Stories from Thursday, December 1, 2011

James William Jacox Jan. 2, 1946 - Nov. 29, 2011 MCHENRY, Illinois -- James William "Jake" Jacox, 65, of McHenry and recently of McCook, Nebraska, died Tuesday, (Nov. 29, 2011), at Centegra Hospital - McHenry, with his beloved daughter, Shelly and her husband, Peter Meehan, at his side...

City of McCook, Nebraska, firefighter/paramedic Mark Eiler replaces a faulty timer in the control box of the civil defense/tornado siren at West Eighth and Q Streets Wednesday afternoon. With its timing malfunctioning, the siren turned itself on Saturday afternoon...

A report that more and more kindergarten students aren't getting the required vaccinations is alarming, but we feel there may be more to the story. According to an analysis of state health department student vaccination data by The Associated Press, more than one in 20 public school kindergartners do not get all the shots schools require...

When will the people of this nation wake up? I doubt that majority of people reading this post have an inkling of what is going on. The banks, the FDIC, options and commodities, stock accounts, derivatives, are all collapsing. Money as you understand it is gone. This is a fact. We are watching an economic 9/11 in progress. A bank holiday is inevitable...

Mayor Dennis Berry wrote enjoining people to shop local. Local merchants support local institutions and activities and supporting them is good for the community. It had the ring of motherhood and apple pie. In all things, the mayor was decrying competition from out of town and Internet sources for the goods the customer wanted to buy. Goods that one can purchase at lower prices, due in part to avoiding sales taxes...

Well troops, astronomically speaking, there is not much going on this week. Of course, there is always something going on, but we, as humans, think in terms of something big or else it is not interesting. Tonight (Thursday) will be a good opportunity to locate one of the dim outer gas giant planets, Neptune. The moon will be a help...

I should have figured the Thanksgiving holiday couldn't have gone as smoothly as it did without something ridiculous happening. We traveled to see family in Ogallala last week and stayed for five days. The week was filled with food, family and fun, and the weather was gorgeous. To top it all off, all five of us managed to escape the holiday without getting sick. That in itself, is somewhat of a miracle...

I was five years old when the original Muppet movie -- called "The Muppet Movie," oddly enough -- came out; I remember my parents packing all four of us Blomstedt kids into the car to go see it. Soon after, the cheery, quirky -- and even surprisingly poignant -- soundtrack was an essential part of our family's traveling music, too...