By Kay Frances I know I’m weird, for so many reasons that I don’t have space to list here, but I often find myself “zigging” when everyone else is “zagging.” Most — OK all — of my friends LOVE bed and breakfasts. I don’t. There, I said it. To me, the very concept is the […]
By Lora Abernathy My husband said the cake was absolutely delicious, but that I really should change its name. “It’s kind of unappetizing,” Gary said. “I’m not going to change its name! That’s what we called it growing up, so that’s what I’ll always have to call it,” I protested with a smile, but throwing […]
There are many ways to know for sure that you are getting older: 1. The phone rings and you hear yourself saying, “It’s 8 p.m.! Who could be calling at this hour?” 2. When a website asks for your year of birth, your finger cramps from scrolling down to find it. 3. But the most […]
By Pamela Stricker EDITOR’S NOTE: This column originally appeared in the Holiday 2012 southwest Ohio edition of Salt. It has been updated slightly. A few years ago, while in a neighboring town, I was ready to head for home when I spotted a little child standing on the curbside looking very alone and crying; a […]
By Pamela Stricker Overloaded outlets can cause fires and most of the fires that are the result of overloaded outlets occur during the holidays. We need to pay attention to those warning labels. But, that’s not the only thing that gets overloaded at this time of year. We do. And it often happens in very […]
Courtney Rogers “I cried because I had no shoes until I met a man who had no feet.” ― Helen Keller I was aggravated at the amount of my time that was tied up in travel to attend a meeting at our company’s corporate office in North Carolina. Little did I know how much the […]
In my job as a Funny Keynote Speaker, I travel. A lot. Mostly because I can’t convince the people to come to my house. When you travel a lot, you learn to navigate the ups-and-downs and find a way to make travel cheaper, safer and more enjoyable, or at least tolerable. I’ve noticed that the […]
By Pamela Stricker In this season of summer vacations, family reunions, weekend getaways — however you may be spending your time away — one thing that seems to always accompany the return to home base is that satisfied sigh of relief that echoes Dorothy’s sentiments from “The Wizard of Oz” film: “There’s no place like […]
I did my share of camping as a child. I think the concept is better in theory than in execution, but the cheapest way to take a family of six around the country is to camp. I have to admit that the significance of the historical sites and battlefields that my dad dragged us to […]
From left, Anita Workman, Dana Cochran and Pamela Stricker. My mother recently connected with a friend of hers. Not just any friend, but one she had lost contact with for decades. The two of them roomed together in Dayton where they both worked at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. Mom was so excited to discover her […]