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Opinion

  • We’re not weird, we’re wonderful

    Stoned on laughing gas and thick-tongued from Novocain, I said “Lawren-th-burg” when the dentist asked where I’m from.
     “Oh, I have friends from Lawrenceburg,” she said, the cruel whirl of the drill screaming in my ears as she leaned in to fix a troublesome tooth. “They’re always sending me that goofy newspaper with all the weird stuff in it.”

  • Meatballs horse, of course

    No one likes liars.
    Particularly when your food is lying.
    Not laying on your plate, but masquerading as something it’s not supposed to be.
    Horse meat in beef’s clothing, for example.
    Imitation may be the finest form of flattery, but except when we’re not aware of the cuisine mimicry.  
    In earth-shattering headlines, media outlets pick up on the latest click-bait “you won’t believe what thing you won’t want to eat next!” and reveal another food isn’t what it said it was.

  • Business licenses, insurance fees...

    Column as I see ’em …
    It was disappointing to learn that the fiscal court won’t do away with its ridiculous business license requirement simply because it includes an equally ridiculous insurance premium fee.
    Frankly, magistrates should get rid of both.
    The first is an inexplicable tax on local businesses put in place, apparently, because some people have the audacity to open a business in our fair town. The second is equally inexplicable and in place simply because people own things they either want or are required to insure.

  • Hemp law makes headway

    Hemp production in Kentucky may soon become more than a pipe dream.
    Back in November 2011, I wrote a column about industrial hemp as a source of biofuel.
    Now in 2013, industrial hemp is fueling conversations from the state senate to FFA debates at Anderson County High School.
    Last Monday the state senate passed Senate Bill 50 to allow the licensing and of hemp growers, should the state eventually receive a waiver from the federal government to produce industrial hemp.

  • Reverse foolish federal policy on...

    Count me among those who wish the federal government would for once listen to Sen. Rand Paul and lift its ridiculous prohibition on industrial hemp.
    Count, too, our sheriff and judge-executive, both of whom have climbed on the hemp bandwagon based on the opportunities it provides for jobs and industry.
    All of Kentucky is buzzing on hemp, although not the way you might think. Unlike its ugly sister marijuana, hemp is the none-dopey version of the plant that can be used for everything from shingles to clothing to oil, plus it doesn’t get people stoned.

  • Put taxing districts under control...

    I moved to Kentucky in 2008 when the economy crashed. Our family decided that it was time for us to live by a budget in order to avoid our own fiscal cliff.
    Each of us puts our receipts into a jar. At the end of the month, we painstakingly open the lid and review each receipt to match our credit card statements, and to see how we are doing in meeting our budgeted expenses.
    By careful examination, we discovered unauthorized charges. We also realized that certain months we had to spend less in order to stay within our budget.

  • A sports lesson the news media...

    That one little piece of journalistic advice offered on a hot August morning nearly 28 years ago is still the one that drives my career as a sports journalist.
    I was attending my first University of Kentucky Football Media Day gathering at Commonwealth Stadium. Looking for a chance to be known as a hot-shot writer, I made my way over to the best in the business: Cawood Ledford.

  • When faith and news collide

    This column doesn’t usually tackle religion.
    But religion found me this week in an unusual place.
    The news.
    First, the facts.
    I am a pastor’s daughter.
    As well as sister, daughter and sarcastic lackwit, I’ve also claimed the title of pastor’s daughter for almost a decade now.
    Therefore, I know a little bit (not a lot mind you) about how the religious sausage is made.
    And everyone has an opinion about religion. Including pastor’s daughters.

  • All quiet on the Interstate

    The most frightening sound is silence.
    Especially four hours of silence.
    Sometimes, during a game of hypotheticals, I like challenge myself to choose what traditional sense I would be able to live without, one I wouldn’t miss more than the others.  
    Smell. Taste. Touch. Sight. Sound.
    Last Thursday night, as I was caught in the hard place between moving forward on icy roads or driving my car in a ditch, was no game.

  • Don’t abuse a right because you can

    Column as I see ’em …
    The old adage that just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should crossed my mind several times this week as I wrote an article about a firearms law that went into effect in January.
    Passed easily by the state legislature and signed into law by the governor, the law says that only the state can regulate firearms and largely stripped municipalities from restricting people from carrying guns into publically owned buildings.

