Whatever kind of crumminess may have come your way recently, I think this will certainly put things in perspective…

Daughter of Christian music

star killed by car

By JOE EDWARDS – 2 hours ago

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — The 5-year-old daughter of Grammy-winning Christian music star Steven Curtis Chapman was struck and killed Wednesday by a sport utility vehicle driven by her brother, authorities said.

The girl, Maria, was hit in the driveway of the family’s home Wednesday afternoon by a Toyota Land Cruiser driven by her teenage brother, said Laura McPherson, a spokeswoman for the Tennessee Highway Patrol.

The brother, whose name and exact age weren’t available, apparently did not see the girl, McPherson said. No charges are expected.

“It looks like a tragic accident,” she said.

Several family members witnessed the accident, which happened in Williamson County just south of Nashville. The girl died later at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, hospital spokeswoman Laurie Holloway said.

A publicist for Chapman’s charity organization said the family was expected to release a statement later Wednesday night.

Here’s the link to the article in its entirety. PLEASE pray for the Chapman family.

All weekend long, this joke keeps popping back into my head and makes me laugh and giggle all over again, usually at inappropriate times.  My sense of humor isn’t all that sophisticated, as 2 of my favorite jokes ever are:

1) Q: If the Statue of Liberty fell into New York Bay, how would they pick it up?
A: All wet.

2) Q: What’s Irish and sits around the swimming pool?
A: Patty O’Furniture

OK, that’s just to make sure you understand before we proceed…

“Where is everybody?” the cowboy asks.
“They’ve gone to watch them hang Brown Paper Pete,” replies a bystander.
“Why do they call him that?” asks the cowboy.
“Cause he always wears a brown paper hat, a brown paper shirt and brown paper trousers.”
“Really?  What are they hanging him for?”
“Rustling.”
(submitted to the Reader’s Digest by Isadora Alman)

I dunno… I just sensed that my little corner of the ’sphere needed a little levity today.

So I’m not quite sure what rock I’ve been living under, but I totally did not know that there was an election yesterday (here, anyway). Well, maybe more like I forgot there was one, because I now vaguely remember seeing something about it on Monticello Live, although at the time I think I was thinking it was the early voting deadline… I think.

Anyway, around 7:00 I decided to take a walk while it was still daylight out. Normally, I wait until everyone’s in bed, and I do 3 miles around the circle drive here on campus (which is a total of 15 laps, and actually not technically a circle, but more like an ellipse, which has nothing to do with anything, and the most boring hour of my day, which may be why I don’t do it as often as I need to). But I was off duty, and figured I’d have enough time to walk to Midway Route and back before dark. As I made my way down Main Street, I saw some folks sitting out front of First Presbyterian, and then I saw the “VOTE HERE” signs, so against my aerobic judgment, but true to my civic responsibility, I made a hard right and went inside to vote.

It being a primary, I could only vote for one party (actually the choices were Democrat, Republican judicial or Non-partisan judicial), and me being a Republican (but seriously considering switching to Independent, because I barely even recognize the Republican party any more, the way they act these days), I chose Republican judicial and found out something pretty interesting: the Republican party in Drew County is practically non-existent. Now I know why they were referring to it as Republican judicial… not a single solitary City council candidate ran as a Republican. Not one. And for all practical purposes, I only actually got to vote in one judicial race (Circuit Judge), as all the others on the Republican ballot were uncontested. It was one of the most unempowering experiences of my life, although after checking preliminary results on Monticello Live later in the evening, I saw where only 11 votes separated the top two candidates in the race I voted in. There were a few other races that were even closer than that… a mere 6 votes separated Rene Knowles and Barabra McLemore in the District 9 J.P. contest, and Raymond Chisom led Joe Burgess by only FOUR votes for Constable in Marion Township. wherever the heck that is. What if like 5 of Joe’s family members were knocking down some Chinese food Tuesday night, and one of them looks at his watch and says, “Oh shoot… polls close in 10 minutes, but they just brought out some more fried okra! Oh well, what’s 5 votes? Dig in!” Now I love fried okra, but why do they have fried okra on the buffet at the Chinese restaurant? That is SO not Chinese, and now it might have cost Joe Burgess the election. You think your vote doesn’t matter? Just ask Joe, or Barbara McLemore or Kenny Johnson if they think your vote matters. (Well, since I wrote that totally fabricated scenario, updated vote totals were posted at ML, and Kenny Johnson overtook Sarah Hartness in the Circuit Court race, and Joe Burgess ended up beating Raymond Chisom for Constable, so maybe some folks pushed away from the table at Fortune Cookie and voted after all, although the revised totals actually show LESS people voted, so it looks like we have a scandal!)

BTW, and I am not very familiar with Arkansas election laws, but is it actually legal to have a campaign sign at a polling place? I didn’t think you could do that, at least not in any of the other places I’ve lived before. But in front of First Presbyterian AND in front of First United Methodist, at least one candidate had a giant banner reminding you to put down the okra and vote for them. I guess it’s legal around here though, otherwise it wouldn’t have been there… right?

So I didn’t get to vote for alderman in the primary… and in the general election in November, I’d just get to cast my ballot for an unopposed candidate… more empowerment! Maybe they should consider revamping the city government. We have 4 wards, with 2 aldermen in each ward, for a total of 8 aldermen… in a city of just over 9,000 people. What’s up with that? Jackson, MS, with a population around 200,000, only has SEVEN city council persons. New Orleans, only has 7. Little Rock (approximately the same population as Jackson) has 7 by wards and 3 at-large. Why does Monticello need 8 aldermen? Maybe if we knocked that down by half (why in the world does each ward have TWO aldermen anyway??) there would be enough people running for local office to actually have some contested races come November. What a novel idea.

So I cast my vote and continued down the street toward Midway Route. Most everyone else I would imagine drove to the polling place. I wonder what everybody there thought as I walked in, voted and then just kept on going. “Who was that fat guy?” I’ll bet they whispered amongst themselves as I walked toward the setting sun. Oops, sun sets in the west. Sorry. Anyway, maybe I seemed really mysterious to them, even though they have my signature, driver’s license and address in their big election book.

I’m like the Outlaw Josey Wales of voting.

Jamie: You can’t get ‘em all, Josie.
Josey Wales: That’s a fact.
Jamie: How come you’re doing this, then?
Josey Wales: Because I ain’t got nothin’ better to do.

Oh man.

Obviously I’m no photographer, but I would think the best place to take pictures of sporting events such as, oh say, the javelin throw, or for that matter, the discus, would be from where the throw originates, not where it lands.

But that’s just me…

Disclaimer for the squeamish: pic accompanies story.

I bet a lot of you get to sleep in on Saturday, don’t you. I try not to be envious of you, since envy is one of the supposedly seven deadly sins. Best as I recall, the only deadly sin is rejecting Christ. But this has nothing to do with any of that. I just didn’t get to sleep in this morning. Why? Because at 7:00 a.m. on the dot, I was standing at the jewelry counter in Wal Mart with my 2 grads. Why? Because as of 6:00 a.m. on the dot, they are now considered to be college students, and able to have college privileges, one of which is that they may pierce body parts. I wonder how much it would deflate them to know that a decidedly NON-college student beat them to it yesterday.

It’s just funny to me that the first thing the guys did to assert their new manliness was to get earrings…

In all honesty though, they’re two great guys and I’m gonna miss them. Tim (L) is headed off to UCA, and plans to be a math teacher. Justin (R) has been accepted at OBU and plans to major in graphic design. I couldn’t be prouder. Oops! Pride is another one of the 7 Deadly Sins, isn’t it…