John Deere’s iconic green and yellow trademarks are so recognizable they’ve become usefully branded in our mind. I don’t know the story behind when the Illinois farmer-turned-businessman came up with that marketing scheme 150+ years ago, but now, during the blah doldrums of late February and early March, I have a hunch.

Each almost-spring, I grow disheartened over the roadkill. Skunks in particular have an instinctual inner directive this time of year that requires road-crossings.
“Well they should stay out of the road,” someone told me.

Candles flickered across the altar, at times their flames seemingly imbued by the prayers they symbolized. About 20 voices united in ecumenical prayer that on this cold Lenten night was voiced in music.

finally got around to slogging through that Nietzsche. I borrowed “Thus Spake Zarathustra” from the library and I’m glad I did.

Local fans of CMT’s hit television series, “Trick My Truck,” can see the owner of a Fort Chiswell business featured in 10 episodes this season.

They should check listings for broadcast times. Kelvin Locklear of Florence, S.C., is the leader of the show’s truck builders now known as Outcast Kustoms.

We hope the county will give its blessing to an Ivanhoe-based company’s plan to take in Wythe trash. Commonwealth Recycling Services, which already handles the county’s recycling, is thinking of buying a composting system that would convert trash to compost material to be used for gardening, farming and erosion control. However, before the company buys a machine, it wants some assurance that it can get the county’s trash, which is now hauled to and buried in Tennessee. 

If you haven’t heard of it yet, it won’t be long till you do. With the catch phrase “Always anonymous, always juicy,” a new breed of Web site is making the rounds and raising hackles on college campuses. 

Ratchet Arnold was humming a tune that echoed throughout the barn.  At first it was hard to make out.  Then it came clear.  He was humming “Take Me Out to the Ball Park…”
“Baseball season isn’t here yet,” said Beck, my ole Missouri mule.  “We’ve got snow falling and you’re humming a summer song.”

On Feb. 15, my friends and I were happy to return to the Marquee Cinemas so that we could attend our second promotional event for the theater spotlighting the fantasy adventure film, “The Spiderwick Chronicles.” In an interview with general manager Jayson Wickard and assistant manager Gina Hamilton, I learned of the marketing efforts they exerted to promote the event.  Hamilton’s duties included contacting area businesses to join them at the theater.  She recruited Chapters Bookstore of Galax, who donated the five-volume series of “The Spiderwick Chronicles” books, on which the film was based, for a giveaway drawing.

I have a strange habit. It’s one that might have appeared sane in some earlier culture, like my grandparents’, but in an age of bizarreness, what once ranked as sane seems admittedly crazy, like growing gardens and trees instead of lawn, saving coffee grounds for the dirt, or walking someplace on foot.