  • Prove your love with photos

    You probably know the saying before I form the sentence on my lips.
    A picture is worth a thousand words.
    Every week in The Anderson News — in every article and every column — I use hundreds, maybe even a thousands of words to describe everything happening in Anderson County.
    It’s no secret that I love words: I wouldn’t be much of a writer if I hid from them.  
    But for the month of February I wanted to show my love for Anderson County through a special photo series, “Why We Love Anderson County.”   

  • The right way to handle problem

    Column as I see ’em …
    The school district’s recent efforts to make sure children are safe paid off early Monday morning in more ways than one.
    When a man allegedly made numerous threats against a female student, the high school and an elementary school, district officials and law enforcement acted smartly and quickly by ensuring that the schools weren’t only safe, but that the public was kept informed.
    First they made sure the person who allegedly made those threats was investigated, charged and put in jail.

  • Keeping resolutions under oath

    I tell people I never make new year resolutions.
    I lie.
    Which is, funny enough, the first rule of forming resolutions.
    My flimsy covenants should not be considered resolutions.
    They’re promises taped together only by mental commitment. Resolutions upheld by the most fragile glue imaginable.
    Maybe, to pin some permanence on resolutions, I’ll eventually learn to write them down. Trap them on paper where they can’t be lost.

  • If you live in historic district,...

    A year has passed since the first public hearing, and Anderson County residents — namely the Planning and Zoning Board — are still not quite sure about moving forward with an historic district in downtown Lawrenceburg.
    To be sure, the establishment of a historic district should not be taken lightly.
    I think it’s fair to say no one wants downtown Lawrenceburg to fall apart.
    The more cynical of us may say it’s doing a good job of falling apart already.

  • State of children poor, in numbers

    Numbers can wound or heal depending on how you wield them.
    One of the side effects of working as a reporter includes thousands numbers tangling themselves into piles of paper stored into file folders in what I consider to be the organized chaos of my desk: salary figures, test score percentiles, ages, birthdays, funeral services, election returns and meeting dates, to name a few.
    Numbers have always been important when it comes to reporting news.
    The greater the number, the bigger the story.   

  • Chandler’s final vote comes as no...

    Column as I see ’em …
    Ben Chandler must have gone to bed the evening of Nov. 6 wondering what in the world went wrong after losing so badly in his effort to remain in Congress.
    Fast forward to his Jan. 2 fiscal cliff vote to increase the deficit by $4 trillion and it’s safe to say he still hasn’t figured it out.

  • Revenge on friend will be sweet

    The burly guy with a hammer on his belt told me he was going to whoop my you-know-what.
    It wasn’t the first time someone who recognizes me from my day job has given me the stink eye, and most certainly won’t be the last.
    I’ve been f-bombed clean out of stores — once while buying potato chips for my kid’s youth baseball picnic — by people whose family members were listed in crime reports or court dockets.

  • Keeping up with Lawrenceburg

    When I was a high school student in a one motel town with one bar and no stoplights, our tiny South Dakota weekly newspaper printed a popular feature second only to the police blotter.
    The coffee talk section.
    Following in the grand biblical tradition of genealogical listings, the coffee talk section was a litany of the week’s gossip and news: who had coffee with whom, who was out of town on vacation, and who hosted their black sheep relatives from who knows where.

  • ‘Honey wagon’ owner owes me pair of...

    You know you’re having a bad evening when you’ve just stepped in a nightmarish stew of someone else’s feces, urine, used toilet paper and God only knows what else.
    Remote in hand, I had just settled in for some Monday Night Football when my phone rang. It was a tip that someone had just illegally offloaded a septic tank trunk on Wildcat Road and the caller figured I’d want that story for this week’s paper.

  • Dismantling Black Friday myth

    Blood gushes from an open wound on a stranger’s head.
    She uses her newly purchased bathroom towels (a deal at two for $10) to clot the gore.
    An elderly gentleman plays discount sweater tug of war with a fellow shopper, using his teeth in an attempt to snag the marked-down sweater for himself.  
    In the days leading up to my first Black Friday excursion, I imagined myself a front-row witness to the above fabled retail battlefield.