BURN OLD GRAND DAD IN THE TANK

PUTTING OLD GRAND DAD IN THE TANK… Would you pay $22.50 for a quart 100-proof booze and then pour it into the tank of your gas guzzler?
 That’s about what you could be doing when the country goes “ethanol.”
 The process of producing a combustible liquid to replace gasoline in your vehicle is basically the same as [...]

WHAT IF … TWISTS OF FATE

WHAT IF… We’ve all played the “what if” game, pondering our place in life (and perhaps life at all) if mom had a not met dad, if dad had taken a new job out of town, if you had stayed in the Army, if you hadn’t gone to college and so on.
 The game has no [...]

BYERS BIBLE QUEST LAID TO REST…

 
BYERS BIBLE QUEST LAID TO REST… I had a private Memorial Day event last weekend in a wooded cemetery in the Hiawatha Township Cemetery; 400 miles north of South Haven, Michigan, where James A. Byers, age 38, from Waverly Township, joined the 13th Michigan Regiment in 1862.
 I was at the grave of James A. Byers [...]

BYERS FAMILY, I HAVE A BIBLE FOR YOU…

JAMES A. BYERS FAMILY, I HAVE A BIBLE FOR YOU… Per haps 10 years ago, Anne gave me a Civil War Bible.  It was printed by the American Bible Society in 1862 in New York City.
 Inside the front cover, printed in pencil, is the name James Byers. Inside the back cover, again printed in pencil, [...]

Mother’s Day and Meeting Workshops

VOTES SHOULD NEVER BE TAKEN AT WORKSHOPS… Given the increasingly complex issues involved in managing local governments and school boards, many are turning to “workshops” to get a lot of the preliminary discussion and information gathering exercises done before a “regular meeting.”
 As in many things, best intentions go by the wayside in favor of expediency [...]

PLEASE SPEND, DON’T SAVE…

PLEASE SPEND, DON’T SAVE… The big news coming out of Washington this week was the “economic stimulus” checks were being distributed by the IRS, just in time to be gobbled up by gas prices nearing $4.00 a gallon and skyrocketing food prices.
 Keep in mind that the economic stimulus check was your money in the first [...]

ONE’S MANURE IS ANOTHER’S SMELL…

ONE’S MANURE IS ANOTHER’S SMELL… I got two phone calls last Friday about an “awful smell” near the “S” curves on Coloma Road Friday morning.
 The first caller had plenty of information, including that the smell had been around for some time and that it was “more than cow manure,” that calls had been made to [...]