“Here Comes Foster!” There Goes Al Michaels

by Kevin Burton    I love me some Al Michaels. Our sportscaster-sports consumer relationship goes back more than 50 years.    How much do I love Al Michaels?  Well, I watched the entire unwatchable Raiders-Chargers game Thursday because he was calling it. I didn’t even have any fantasy players involved.   And I’ve been watching …

Students Sue District Over Free Speech

by Katie Stavick The Frontiersman    Wasilla, Alaska – Two students filed a lawsuit against the Matanuska-Susitna Borough School District Nov. 30, stating that the district has violated their right to free speech.    The plaintiffs in the lawsuit are Ben Kolendo and Quinlen Schachle, both seniors in the District-Kolendo is a senior at Career …

Chef Boyardee And Midweek Culinary Capers

by Kevin Burton    Got re-acquainted with an old boyhood pal last Wednesday and I had lasagna for dinner.    Sounds like glad tidings, yes?    Well maybe not so much. The “lasagna” came out of a can.    This all started with an e-mail from the Interesting Facts website, that alerted me to the …

Where Does Lost Airline Luggage Go?

by Melanie Peeples National Public Radio    The Transportation Security Administration screened 30 million people over the recent Thanksgiving holiday.    That’s a lot of suitcases for airlines to keep track of, and unfortunately, some are bound to get lost. So where does all that lost luggage end up? In a store called Unclaimed Baggage, in …

Keeping Christ In Christmas At Our House

by Kevin Burton    Only one snack company has permission to send me e-mails; Herr’s chips, based in Nottingham, Pennsylvania.    I love their red-hot chips.    Herr’s sent me an e-mail Wednesday with the subject “Merry Chip-mas!”    And I just sighed.    It didn’t make me angry, but it also didn’t make me …

Closing Credits For TV Icon Norman Lear

by Kevin Burton    The television shows produced by Norman Lear were a cultural backbone for 1970s America.  In this case, the backbone was connected to the funny bone.    When I read that Lear died Tuesday at 101, my mind went immediately to that instrumental piano-driven song that played over the closing credits for …

Turning My NFL Sunday Inside Out

by Kevin Burton    I don’t know what that was last Sunday, but it was something, and it was personal.    Was it a self-boycott, playing hooky, a tantrum ( I am good at those)?    I guess it was the fantasy football version of the line “I’m just tired and bored with myself” from …

Syracuse Turns Its Back On The Disabled

by Stephen Kuusisto     (Nationally-known poet and disability advocate Stephen Kuusisto writes the “Planet of the Blind” blog on WordPress. The following is from his posts of  Nov. 28 and Dec. 2.)    When Helen Keller attended Radcliffe she observed that the experience was a “largely lonely triumph” and described how she was ignored by …

Last Of The Original Temptations Looks Back

by Nick Krewen Special to the Toronto Star    Sixty-three years on, Otis Williams is still at the helm of one of the greatest Motown acts of all-time, the Temptations.    Not only does the tenor and baritone vocalist continue to tour with the group into its seventh decade as its only original member, but …

Interesting Facts About Fast Food Chains

by Kevin Burton    Pretty sure I have mentioned on Page 7 that I don’t do New Year’s resolutions. Here’s a possible clarification for 2024.    What I should have said is I don’t get close to the new calendar year and make a resolution, just to have one.    There is one that occurs …