Obituaries

If you?re going to be a sports fan, you might as well be an optimistic one, especially if your team is doing well. Growing up a Cubs and Hawkeyes fan, I?ve learned that it?s actually better to be optimistic, and set yourself up for disappointment, than be pessimistic and look like a band wagoner when your team wins.Tomorrow night (Fri.), the Hawkeyes will be in their second Rose Bowl of my lifetime. The first ...

Mayor Ed King wanted to submit Barb Welander?s name to the Mt. Pleasant City Council as his choice for the position of Building and Zoning Administrator.There had been many applicants for the 32-hour per week position and, of course, Welander was the only female. Welander asked Mayor King if she needed to attend the council meeting. He said it wasn?t necessary.Mt. Pleasant would make national news that day. A ...

Last night, I was snuggled up under a blanket, reading my new book by the glow of the Christmas tree. It was the first time all season I started to feel excited for the upcoming holiday.I had just finished the last of my Christmas crafts and all of my gifts were finally wrapped. Mom and I had spent the afternoon baking and the aroma of cookies and bread still lingered in the air.Yes, I was finally excited, but ...

To the editor:When I moved to Wayland three years ago, one of the first holidays in my new home was Thanksgiving.Living 12 hours from my family meant that I was going to spend this important day for food and fellowship eating a frozen meal alone in my recliner. Thankfully, that was not how I spent that first Thanksgiving separated from my family. Instead, I went to WACO High School and joined a hundred other ...

I called Columbia, Mo., my home for a year. The University of Missouri-Columbia (Mizzou, MU) was my beat when I worked for the Columbia Tribune.I?d go to Coffee Zone on 9th St., for my turtle latte for an afternoon work break and to McNally?s afterwards for a pint with my friends and fellow writers.To say I?ve been following the unfolding events at Mizzou would be an understatement. And as you can imagine, I?ve ...

It?s beginning to look a lot like winter. Not because of snow, or because its particularly cold or anything, but because high school fall sports are coming to a close, basketball, wrestling and bowling teams are starting to have practice, and millions of people around the country are putting up their premature Christmas lights three weeks before Thanksgiving.I get it. Christmas is awesome. It?s almost everyone?s ...

Kenny Greer, of Salem, is at it again.Della Appel, of Mt. Pleasant, had a tree cut down in her back yard. It was a pretty flowering cherry tree, and Della hated to lose it. When she had it cut, there was a rather tall stump left. Something nice had to be done with that stump, more than just a chainsaw wood carving. Having read where Kenny Greer had made a Gnome Home where a tree stump used to be in his yard, she ...

For those that are friends with me on Facebook, it?s well known to you by now that October is Spina Bifida Awareness Month.Everyday this month, I have been sharing at least one fact or stat about the birth defect to help my fellow Facebook users better understand the condition that I live with every day. And in keeping with this year?s Spina Bifida Awareness Month theme of ?Living Beyond Limits?, I thought I ...

DEAR ABBY: I am a college sophomore and have been dating my boyfriend, "Evan," for nearly a year. I am planning to take a semester abroad at the beginning of my junior year.Recently, Evan confessed that if I leave, our relationship would have to end. He asserts that being away from me for more than three months would be too painful and scary, not knowing if I was all right. (He has some anxiety issues, for which ...

I am lucky.This week, I said my final goodbyes to a very dear friend. Ever since Brian Roth?s passing, Mt. Pleasant is no longer the same place it was to me when he was still living in it.I can?t go to many places around town anymore without being taken back to a memory that had Brian in it. Whether it?s the local Pizza Hut that Brian and I met every Monday afternoon for lunch; Papa George?s, where Brian and I ...