From My Family to Yours

There are some folks that take Christmas as an opportunity to send out a family newsletter. It is good when it is just to the family. When it reaches out to casual acquaintances, it borders on, at the very least, a puzzlement. You read it; after all it is from the person to whom you gave your business card in the Branson Regional Airport just after you had been to see Yakim Smirnov and Andy Williams……… and you were feeling pleased and all was well with the world. Then, in about the third paragraph you realize that you do not know Aunt Millie and her thirteenth grandchild, or Sammy or Joelle or any of the others.

I have never had the urge to produce such a missive, or perhaps it should be called a missile. My family is somewhat mediocre when it comes to interesting folks, although I may get a challenge there.

But this year the urge descended upon me. I acknowledge that it is a bit late, but I did my Christmas column and got chided by my friends and relatives because they considered it improper for the Season. Claude Reese quoted the Bible and got front page exposure. I can’t blame Claude. At our age we should both boning up on the Book. St. Peter may have a few questions of us when we try to tell him why we should be allowed to stroll through the Pearly Gates. Sid Riley put my writing near the back of the edition, but still ahead of “Partners for Pets”.

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It’s Time to Prognosticate, not Prevaricate

We have a year before us, a year fraught with whatever may be. Our President did his State of the Union speech, and the Loyal Opposition said that what he said is really not so. Governor Rick Scott decided that state spending should be cut, so he immediately put the state’s two aircraft up for sale, and his critics say that this is false economy, because he will be using his own planes and charging their use off on his personal income tax.

But these problems are minor when it comes to deciding what the subjects for my columns for the rest of the year will be.

I know that I will recognize the Navy and the Marine Corps birthdays, and I truly hope that my readers have forgotten what I have written before. I may sneak the old ones in. That takes care of two of fifty columns. I have promised to take up the bagpipes, and in my “I love a Parade” I told about chatting with some pipers and being encouraged. And today the proprietor of The Wooden Nickel in Chattahoochee admitted that he has the same desire, so we may be on the way to beginning a pipes band. We will probably rehearse in the back room of his emporium. He has excellent coffee and ice cream. At the very least I will have something for a column, if it is nothing but “well, I tried”.

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I Love a Parade!

Jackson County is known for its peanuts, cotton, corn, wheat, cattle and kudzu. On the first five our farmers make money. Then they expend all that they have made trying to overcome the kudzu before it overcomes the cattle.

But we are known even more for our love of parades.

Parades are held for every possible event, except for Saint Swithin’s Day, which is closely related to goats and sheep, both of which are notorious for being difficult to steer down a highway while horns and fireworks are going off.

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Nobody Takes Us Serious

Last April I had eyeball surgery. I am certain that the ophthalmologist who did the cutting has a different terminology for this, but it was surgery and it was on my eyeballs, so there! A few months passed and I went in to see the doctor for my checkup. He found that I am not seeing as well as I was, and that I should come back. My appointment is for next May. This is just before he takes his vacation, and I am certain that he, like most of us, wants to have a little extra cash on hand when he travels. Does this sound suspicious or did it just happen that way? You may decide for yourself.

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