My friend Susie moves about our neighborhood like a woodland sprite, leaving handmade ornaments in her wake. They appear like magic every December, right around the time we put up our Christmas tree. I never see her coming or going, the ornaments just appear in a puff of fairy dust. This year's ornament arrived and [...]
My friend Connie the Cookie Lady announced her retirement a few months ago. "I'm not knitting any more Christmas stockings," she said quite decisively as she sat on her front porch, a spry 94-year old surveying the neighborhood from her lawn chair throne. "Makes sense to me," I replied. "You've knitted 1,352 more than I [...]
Our friend Mike Nofzinger believed “Miracle”, the story of the 1980 U.S. hockey team, was the greatest sports movie ever made. Maybe he was right, but only because no one ever made a film about the 2003 Ripon Triathlon. They will, my friends. Someday, they will. That year, an unlikely trio of Mike, me and [...]
In an effort to provide a little end-of-the-week cheer and, hopefully, add a needed boost to places and people I admire, I'm going to start featuring area businesses that are rising to the challenges of this crazy year. I plan to write about three businesses every Friday. If you know of any similarly admirable businesses, [...]
My friend Cathy is creative, compassionate and, like a lot of us these days, confined. As a result, she's gone a little squirrelly. She and her occasionally ornery friend Newman have provided all of us with a delightful distraction from all the angst 2020 has wrought. "This is Newman," she posted one day. "He is [...]
