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Going To The Cellar For Food, A Joy Of Homemade Preserves

Someone recently shared a picture of canned goods in her basement. I do not think it was a picture that they took, just one they found. Foods preserved in jars really make a pretty picture. I often went downstairs and just looked at all of the food I had preserved. We never had much money. Milk checks came twice a month with the first check being the larger one since it was an advance on what would follow. During the summer months especially the second check was small so I learned not to rely on it. I went to the grocery store with my little red checker — some of you will remember ...

Enjoying L’esprit De L’escalier And Other Fun With Words

Atrabilious, immiscible, susurrus, tergiversate, trompe l’oeil — I have a spiral notebook that probably dates back a decade or more of words I hadn’t known so looked up meanings and added them to the list. Terricolous, educe, missish, tergiversate, the list goes on and on. And I’ve forgotten almost all (including all those listed here). They are real words — most not acknowledged by my spellcheck (if that helps). There are others though that I do use and appreciate. I do have a word and then an expression I’d like to see used more commonly. First is “petrichor” which ...

Government Goes Too Far

I’m “social distancing.” I stay away from people. I do it voluntarily. There’s a big difference between voluntary — and force. Government is force. The media want more of that. “Ten states have no stay-at-home orders!” complains Don Lemon On CNN. “Some governors are still refusing to take action!” Fox News’ host Steve Hilton agreed. “Shut things down! Everywhere. That includes Utah, Wyoming...” But wait a second. People in Utah and Wyoming already socially distanced just by living there. Why must Utah and Wyoming have the same stay-at-home rules as New ...

Socialist Rent Restructuring Is Not The Answer

Liberals never let a crisis go to waste, and sadly for America’s landlords and real estate developers, the current pandemic is no exception. Far-left lawmakers including members of “The Squad,” Reps. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., and Ayanna Pressley, D-Mass., are exploiting the crisis to advance their social justice warrior agenda at the expense of property owners. They seek to punish landlords by forcing them to provide free rent for all tenants impacted by the coronavirus. Don’t let them. For if Omar’s bill, introduced last ...

Coming Home From Florida: An Eerie, Antsy Journey

Are people elsewhere in America hunkered down during the coronavirus pandemic? Mostly. Along our stretch of Interstate 80 last week, there were relatively few cars and pickup trucks. Elsewhere along our 1,200-mile return trip from Florida, the traffic was similar ... mostly. The shelter-in-place message was bluntly conveyed on South Carolina’s large black-screen programmable billboards dotting Interstate 83: GO HOME. STAY HOME. Succinct. Carolinians north and south seemed to be cooperating. Truck traffic along most of the route was near normal, but non-commercial ...

Facing A New Normal

This morning, the first email that caught my eye had this in its subject line: World Class Hater. “Miss Schultz,” it began. Oh, good. An angry man who refuses to use Ms. How I’ve missed them in this pandemic. As we enter week 72, or maybe it’s week four, of the stay-at-home order here in Ohio, even our dogs are starting to act weird. There’s a plastic bag flapping from the top branch of an elm tree out front that has inspired them, for eight days now, to bark out the front window like coonhounds at a feral pig. When they’re not defending the homefront, they’re ...