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"Rain, rain, go away. Come again some other day. Little Susie wants to play." Or Johnny, or Billy or Cathy. Or the Northeast. States that don't normally get pounded by rain have been heavily hit in recent days. Massachusetts has been deluged. The images are those that one does not normally see coming out of that grand old state. I can remember the long ago phrase, "Banned in Boston." I would imagine that, if they could, they would ban rainy weather for a few weeks to allow them to recover.

I know, I know. Some wag will make the comment, "Come August we'll be…  ( Click for more )

Mother's Day weekend is always an interesting one. Before the kids were all grown up and on their own we would have these times of hustling around to make sure that all the bases were being covered as to what everyone was getting Becky, my wife, and where we were going to go for the big dinner. This year we were wondering if we would see the kids in shifts and pretty much knew that we would not even see one of them due to his requirements in the ministry he is in up north in Wisconsin.

At first my daughter and her husband were coming over for the church service at Minosrsville.…  ( Click for more )

Preparing for a yard sale is always a drawn out proposition. The first thing you have to do is figure out what you have of worth to even sell. What is there cozied away in your closet or attic that might be important enough to advertise for people to buy? Then comes the big question. What worth will you assign those things? Real value has to be laid aside here. You cannot dwell on an item and remember that it one time cost whatever. The big word in yard sales is value.

Value. Translate that to mean an indescribable bargain. That is what puts people in your sale. They…  ( Click for more )

"Hit'em where they ain't." I believe that old baseball adage is attributed to Casey Stengel, one of the winningest managers ever in the history of the game. However, he may not be the one who had the original concept. Paul Waner, who played baseball back in those halcyon "Golden Years" of baseball, was one of the greatest players of all time. For his career he amassed 3,152 hits and compiled a lifetime .333 batting average. When Waner talked hitting, people listened.

"Look, there are three outfielders," he once said. "Why hit it where they are? Shoot for the foul…  ( Click for more )

Back in the 1920s George Herman "Babe" Ruth single handedly transformed our national pastime. Baseball had been a game of get on base and manufacture a run through astute hitting that advanced runners. Occasionally someone would actually hit a ball over the outfield fence. But that was an anomaly. Most player, such as Ty Cobb, were just trying to get on and claw for every base they could get in the hopes of being able to simply cross home plate.

Enter the "Babe". Ruth began his career as a pitcher, and a very good one at that, with the Boston Red Sox. While he made quite…  ( Click for more )

The story is told of a man and his wife who were on their way out to eat one evening when they were confronted by a man who kept getting in front of them and trying to slow them down. He jumped in front of them on their way out the door and bothered them all the way to their car. Once in the car he tried to keep them from leaving their driveway but finally they were able to get away. However, when they arrived at their destination who should be there to meet them but the same man who began employing the same tactics as before.

In frustration the husband asked the man why he…  ( Click for more )

Nothing more satisfying than spending the afternoon on the water with some of your friends and the kids. Ah yes, tooling around the fluid surface in a powerful craft. Watching the other boats as they make their way around the broad expanse of water. Love it. Absolutely love it. However, not everybody gets to do that. So, Sunday afternoon I had to settle for a little two person paddle boat on a dammed up creek and share our little corner of waterworld with three other craft, also two person paddle boats.

The venue for this aquatic experience was the creek at the Blue Grass…  ( Click for more )

Disgusting! Yes, that's the word for the day. Disgusting! There are things that are disgusting. Fresh road kill. Nothing is more capable of ruining the old Saturday afternoon drive in the country than a pancaked turtle or opossum. "Why did the chicken cross the road?" To show the turtle and opossum it could actually be done. Yes, road kill is disgusting. It's right up there with a baby's loose bowel movement in a diaper and a garbage can that has been assaulted by dogs and shared with the community.

I'll just about bet that most of you don't have…  ( Click for more )

I have always been fascinated by the values that are placed on collectibles. I am even more fascinated by the people who determine those values. Who are they? Is that their only job? Think about it for a moment. You have a collectible item and you buy a book to find out what it is worth. Funny thing is, it is only worth that if that is what you can actually get out of it. That's the nudge on collectibles. You pay the worth at a store, but can you turn around and sell it to someone for what you just paid?

Years ago I collected ball cards with my sons. We mostly collected…  ( Click for more )

"When in the course of Human Events…" begins one of the documents that has framed the course of this nation of the United States of America. When the Declaration of Independence was penned that phrase explained what was to follow as the reasons for our decision to separate from Mother England. It was those "human events." They were comprised of a string of events that both happened to and were brought about by the humans here in the new world.

Funny thing about human events; they are unpredictable. They happen at the worst possible time and can have the most damaging results.…  ( Click for more )

Allegations of steroid abuse have permeated the sports world for a number of years now. However, the sport that seems to be having the most trouble with them is baseball. With a recent book out on the subject that points fingers at certain star baseball players and last year's round of suspensions for steroids including certain stars, baseball is awash with the issue.

Mike Schmidt, former third baseman for the Philadelphia Phillies and a member of the Baseball Hall of Fame, was interviewed this past week on a segment of ESPN's Sportcenter. When asked if he would have…  ( Click for more )

I spend a lot of time on the road as a preacher. It takes time to make the distance between people's homes and the occasional hospital in which they might be receiving care. As such I am often on the local interstate highway, I-75. I-75 dissects the state in its run from Detroit to the Gulf Coast of Florida. Almost every day a traveler can see cars from Canada (usually Ontario) as well as Florida and many other states in between.

