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President's Column March 2013

As I write this, freezing rain is falling across much of West Texas and the roadways are coated with ice. It’s the fourth winter storm of the season and, quite frankly, I’m sick of it.

I might feel differently if the cold weather was accompanied by snow, but it rarely is. Eldorado is far enough south that the fluffy white stuff almost never makes it here. What we get is instead is ice, and for the past two years we’ve seen plenty of it.

I’m tired of car wrecks, power outages, slick sidewalks, and broken tree limbs. I not sure if I should be angry with Al Gore, who promised that the globe is getting warmer, or with that lying groundhog in Pennsylvania.

My friend Russel Skiles from The Lamesa Press-Reporter helped to lift my grumpy mood with an email containing a headline that he found amusing — DA Says Teen Passed Shotgun.

Russel said he had heard of people passing kidney stones, among other things, but never a shotgun.

I couldn’t help but laugh even as I recalled a couple of headlines that I would rewrite if I could. Luckily, my bungled heads never made it on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno.

A newspaper in a neighboring town had one of the best, or worst, depending on your point of view, headline bloopers I can recall — Mayor’s Wife Arrested for Pubic Intoxication.

A quick Internet search turns up thousands of headline bloopers and I keep a list of my favorites in my desk drawer especially for dreary days like this. I’m sure that you have seen many of these, but on the off chance that one of them might help brighten your day, I include the list here.

  • Panda Mating Fails - Veterinarian to Take Over
  • William Kelly Was Fed Secretary
  • Police Begin Campaign to Run Down Jaywalkers
  • Queen Mary Having Bottom Scraped
  • Eye Drops Off Shelf
  • Never Withhold Herpes from Loved One
  • Obesity Study Seeks Larger Test Group
  • Sex Ed Teachers Require Additional Training
  • Man Struck by Lightning Faces Battery Charge
  • Federal Agents Raid Gun Shop, Find Weapons
  • Forecasters Call for Weather on Monday
  • Total Lunar Eclipse Will be Broadcast Live on Northwoods Public Radio
  • Barbershop Singers Bring Joy to School for Deaf
  • Students Cook & Serve Grandparents
  • Ten Commandments - Supreme Court Says Some OK, Some Not
  • No Benefits for Ill Man - Agency Says Terminal Illness Not Severe Enough
  • Utah Girl Does Well in Dog Shows
  • Write-in Voting Gets Woman Shot at School Board
  • Candlelight Ceremony Unties Couple
  • Westinghouse Gives Robot Rights to Firm
  • Poll Says 53% Believe Media Offen Make Mistakes
  • Trial Ends in Mercy Killing
  • Editor’s Wife Rented to 2 Suspects, FBI Says
  • Joint Committee Takes Up Marijuana Issue
  • Columnist Gets Urologist in Trouble with His Peers
  • Coach Sells Wife on Move to Dayton
  • Cemetery Praised by Former Resident
  • New Vaccine May Contain Rabies
  • Weather: Cloudy with a Chance of This Morning
  • Hole Appears in Nudist Colony Wall — Police Are Looking into It

 

And, I saved this one for last. It’s fitting since the temperature continues to drop and the wind is really howling outside — 

  • Cold Wave Linked to Falling Temps

May your tomorrows all be sunny...and warm.