Back in the saddle again...

(With apologies to Gene Autry)

Good day to you and thanks for taking the time…

For 37 years, every week, usually on a Tuesday morning, I’d settle myself at a keyboard and string together six- or seven hundred words concerning some odd-assed thing that had caught my attention, words that would be passed along to whomever picked up that issue of the newspaper or chanced to click on the wrong web page.

That Tuesday morning ritual’s had about a two year hiatus during which time I’ve gotten married, gotten elected to the city council, gotten older and regained a bit of weight…all of which I feel pretty good about, with the possible exception of the weight. But old habits are hard to break and, of late, I’ve had a number of friends and folks I really didn’t know suggest it might be time fo me to get back to putting together a column. Trouble was, I didn’t have a newspaper to put it in.

Then a while back I came across Substack, which seems to offer a sort of do-it-yourself version of a newspaper website … including a way to get paid for the effort. Let’s just say that last feature is important to me … not because without your money I’ll be going hungry - that aforementioned weight gain attests to that - but because in our culture, other than a mother’s love or a warm, sunny day, most of the things we value come at a price — nearly always measured in dollars and cents. If we claim to value the work of writers, musicians, and artists, they too deserve to be paid for what they do. In that spirit I’m offering a modest paid subscription that includes a weekly Wednesday column, plus the occasional, irregular extra in response to the unexpectedly odd, amusing, and annoying, along with access to more of my previous columns than anyone ought to care to read, and other odds and ends that my get sucked into that digital black hole.

‘Nuff said. Please sign up if you’re so inclined … it’s less than the price of a cheap beer at a nice bar… There is plenty ready for you to peruse waiting on the website, an extra should be coming to you in a day or two, with your regular monthly subscription starting the first week in February.

Thanks and keep having fun…

Jerome