While traveling North on I-75 the other day I was approaching a vehicle that was stalled on the shoulder. It was parked fairly close to the…  ( Click for more )

Raising children is an exasperating endeavor to say the least. Regardless of Dr. Benjamin Spock's volumes of work, or that of myriad others, there is truly no definitive work on raising children. That is why a pregnant mother-to-be is referred to as "expecting". Andy Griffith, the comedian, once remarked that the first child lurks, indicating that the baby may be ready to sneak up suddenly and be born or just kind of hang around for awhile.

But when the baby comes is when the real challenge starts. What do you do with this little wrinkled package of flesh and still forming…  ( Click for more )

I can remember years ago going to my friend's house and seeing their heating stove sitting in the front room of their house. Clearly seen on the front of the stove were the words, "Warm Morning". Over the years I have come to appreciate those stoves as being dependable and true to their name. My wife and I even had one at one of the homes we have rented over the years. We had a lot of warm mornings from our Warm Morning.

You can imagine the shock we had then this past Saturday morning when we awoke to temperatures outside that were below zero with an indoor temperature…  ( Click for more )

Now that we live in Georgetown, Kentucky there is one thing that I will probably never use but still have. I have an emergency kit that was sent to me as a resident of Madison County who lived in close proximity to the chemical weapons dump that the United States Army maintains just off Route 25 South of Richmond. I can remember first moving into the area and seeing this little box that I was told to keep plugged in at all times. The box was the warning system which would give us a few minutes to use the emergency kit.

In case of an emergency we were to open the kit and remove…  ( Click for more )

I have a favorite cartoon and a favorite humorous story. The cartoon is one of those multi-panel setups with the first panel displaying a man sitting in a fishing boat with rod in hand and line in water. He is all decked out in the attire one would expect of an avid fisherman. He is extolling all the joys of being out in God's creation; the sun being like God's light and the breeze like His breath, the beauty of the lake and the trees and the wildlife. The next panel shows the man with a puzzled look on his face. The last panel shows a sheepish fisherman admitting, "I…  ( Click for more )

Something happened this past weekend that was barely a blip on most people's radar. I don't remember hearing mentioned on any of television's news magazines or reports. Perhaps I just missed them. The event was the death of Philip Crosby. He was 69 at his death. Died of natural causes unlike his three brothers. Philip Crosby was the last remaining son of Bing Crosby and his first wife, singer/actress Dixie Lee.

Philip was one of a set of twins. His brother, Dennis, preceded him in death in 1991. Dennis, like his brother Lindsay in 1989, committed suicide.…  ( Click for more )

Throughout my fifty-three years plus of life on this planet I have held a lot of jobs. When I was just a little guy about twelve I was mowing lawns in my neighborhood and, at times, was quite prosperous doing it. I can remember one week in 1963 when I actually banked $40. That may not sound like much today but there were a lot of families at that time in which the main bread winner was making about $80 a week and doing well.

My parents had ingrained in me the concept of overkill in doing someone's lawn. I trimmed as well as mowed. That was before the string…  ( Click for more )

I am a football junkie. That's American football for those of you who are purists and know soccer by its worldwide appellation. I have followed football, more precisely, professional football, since I was barely seven years old. That means that when the 2004 season begins I will begin my forty-eighth season watching the sport. Sundays have been my hallowed days during that time period both for my love of worshiping my heavenly Father and my joy of watching large armored humans run into each other.

The oddest thing has happened during the end of the 2003 season. I have…  ( Click for more )

Professional golf has returned for the 2004 tour. The Professional Golfers Association is in Hawaii right now playing in absolutely stunning surroundings at picture postcard venues in balmy weather. All this serves to get the itch going for guys like me who are anxious to get back on the course. Winter is a tough time for us golfers who live far enough north that the golf season ends sometime before Thanksgiving and restarts sometime around Easter. Watching the PGA on TV scratches the itch but it doesn't bring relief.

Ah, yes. To be back on the course staring down the…  ( Click for more )

"When in the course of human events..." So begins one of the most important documents in the history of the United States of America. The "Declaration of Independence" was fashioned in 1776 for the express purpose of being just what it was called...a declaration of the intention of the colonies founded by England to be independent of the Motherland. It ignited a war whose final outcome and result was realized in 1783 when England recognized the independence of what was now being called the United States of America.

The entire civilized world had been abuzz due to the great struggle…  ( Click for more )

The recent flap over deposed Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill has raised some eyebrows concerning the plans of President Bush when he first took office. According to documentation provided by O'Neill, Bush had plans to attack Iraq and remove and capture Saddam Hussein early in the administration. O'Neill's comments, documents and such are the focal point of a new book written by Ron Suskind, The Price Of Loyalty. Other Bush informants are cited in the book concerning their observations and knowledge of the President.

Such things are not new. Practically…  ( Click for more )

The last several days in Central Kentucky have left a lasting impression on my car. Due to the amount of rain and snow that have fallen recently, along with the accompanying melting, my car now looks like a butterfly preparing to emerge from its cocoon. My dark red Stratus is now a kind of tannish white as it is covered with the spray from the dozens of autos that I have followed in the past week during my driving hundreds of miles between Minorsville (where the church and people are) and Richmond (where my wife and I currently reside).

I keep expecting to see the words "wash…  ( Click for more )

Ever look at the ingredients list for a bar of soap? I use Irish Spring (for long, long deodorant protection). According to the box it has a great invigorating scent and helps keep me clean and fresh. As for the ingredients I was a little shocked. Guess what is the first listed ingredient for my bar of soap. Soap. No kidding. The first listed ingredient is soap.

There are a lot of other things added that make it distinctly my bar of Irish Spring. Stearic acid and glycerin are added as skin conditioners as well as coconut and/or palm kernel acid. The nice green color is…  ( Click for more )