for…

The Oscar Award show Sunday night was good entertainment, considering last years’ unsettling events. One popular movie sweeping seven top Oscars reminded us of other big winners like Gone with the Wind, Cleopatra, Jaws, Star Wars, and Silence of the…

By Scott SullivanEditorGoRed means stop, green go, yellow caution. Primary color blue + yellow = green: go with caution. Blue means go.Having shot black-and- white Kodak Tri-X 400, I went color 15 years later with trepidation. What would Cartier-Bresson say?…

     We received a Christmas card and letter from longtime friends, and in it they wrote about returning to Orchestra Hall for the first  performance by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in nearly two years. At the end of the evening the director,…

I play a lot of tennis, and Novak Djokovic, the best in the game, and maybe the G.O.A.T, is a hero of mine. Like Jordan in basketball or Brady in football, Djokovic has dominated men’s tennis for a decade and…

“Spring forward” means summer is right around the corner, doesn’t it? Daylight Savings Time begins Sunday morning and just eight days later on the 20th the calendar says “March Equinox!” That’s supposed to be the first day of spring, at…

“A single rose can be my garden…a single friend, my world.” – Leo BuscagliaIn the movie “The Graduate”, Dustin Hoffman was given a word to remember. It was a word that was supposed to be the answer to being successful.…