COLUMNS

Betty Stone: Better late than never

Posted 1/30/2010 in Columns

I hope that “better late than never” is a truism, because with the rush of the recent holidays, I let a significant anniversary slip by.

Lelia Kelly: Plan early for beautiful landscape designs

Posted 1/30/2010 in Columns

Even though it’s cold outside, now is a good time to stroll through your yard with pencil and paper in hand, noting what worked and what didn’t in your landscape last year. Viewing it during the bare-bones winter season will help you see where changes should be made.

Anne Freeze: Oyster season

Posted 1/27/2010 in Columns

It’s oyster season, and I’m hankering for a trip to Apalachicola for an oyster orgy. I’ve only been to this part of Florida — the Forgotten Panhandle, as it’s known — once several years ago on a Southern Foodways Alliance field trip. Terry and I spent three days with others learning about the challenges facing the U.S. oystermen, going out with them on their boats, with tongs, shucking oysters, eating oysters, smoking mullet and worm grunting (hunting for earthworms). I came home with a deeper appreciation of these men and women and the hard work they do.

Adele Elliott: Mardi Gras mambo

Posted 1/23/2010 in Columns

I got a strange phone message this week: “Miss Moonpie has taken down her Christmas garlands.” Most folks don’t feel the need to announce the ups and downs of their holiday décor. But, I had given her a gentle ribbing about leaving them up so long. She thought I should be informed.

Shannon Bardwell: When is enough, enough?

Posted 1/23/2010 in Columns

Seems like everyone I talk to is doing some form of “cutting back” on expenses. I am no exception. Over the years I’ve gotten the reputation for frugality. My mom said I acquired this attribute after leaving home because I certainly never had it while living with them. I say, “Better late than never.”

4-H youth given a chance to serve state government

Posted 1/23/2010 in Columns

MISSISSIPPI STATE — Four qualified 4-H’ers who want to learn more about Mississippi government will have the chance to be legislative pages for oMISSISSIPPI STATE — Four qualified 4-H’ers who want to learn more about Mississippi government will have the chance to be legislative pages for one week in March for the Mississippi Senate or House of Representatives.ne week in March for the Mississippi Senate or House of Representatives.

Rob Hardy: Tzara and Lenin play chess

Posted 1/20/2010 in Columns

If you are like me, you always pay attention when Andrei Codrescu recites a commentary on National Public Radio.

Rob Hardy: 'An Infinity of Things'

Posted 1/20/2010 in Columns

Collecting things is a human trait that almost anyone participates in.

Adele Elliott: Smile therapy

Posted 1/16/2010 in Columns

This new year is getting off to a very bleak start. We are still grieving over the apartment fire in Starkville and sending prayers to Haiti.

Betty Stone: Your own opus magnus

Posted 1/16/2010 in Columns

I am on a crusade. I think it is not one that would come to your mind immediately, but something that would provide every family with a precious document.

Shannon Bardwell: Bell wins the prize

Posted 1/16/2010 in Columns

“Some people think the Internet is the best invention in the world,” Laura stated, “but it’s not. It’s the telephone.”

Rob Hardy: Googled

Posted 1/12/2010 in Columns

It might be that right now, a couple of guys in a garage are coming up with the next big thing, an item of software or hardware that is going to change our way of doing things or looking at the world. This is just what Bill Gates, head of Microsoft, used to say he worried about. And then it happened. Maybe leaders at Google now worry about the same sort of thing. After all, Sergey Brin and Larry Page were just a couple of young nerds tinkering with a new idea for a search engine in 1998, and now everyone knows what Google is and many people use it in some fashion everyday.

Rob Hardy: The good life in Newport

Posted 1/12/2010 in Columns

There is no city in America that has so extraordinary a history as Newport, R.I. This is chiefly due to its being a destination for visits, first by well-heeled New Yorkers and Southerners in the 1850s, and then most famously by the rich society swells who installed showplace mansions especially along the magnificent rugged coastline, and then by tourists who come to see the mansions. The mansions (erected by rich people who enjoyed the ironic humor of calling them “cottages”) and the society within them are not the whole Newport story, but any social history of the city is going to concentrate on them.

Adele Elliott: The silence of sorrow

Posted 1/9/2010 in Columns

Why does death always come as a surprise? We expect it throughout our entire life. It is the logical bookend to birth, the soul’s escape.

Shannon Bardwell: Technology run amuck

Posted 1/9/2010 in Columns

Sharon knew her husband was cheating. She lined up four friends with cell phones along a likely route. As the husband left the marital abode the first friend followed and alerted the other friends along the way. The husband led the posse right to the front door of his love nest. Photographs were taken, proof garnered — divorce, a done deal.