In the news.

I don't know about your news gathering habits, but it seems to me that some days-- the vast majority of days-- the World Wide Web, the radio in the truck and various other sources bring me bad news of the most disgusting and demoralizing sort. This is nothing new, of course, and it doesn't keep Mr. Big Food and I from talking about the bad news each and every day.

Fortunately, we get a reprieve on Thursdays. Thursday is when our local paper comes. Mind you, the news is not all good in our local weekly paper-- the jail docket bears this out!-- but it is never disgusting or demoralizing.

I am not sure if the top FRONT PAGE news is good or bad news (I suspect good). The board of directors of our county Development Council has voted to dissolve the Council.

In other front page news, an Associated Press analysis has deemed our county School District financially sound. That's good news. (I've only skimmed this story so stay tuned for a more thorough analysis from me.) The primary is set for Tuesday. And Head Start students went to the county Public Library for Story Time. They listed to "Curious George goes to the Chocolate Factory." There's a color photo!

PAGE TWO continues the Development Council story.

PAGE THREE has bad news: Obituaries. Page three also has a clearly biased article on Henry Ross who is challenging Alan Nunnelee for our US House of Representatives seat. He'll get my vote on Tuesday. Although Henry and I have deep philosophical differences, I wouldn't mind if he had a chance to show us he really does believe in smaller government. (Who am I kidding?) The larger point is, I've met Alan and I know his record. He needs to come back to Mississippi. Permanently.

PAGE FOUR has Vaughan's Vocabulary. This is a regular column written by a Ph.D. who lives in town. Today he's railing about "good," "basically," "you know" and long list of other throw away words and phrases. There are three words to learn today: resonate, prolific, and banality.

PAGE FOUR has another weekly column, Time Capsules. GOOD LORD! Seventy-five years ago there was a bank robbery! Fifty years ago, March 8, 1962, "Mrs. Alsie Jones celebrated her 70th birthday... . A bountiful and delicious birthday dinner was prepared for her by her four children who live near her." 25 years ago, "Mr. and Mrs. Bob Jones and son of Jackson spent the weekend with parents and grandparents, Mr. and Mrs. Hugh Cooper."

PAGE FIVE is a full page Calendar of Events and an advertisement for Oktibbeha County Hospital. There's a lot going on next week! New books at the library, a Brunswick stew fundraiser for a volunteer fire department, a benefit, a gospel benefit, a dance, a re-union, another benefit, a support group meeting, computer classes, testing storm sirens, bingo at the VFW, and of course, Story Hour.

PAGE SIX continues the School District story, has a sample ballot, and a warning to "Don't fertilize lawns too soon."

PAGE SEVEN is almost all photos of folks receiving awards or winning competitions, except for a 2-column square Card of Thanks from the family of a little boy, Kye, who wandered off on a recent Sunday afternoon. Hundreds of people showed up to his grandparents' farm, where the family was visiting, to help look for him. Last week, there was a long story about it. Men brought dogs to track him. Someone brought a backhoe to break the levy of a pond. Women brought food to feed the searchers. Tragic. Heartbreaking-- they found his little body the next morning in a place that had been gone over and over again by a hundred people. So sad, but somehow not demoralizing.The Card of Thanks ends by asking for prayers that they will find comfort as they grieve, and the suggestion that you should appreciate what you have now, now.

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PAGE EIGHT is a full page ad for the Piglet. Livers or gizzards are on sale for $0.89/lb. Bananas are 2 lbs./$1.

PAGE NINE has my two favorite weekly columns, the Jail Docket and 911 Calls. Page Huffman, DOB 08-17-88 wrote five bad checks! On Feb. 27 at 6:34am the 911 center received a call reporting livestock on a local highway. Good grief. What is the world coming to??

PAGES TEN and ELEVEN are the Devotional Pages, which also contain a number of small advertisements from "businesses who encourage all of us to attend worship services."

PAGE TWELVE begins the Classifieds.

PAGE THIRTEEN continues the Classifieds and also includes some church news that must not have made it onto pages 10-11.

PAGE FOURTEEN has legal notices and ads.

PAGE FIFTEEN is sports. Now here I must say something. Usually the sports page is around page five or six and is at least two pages. But the high school baseball season has just begun. Sports is in a lull. Page 15 also has some photos of students who traveled to Tupelo and won some competitions. In the right photo, "Logan Johnson accepts the third-place award in the Poetry Writing Competition." In the photo, Logan is surrounded by some friends, one of whom has on a "TEAM TEBOW" T-shirt.

The back page is a full page ad from a local car dealer. The ad has 30 photos of used vehicles. Twelve of these are pickups trucks.