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Covering the arrival of spring
Hilton Head Island, S.C-Soft rain is falling, the wind is blowing, and the skies are cloudy. But the temperature is pleasantly mild, and for three days previous to this one, late winter's costal sun has shown brilliantly. I will be leaving here soon, and that thought saddens me. I will miss my duck. There has never been such a duck. I don't know much about ducks, but this one lives in a lagoon outside my bedroom window and makes a sound like, "Braaaack! Braaaack!"




Mommy, daddy handle baby differently
The past five months have reminded me that the differences between men and women are rarely more evident than when there’s a new baby in the house. Let’s look at a few examples of these different approaches to parenting.




4-H 4-Ever: The power of the media
If you think people don’t read the newspaper, think again.




Saying goodbye to the Southern Crescent
Aboard the Southern Crescent-I don't know exactly where we were. Between Spartanburg and Charlotte perhaps. Midnight approached. Four hours earlier, the Southern Crescent had pulled out of Atlanta's Peachtree Station bound for Washington with three green-and-gold engines, 13 cars and a pack of riders come to attend the funeral-on-wheels of America's last privately owned overnight luxury passenger train. "I just wanted to say goodbye in person," said a man who had boarded in Gainesville for ...




The little kid and the engine ride
Aboard the Southern Crescent - This weirdo little kid I know who loves passenger trains and wouldn't give you a dime for what the Wright Brothers thought was such a big deal got to ride in the head engine of the Southern Crescent twice this week.




The only thing that lasts
Newton County, despite phenomenal growth in the past two decades, remains largely untouched by the expanding steel and concrete giant, Atlanta. From the air, Newton County is a dark emerald cut by several brown rivets of water and bisected by a thin gray strip of Interstate 20. The Green Enterprise Group of the Newton County Leadership Collaborative has discovered that 54 percent of the county remains farm or forest land and has charged ...




Kari's Corner - What to give up for Lent?
We missed celebrating Mardi Gras last week. I was getting over a wicked case of food poisoning and not up to celebrating anything besides staying out of the bathroom.




4-H 4-Ever - Spending cuts teach youths to lead
Has a leader become “the one who has to make the tough money decisions”?




The smiling chef
Yeah, I knew Lewis Price. I have eaten his cooking, and I have shaken his hand. And what comes back now is the recollection of the morning I poked my sleepy head into his office — the kitchen of the Southern Crescent passenger train dining car — and inquired as to the state of his general health and well being.




Digging Deeper - Hang a right for a surprise
 We have all driven by the sign for Factory Shoals Recreation Park on Highway 36 North. This day, I turned right at the sign and got a pleasant surprise when I found this beautiful area on the Alcovy River. I didn’t realize at the time that this turn would peak my interest in Factory Shoals and lead me to research what happened there and why it is named Factory Shoals.




All in a Rowe: Redneck romance
This year Valentine's Day coincides with the start of 2010 NASCAR racing season and it just doesn't get any better than that. It's been a long winter and it ain't over yet. Typically, one would think NASCAR is a man's sport, but I'm willing to bet there are just as many, if not more, female NASCAR fans. Going to a race is anything but boring and it's not as hard to understand as football - ...




Jimmy Harmon loved trains
It wasn’t that long ago all little boys loved trains. Most of them grew out of it. Some of us didn’t.




There are no small things
"Sometimes when I consider what tremendous consequences come from little things, I am tempted to think there are no little things." ~Bruce Barton

4-H 4-Ever: 4-H can take you anywhere
4-H 4-Ever: 4-H can take you anywhere
I love my job in 4-H, but I must admit to reading stories of the Zoo Atlanta employee accompanying Atlanta’s panda to China and thinking, "Wow, I wonder how she got that job?"
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Saltines and Solzhenitsyn
TELLICO PLAINS, TENN. -- I had been days without a newspaper, locked away in a careless world of mountains, rivers, dirt roads, and a supply of Vienna sausage and sardines and a gift for which we can never offer enough gratitude: the saltine cracker.




Telling It Like It Is. . . . Sounding Off and Speaking Up
My last column was about moving back to my hometown of Social Circle, so, I wanted to expand on that a little. My little hometown has found itself in the center of a very heated debate over a proposed drag strip. I'm not going into my stand on that issue, but, suffice it to say that you can draw your own conclusions by reading between the lines. Now, if you really want to know what I think, I might be bribed into telling with the right offer, say a nice steak dinner.




All in a Rowe: Feeling good about coming home
We recently moved back to my hometown of Social Circle. We settled in Newton County and started our family about 25 years ago and, until recently, called it home. Momma and Daddy still live in the same spot, as do most of their neighbors, and our little town has grown a lot, but it's still as charming as ever. We moved in just before Thanksgiving, so we'd barely gotten unpacked and settled in before it ...

4-H 4-Ever: Look confident
4-H 4-Ever: Look confident
One of my professors this semester starts each class with the take home message, so here is mine: look confident.
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New York Subways
I had planned to ride a lot of commuter trains around New York to practice for when Atlanta’s new rapid rail system opens. That will be just as soon as the excavation is completed and the city is put back together again.




The Cyclorama: A disgrace
The strains of "Dixie" come up softly at first and then grow louder and louder. Recorded musket fire bristles in the background. There is a vague human cry from somewhere in the distance. Perhaps it is a Rebel yell, or perhaps it is some mother’s child catching a bullet 114 years ago.




Illness boot camp
Have you fallen victim to the stomach bug yet? There’s a nasty one going around our church and another circle of friends. So far, we haven’t caught it. But knowing it’s out there leaves me worried that our turn is coming.




Cn u read dis?
Doze of u hu cn read dis r prolly teens.




Riding the High Lonesome
On a Georgia backroad — there are only two sounds out here. Four tires are humming as they hug the taxpayers’ asphalt on Georgia 15. And the radio — God bless and automobile radio — has me in touch with you wouldn’t believe the faraway places.




How 2010 is shaping up
How’s your new year going so far? I didn’t make any New Year’s resolutions because I don’t believe in them. I also don’t believe that collard greens and black-eyed peas will bring you mountains of wealth, but, when accompanied by a hunk of buttermilk cornbread, I can be halfway talked into anything.




4-H 4-Ever: Did you know?
"We are currently preparing students for jobs that don’t yet exist, using technologies that haven’t been invented, in order to solve problems we don’t even know are problems yet," wrote Karl Fisch.




The truth about General Lee
Dr. Emory Thomas came on the line from Athens where he is a professor of history at the University of Georgia.




Snow days and weather wimps
So the first great snowfall of 2010 has come and gone, and I daresay most of us survived. My yard looked like Jack Frost gently sneezed across it. The most annoying thing about this storm was wrangling hyper, snow-hungry kids on Thursday, and dealing with their disappointment Friday morning when they realized we hadn’t gotten the foot of snow they’d prayed for.







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