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There’s a-whole-nother population out there
Posted by wkiernan | 05/06/08
There’s a-whole-nother population out there
With this job, it’s not solely about the writing, you know. My job description, if I had one, would be all over the page and continued in another volume. This job requires a multitude of staff members who are self-starters and can multi-task from dawn to dusk. And yet I often find myself alone in a room with no windows making unilateral decisions on what the news will be.
Though we may dream of perfect worlds, we only really get the ever-changing one we’ve got, which may be as perfect as it gets. If I had my druthers, I’d have a dance that followed my steps...
CATEGORY: General Society
When life hands you lemons...
Posted by wkiernan | 04/23/08
When life hands you lemons, make a half glass of lemonade
According to the pundits, we’re all going to hell in a hand basket. If you Google the phrase ‘according to the pundits’ you will find an assortment of discordance and incongruities with the only common ground being negativity. I looked up pundit and it means learned person or expert. So according to the pundits, the glass is half empty. But I disagree and I’ll prove it if it kills me.
Life is a miracle of inexplicable origin. It’s the given that many people cannot accept. People think they need to comprehend everything in order to function...
CATEGORY: General Society
TAGS: positive thinking
Sometimes the best choice...
Posted by wkiernan | 04/15/08
Sometimes the best choice is the one you never had
With two young daughters rather close in age, it takes a lot of doing to achieve fairness or even approach it at all times. God forbid one thinks I love the other one more. Sometimes it’s like walking on a clothesline over a piranha pond.
The other night, the older one had mentioned hot dogs for dinner. It seemed like a slam dunk but the younger one said she gets headaches from hot dogs. While in the store with my wife, it was made clear that hot dogs were not a family favorite. So I bought a small pork loin with whole grain rice and green beans. My oldest daughter was not pleased with this development and hot dogs had to be promised for the next night...
CATEGORY: General Society
Can’t judge a player by his uniform
Posted by wkiernan | 04/08/08
I was recently referred to as an atheist or an agnostic. Something that was assumed after reading one of my columns? I would like to debunk these accusations, but first I had to look the words up in the Webster dictionary. Debunk means to expose as being false.
Webster, by the way, was a devout Christian. He even released his own Bible in 1833 with the King James version as a base, and consulted the Hebrew and Greek along with various other versions and commentaries. He molded his Bible by correcting grammar, replacing words that were no longer used and by doing away with words and phrases that could be seen as offensive, like the DH rule.
An atheist is a person who denies or disbelieves in God, the supreme being or beings...
Bringing my own peanuts and Crackerjacks
Posted by wkiernan | 03/25/08
Bringing my own peanuts and Crackerjacks
Diamonds, stealing, hitting, bullets, rifles, no, I’m not talking about the Mafia coming to town to open a gelato joint; this is baseball talk. The double play, the hit and run, the ham and egger, the Donnybrook, the can of corn, the Texas League fly, the bleacher bum and the Bronx cheer; it’s all the lingo and poetry that is springtime in America, the welcome mat to summer.
The days are getting longer and hopefully the snow is tapering off. The crocuses are popping out and the screen windows are popping in. Spring cleaning is around the corner and spring training is almost over.
When I was a kid, baseball cards were a nickel a pack. You got five cards and a stick of gum. Now they’re $2 for a pack of ten, no gum...
Reinventing the column or just stalling?
Posted by wkiernan | 03/18/08
Reinventing the column or just stalling?
Here we go again, it’s time for a column and there’s nothing to discuss. The pool has been drained; the cookie jar is empty and the cupboard is naked. Constant toil has led to focus fatigue, idea inaccessibility and concept constipation. My gift for the written gab has expired, worn out its welcome, taken a powder. My forte has been frayed to fiddle-faddle.
My loyal subjects are exhausted. My kids are tired; my tires are flat; my flat needs paint; my paint is chipping; my chips are down and my downs are Vernon. I’m just a hunka’ hunka’ Vernon love. See what I mean?
I have a song in my head that won’t go away. There’s a hole in my bucket, dear Liza, dear Liza. Then mend it, dear Georgie, dear Georgie...
They make fun of me
Posted by wkiernan | 03/11/08
They make fun of me at the editors’ meeting
Here it is Sunday night, the first day of daylight savings time. The sun is just going down and it’s later than I think. We lost an hour last night and I just don’t know where it’s coming from. This week started Monday at 4 a.m. and I’m still not done working. But then I’m reminded that it’s a leap year and I gained a day somehow. Where did that go? Did I gain a day or just work one more day with the same pay?
They make fun of me at the editors’ meeting. They say Cazenovia is a weird place with a bunch of people who think who they are. I’m ridiculed for championing a fundraiser for Haiti or Sudan, or for rare diseases that lead to extraordinary human achievements or motorcycle trips halfway around the world...
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On the jobGreetings. I'm Willie Kiernan a columnist, reporter, photographer, singer, guitar player and editor of the Cazenovia Republican and the Hamilton/Morrisville Tribune. My weekly column is called On the Job, and regularly addresses my take of the modern day balancing act that is necessary to master when one wears several hats such as income provider, husband, father, community member, philosopher, entertainer and newspaper maker.
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