LATE DEPARTURES: “I just heard a flock of geese headed south and
they weren’t Snows or Tundras either as from the sound of them they
weren’t very high and had the typical Canada ‘honk,’” Skip
Riekofsky of Kushequa wrote us at 6:55 p.m. Sunday.
“Last weekend I saw another flock about 3 in the afternoon and
they, too, were headed south. I guess they’re all just late in
heading south.”
We also had a note from Dave Burkhouse on the same subject but
earlier in the month: “I was shoveling the driveway Saturday
(12/12/09) around 8 a.m. and heard the unmistakeable sound of geese
honking. Looked up and saw a large V formation heading south.”
“Beautiful morning with the sun beginning to rise, a sliver of
the moon still visible in the blue sky and the clean, white blanket
of snow on the ground.”
GET THIS: Ken Lunn of Mount Jewett wrote to us on Monday: “Check
out the Kwik Fill gas station on the south side of Johnsonburg. Gas
Monday evening was $2.37 a gallon. I believe that’s 30 cents
cheaper than Bradford the day before.”
We’re used to astonishing gas prices from other places but this
one really caught our attention because of the large
differential.
The state House of Representatives recently approved a measure
which dictates prices for legal notices published in newspapers …
this is the same group of people who can’t seem to find the legal
authority to even investigate how gasoline prices are
determined.
The argument for reviewing gas prices always revolves around
“private enterprise” and the “free market.” This is capitalism at
work and not monopoly — or so the rationale goes, despite the
virtual monopoly in a rural area. Seems the legislators don’t
understand that a newspaper, too, is a business operating in the
“free market.”
Go figure.
(Incidentally, our Rep. Marty Causer voted against the measure
concerning legal notices — for just these reasons.)
BACKLOG: We have managed to accumulate quite a stockpile of
material over the past couple weeks — everything from swimming
holes, to Texas hot, to Christmas poems — which we’ll get to as
soon as possible. Be patient!
