Randy Dewberry of Baxley, Ga., tells about the negotiations, phone calls, and, yes, chicanery, it took to secure the future of nine puppies orphaned when only about two weeks old.

Jean belongs to an online baking circle and has learned more than just how to make her own sourdough. We both believe that the Internet “used with caution” offers community in a world in which community is sometimes found wanting.

The correct number for Tree Climbing USA is 770-487-6929.

For publishing the wrong number in the May 24 column, my apologies to Abram Winters – and to an unknown telephone subscriber who may be wondering why people are calling him or her about climbing trees.

Got this little note from my credit card company recently, when they decided to change their contract rules: “We may amend this Agreement at any time. We may amend it by adding, deleting, or changing provisions of this Agreement.”

It was probably my calling to Dave that got the attention of a fisherman on the bank of Lake Horton. I was trying to keep my voice moderate, while avoiding the use of the word “snake,” lest I panic picnickers.

He didn’t even notice the neat rows of new candles hanging from the racks as he crossed the porch and stepped into the kitchen.

If we hadn’t taken the golf cart to Easter services, we would have missed the first song of the thrush. There are several densely wooded pockets on our route, perfect haven for songbirds, and we’ve listened to thrushes there every spring. But if we’d driven the car that glorious morning, we would not have heard those first-of-the-season flute tones.

In the spring of 1971, we were about to move our family to Georgia. I was charged with house-hunting while Dave was already at work at Owens Corning in Fairburn. Driving through southside towns and neighborhoods I thought we could afford, I saw a mishmash of faulty or no zoning which allowed an unseemly mix of small houses and convenience stores, shopping centers and apartment complexes, jammed and seedy neighborhoods.

Note to newcomers:
Try not to get tired of your neighbors’ remarks about how unusual this spring has been. It’s just been so pretty this year we don’t want you to be disappointed when next year contradicts us.

It’s late Tuesday night and I’m paying the price to go boating with Dave tomorrow. I had some “Fayette Woman” stories to finish, and I’m working late.

You may have witnessed a two-year-old throwing a good old-fashioned tantrum at Braelinn Kroger a couple of weeks ago? The boy with spun-gold hair? Right in the check-out lane? Face red and tears soaking his shirt?

The idea for an informal Golden Anniversary reception came from one I attended last May, when the daughters of Etta and Ro Schlobohm put on a really sweet celebration of their parents’ Big 5-0.

Is it possible to celebrate an anniversary for its own sake? To invite friends and strangers alike to pay tribute to an institution, without giving credit to the two who hung on for the ride?

Cont. from last week: Potter D.X. Gordy -
There seemed to be a perception among students that they would somehow be handicapped by having no “family tradition” like D.X. Gordy and those craftsmen whose fathers had worked in clay. Gordy told them, “What you want and what I want is an American tradition. What the whole country needs is a good American tradition.”

The man who came out on the porch of the rustic shed smiled tentatively. He was slight and tousled and somehow fragile-looking, and he wore bandages on several fingertips.

A woman walked into Peachtree City’s wondrous new library last week and went, as the saying goes, ballistic.

If you are a patron of that temple of knowledge you know that nearly everyone involved with its planning, construction, furnishing, and reshelving is proud of the long-awaited results. Its high tech glass and metal design combines well with old-timey comforts like a fireplace (albeit gas-fired), easy chairs, and tables at just the right height.

Talk about déjà vu all over again.

For the first time in many, many years we had dinner at Flat Creek Club in Peachtree City. We were there twice in the past month, actually.

Ever a reader of local journalism when we travel, I clipped a small op-ed piece I found in the Washington Post last month. The headline read, “It’s a Life, Not a Feel-Good Moment.”

Dear Mary and Rainer,

Where has the time gone? I was going to write you a nice long letter at Christmas, then again at New Year’s, and here January is almost gone. Sometimes I worry whether you feel neglected, but I do know how busy you are, especially during the holidays. Time just got away from us too.

Take the traditional sitcom approach to baby-birthing.

Please.

Daughter delightedly announces to her mom that she is going to make her a grandmother.

If you thought 2006 might give us a break from columns about my never-ending searches for lost objects, you thought wrong.

When I was little, my mom had a proverb for every occasion. Looking back, I can’t help but feel as though someone played on her repression that if you “Sing before breakfast, [you’ll] cry before supper.”

Dear friends, dear family, dear community,
As usual, we promised ourselves we are not sending Christmas cards to people we see frequently, but then, as we get notes or cards from them, we get cold feet, buy more cards, and send notes after all.

On my computer desktop there is a little boy in white T-shirt and blue pants, shown in profile, hunkered down in that nonchalant squat that young kids and athletes make look easy. Arthritic adults wince at the mere thought of all their weight swung between two knees.

As faithful readers may recall, when we travel in Europe we tend to stay in Bed & Breakfasts or family-run inns. We seldom do so in the United States, where we travel mostly in our little RV.

It seems, these days, that someone or some group lurks in every shadow, ready to pounce on a perceived new scratch on the Bill of Rights.

A recent article from the anthropology department said that human beings, and only human beings, do good things for others who will never know from whom the largesse came.

A recent article from the anthropology department said that human beings, and only human beings, do good things for others who will never know from whom the largesse came.

By the time this publishes, the local election will be history. While I’m not embarrassed to say I’m voting against rather than for, I don’t feel particularly passionate about any of this year’s candidates. At least not in a positive way.

A few thoughts about weddings:

There’s nothing unusual about wet faces at a wedding.

The role of the best man and the maid of honor is to keep things under control so the chief participants can enjoy their big moment.