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Burton Cole

Mothers: Those gray hairs are well earned

Hi, Mom! Sunday is Mother’s Day. I’m the kid who made you a mom way back in… well, we don’t need to go into all that. It was so last century. But Tuesday was your 86th birthday. I don’t think you can blame all your gray hair on me anymore. Nature gets the assist. Wasn’t it fun ...

Births

St. Elizabeth Boardman Hospital BLOSE, Stephanie and Andrew, of Kinsman, a daughter May 9 GORE, Aerianna and Alex Pelley, of East Liverpool, a daughter May 9 MARSTELLAR, Emily and John, of Mineral Ridge, a son May 9 SMITH, Gabrielle and Charles, of New Springfield, a son May ...

Pelted with pun-ishment and pun-chlines

To paraphrase Mark Twain, “’Tis a terrible death to be punned to death.” Sadly, I came across a new lot of tearable — er, terrible — puns. This is not a judgment call. It said so in bold letters right at the top of the page: “These puns are tearable.” It was one of those ...

The road less traveled by made too much of a gasping difference

Many years ago, poet Robert Frost penned the famous lines, “Two roads diverged in a wood, and I — / I took the one less traveled by, / And that has made all the difference.” Bob, buddy, I know what you mean. I got lost too. A wrong turn, and wrong turn there, and next thing you know, ...

30 years later, back to dorm life

After 30 years of living in a house in the country, I’ve moved to a small apartment in the city. It’s dorm life all over again, but with bad knees and fewer escapades involving random male stupidity. I grew up in the country, where we boys could run, holler, spit and throw things all we ...

The Cap’n and I are going to be ship shape — or barge shaped

Stop me if you’ve heard this before, but now that summer nears, I’m going to get back in shape. Oh, you’ve heard that one before have you? Well, I mean it this time. No seriously. Ah, c’mon, that wasn’t supposed to be the humorous part of this column. I started yesterday. Well, ...