Columns

I consider myself one who adapts to change fairly easily. The changing seasons, for example, is something I love. My life has included job changes, new family members, lost family members, lots of moves, and a host of other changes that have trained me to just roll with the punches. The one change, however, that I really do not like is…the time change.

If My Body Was a Car Scary how true it is! If my body was a car, this is the time I would be thinking about trading it in for a newer model. I’ve got bumps and dents and scratches in my finish, and my paint job is getting a little dull.

As I type this morning, I’m enjoying a little “Java”, otherwise known as coffee. Coffee is the most popular drink in the U.S., with an estimated 66% of adults drinking it daily. Coffee comes from the beans of a tree native to the Kaffa region in Ethiopia. From Ethiopia, coffee plants were taken to Yemen, specifically the port of Al Mokah, and from there, around the world.

Last week the Legislature began debate on the first major revenue proposal of the session: raising the tax on cigarettes by $1/pack. In November, I made a very public pledge that I would not support tax increases, along with three of my colleagues, so our vote should have been the least surprising issue of the day, yet tempers flared with frustration that we would not support this tax increase.

For this month’s superintendent's corner, I am going to cover a topic that I am definitely not an expert in. I don’t know if you are like me, but I have reached the age where change is more than just a little unsettling. If you remember what a Commodore 64 looked like or if you remember playing your favorite music on an 8-track tape, I am guessing you are as uncomfortable as I am with Artificial Intelligence (AI).

Sitting is an art that isn’t getting passed along. People these days feel as though they have to be doing something.

Last week, I was pleased to see my fentanyl sentencing enhancement pass on Final Reading as part of Senator DeKay’s LB 795, with a vote of 32-14-3. As a reminder from my Week 4 newsletter, LB 817 aligns the weightbased penalties for fentanyl distributors/traffickers with those currently in state statute for other exceptionally hazardous drugs including methamphetamine, cocaine and heroin.

Last week, I received an email from a reader who shared his thoughts on my column that appeared in the Feb. 12 Courier, in which I criticized the NFL halftime show. The reader suggested that I should have done more research on the topic I was writing about, and the letter made me question whether other readers might have similar concerns.

Is this what all of us 75+ year-olds, and those yet to-be, have to look forward to? This is something that happened at an assisted living center. The people who lived there had small apartments, but they all ate at a central cafeteria.

Last week, I talked about our “nature” of bringing nature indoors with us. I talked mostly about animals.