Happiness is a lifetime investment

January 12, 2023

Last weekend, CBS Sunday Morning’s feature about “Happiness” was not a total surprise. What could be a better subject for television’s second happiest show, second only to Sesame Street? Since its beginning over 40 years ago, I’ve happily watched this TV magazine offer features of everyone from the band U2 to chef Ina Garten, and everything from migrating monarch butterflies to Ferrari manufacturing in Italy. It’s always new knowledge, perfect for a Nosy Nellie like me, curious about everything. Last week’s lead story was Happiness, and even academia weighed in. Harvard ...

Put to pasture in the military

January 7, 2023

Here is a short story former military folks can relate to. The U.S. Navy warship USS Kitty Hawk, the last conventional-powered (fossil-fuel fired) aircraft carrier, embarked on its final voyage last year, leaving Naval Base Kitsap in Bremerton, Wash., heading to a shipbreaking company in Brownsville, Texas. The current fleet is made up entirely of nuclear-powered carriers. The ship was to be decommissioned after 48 years of service, having been stored in mothballs for over a decade. Launched in 1960, the Kitty Hawk conducted missions in combat operations in support of Vietnam, ...

View from Hickory Heights:There’s options with leftovers

January 6, 2023

Did you have ham for Christmas? Do you have leftovers? I have several things that I do with ham that are delicious. My first husband was not a fan of leftovers so I learned to disguise them. In my mind you can never have too much ham left over. It is always good as an accompaniment to breakfast eggs. I have a bone tucked in the freezer so that I can make soup later but for now I will concentrate on another way to use those left overs. When I lived at home my grandmother used to get ham loaf from her local butcher. We all loved it. My mother used to bring ham loaf over to us from ...

Game scores tell only part of story

January 5, 2023

This is not a story about football, baseball, or any normally entertaining game. It was however, for me, a game of survival. I felt like a gladiator at the Coliseum, when COVID nailed me two years ago. Very sick, I was yet determined not to let it get me. I finally said to Dear Richard, “We have to go to the hospital. I’m getting much worse and I’m not going to get better lying in this recliner.” In minutes, he had warmed the car, notified the E.R., and we were enroute. The score when I walked into the hospital late that night was COVID 98, Marcy 2. I barely had a leg under ...

Before looking ahead, take time to reflect

December 31, 2022

Often the focus of New Year’s resolutions emphasizes what is ahead such as setting goals and challenges to be achieved in the future. This focus on resolutions is often connected with an unintentional decrease in reflecting on what we are grateful for in the past year. I once heard Dave Ramsey on a financial podcast share that our mindset in life should be like looking from the perspective of the driver’s seat in a car. The large windshield is what we can see before us, and the smaller rear-view mirror is what we can see that is behind us. The greater focus is on the larger ...

Some events young people will never know

December 30, 2022

I recently read an article that sent me back in time. It mentioned some of the things that I remember, but young people today will not know about. Let me say here that I have watched numerous changes take place – so many that I cannot touch on all of them. I remember young people coming into the fair office to use the phone to call home for a ride. That in itself is something that never happens any more. Now all of the young people have cell phones. At that time no one or very few had cell phones so it was necessary to use a land line to call. They would look at the phone, then ...