Amazingly, it is now mid-December and Christmas is just a matter of days away. After the holidays the Georgia General Assembly will convene for the second year of the current two-year term of the legislature.

Early in my column-writing career I took note of comments by the singer Madonna. A skin magazine had published nude photos of her, taken when she was a teenager. An interviewer asked if she was ashamed about having posed for them. She threw the question back, saying something like, “What have I got to be ashamed of?”

Every trip to the beauty shop is, for me, an adventure in some way. And, without fail, it’s immensely entertaining.

Time has really crept up on me this year and here it is almost Christmas. Less than two weeks to go and I have done no shopping — and me with six grandchildren and now, one great-grandchild. I am really behind for whatever reason.

A few weeks ago, a phenomenon occurred at our church that demanded notice. I was in Chicago at the time but word came to me that the water at the church was purple.

No one knows where the people in the woods actually came from or how long they had lived behind the vacant, dilapidated house on the corner of Flamingo Street and Beacher Hills. They had been there as long as any of us could remember. Some said they would always be among us.

President Obama keeps talking about the jobs his administration is “creating” but there are more people unemployed now than before he took office. How can there be more unemployment after so many jobs have been “created”?

In 1952, Shepherd Mead wrote a little book called “How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying.” In 1961, it became an award-winning Broadway musical. It’s an instruction book about how a young man with lots of drive and cunning can rise from the mailroom to the top of the company. One of the songs from the musical, sung by the main character, J. Pierrepont Finch, is “I Believe in You.” Finch sings it to a mirror.

Last year, my column “Global Warming Rope-A-Dope” (12/24/08) started out: “Americans have been rope-a-doped into believing that global warming is going to destroy the planet. Scientists who have been skeptical about manmade global warming have been called traitors or handmaidens of big oil.”

When we drove to Leesburg for Thanksgiving with daughter Jean and her family, the weather was nice and the roads mostly dry. In these latitudes daylight is brief. It behooves the traveler to pick his weather and his day.

Fayette County has always been known as a hub for great soccer, at least as far back as I can remember. Every year the title hunt comes through here and the trophy cases at the local schools are proof. For regular followers of the local sports scene though, it is easy to see that there is a new trend of winning traditions in all sports.

Normally I’d rather not discuss religion publicly, since it leads to hot heads not given to reason and logic. But today I’ll break that rule to weigh in on global warming, with no more than sober reflection as my credentials.

Congratulations to Mr. Haddix, Ms. Learnard, Mr. Imker and Ms. Fleisch, and we wish you well.

Please remember after the warm glow of election victory subsides, you have a derailed train to put back on the tracks. That train needs your immediate attention.

By Sheldon Richman

If Congress manages to pass a health-insurance bill in the next few weeks, it will undoubtedly require every person to have medical coverage or pay a fine. If someone’s employer doesn’t offer a policy, he will be obligated to buy one for himself no matter how expensive. (Subsidies will be available to lower- and middle-income people.)

It wasn’t intended to be a long conversation, but I should have known better than that. No call to Poet is ever abbreviated.

As a boy I was a “P.K.,” a “Pastor’s Kid,” so every time the church doors were open, I was there. And there were no trips out of town for the holidays, of course, so every year on Christmas Eve I was a part of the Sunday School Children’s Program, which was just fine with me because I liked being in programs and having to do something up front in church.

I was 8 years old, almost 9, and an only child when my mother informed me that I was about to have a little brother or sister.

If government would just stop trying to do everything in the world ... Well, wait. Let’s review what the U.S. government is currently up to:

“Dad, what do you want for Christmas?” is the question kids across this country are asking. Forty-six years ago I asked my Dad that same question.

Assuming a rock-solid 40 Republicans stand against the healthcare reform bill now being debated in the Senate, it will take just one Democrat or independent to derail this monstrosity, which along with its House companion, may be the most disastrous piece of legislation ever to be this close to enactment by Congress.

The ultimate constraint that we all face is knowledge — what we know and don’t know. The knowledge problem is pervasive and by no means trivial, as hinted at by just a few examples.

So here’s the January 2010 PTC Council lineup: The grizzled two-year veteran, Doug Sturbaum; the newly promoted two-year veteran Don Haddix as mayor; and three rookies — Vanessa Fleisch, Kim Learnard and Eric Imker.

When Jean was at Georgia Southern 25 years ago – a quarter century! – we made a point of getting together early in May to celebrate Mother’s Day and her birthday.

At this writing I don’t know what President Obama will decide and announce this week on Afghanistan, but I do hope he considers the men and women in our armed forces at the top of his priority list. Presidents have not always done so.

[Editor’s note: The following is an appreciation of Ralph Jones, the second mayor of Peachtree City. Jones died Nov. 24.]

Sometimes two old souls can find each other and form a friendship that is anchored in rock-solid respect and like thinking.

While Obama has been at great pains to make a show of avoiding taxes on the middle class to pay for his healthcare changes, his proposed increase in Medicaid eligibility will have a huge impact on the 39 states whose income cutoffs for the program are below those required in the new federal legislation.

Answers to your questions about life, religion and the Bible

Pastors get some of the most interesting questions from people they meet and people in their congregations. Here are some that I’ve gotten over the years and for this column.

Really, what drives her decision-making process?

In the few instances where Councilwoman Cyndi Plunkett actually owns up to her infamous support of selling city streets to enable a big-box developer to construct larger big boxes, she cites aesthetics — her personal notion of aesthetics, not anything in city planning or zoning documents.

Well, it looks like you’ve made it another year — almost. The hurdle of the holidays, overstuffed with physically unhealthy portions of food and fiscally unhealthy credit card bills, still must be jumped. In this economy the bar of self-control has been set really high as we watch our waistlines expand almost as fast as cash disappears out of our wallets.