Skip Schweitzer
The Old Road… Saving Another Model “A”
It was a snowy day, the second one in a row toward the end of April. The temperature hasn’t gotten out of the lower 40s. It started out at 27 degrees this morning. The weeks, no, the whole month before was characterized by weather in the 50s and 60s...
Less Than Pretty Nashes
“1950s Nashes were ugly. My father had Nashes. We’d get ‘em real cheap when they were a few years old and drive ‘em a while until something major went wrong. Nashes didn’t hold their values even in the 50s. They were always odd looking. Then we’d get another one. ...
What Were You Doing Before The Corona Virus Hit?
Funny you should ask that question. Me, I am just sitting here in my command chair (as my daughter and lady friend call it), watching the depressing, minute by minute updates on CNN about the Corona Virus situation out of the corner of my eye-- sound turned off --while...
Jammin’ In Mantua
What actually goes on at an old-time country music jam session? What do they really play? It is held in a local church—maybe it’s all church music and gospel? Then again, what if you’re not a church goer, maybe not even a Christian? Maybe you’re Jewish or some Eastern...
Tales from the Americana Music woods… Dancing Eyes
Dancing eyes across the room from me; the so energetic, expressive eyes of the lady fiddler darting in sync to the bluegrass music that we were all playing. You couldn’t miss them. Like a light-house beacon shining across a harbor, you notice them first. They shifted back and forth...
Woodworking Classes By Ernie Conover In Parkman, Ohio
Would you like the opportunity to work for a week with a renown world-class professional woodworker who could teach you anything you ever needed to know about various aspects of woodworking? If you took a series of woodworking courses you might be poised to slip into a well-paying job...
Renovating The Center School Building
Mantua - The second annual Sweet heART Auction and Cookie walk will be held from noon to 5 pm February 10 at the Mantua Township School building (Old Center School), 11741 Mantua Center Road.
This is a joint effort by The Mantua Restoration Society and the Community Center Management Board...
Seventy-Something and Rolling: Thoughts While Recuperating From Surgery
I wonder if many of you have had the experience of suffering through a major block of down time while recuperating from a significant illness, substantial operation or physical setback. I’m sure I am not alone. I, who have always been very active, whether it be in my woodshop,...
Hotter Than Hades In South Dakota
Neutrinos: An uncharged elementary particle that has 2 forms associated respectively with electrons and muons and is massless…… Websters Dictionary
It is the week of the fourth of July and we are in the Black Hills. The temperature is a suffocating 102 degrees today, 99 degrees yesterday, and forecast to...
SweetheART Auction a Smashing Success
Mantua - “Community Center? I hope to tell ya! Look at it; look at all the people who are here. There ain’t no more places to park, so many people. We’ve needed this—a place to gather-- for a long time”, she said, directing her friend to the old principal’s...
Mantua Center School Community Center Transformation Moving Along
Mantua - On Thursday, October 6 the Mantua Township Trustees played to a packed house as the community once again came together in an impromptu move to ask for an update on the progress being made on the Mantua Center School Community Center. Close to 40 people crowded into...
North to Canada Following the St. Lawrence River
We are whale watching in Tadoussac on the St Lawrence but staying 30 miles inland in Petit Saguenay. You will need to look on the map/world atlas to see exactly where we were. It’s about a hundred miles northeast of Quebec City up where the St. Lawrence River widens...
North to Canada Following the St. Lawrence River
We are in the Baie De Laval area south and east of Montreal. It is a shallow lake area caused by the river widening out and slowing down which in turn caused many sediment islands to form. This excursion was represented to be a boat tour of the St....
Two Steps Forward, One Step Back: A multipart saga of dealing...
Previously I explained how the Ohio Public Employees Retirement System (OPERS) made the decision to stop offering supplemental medical insurance to us retirees and, to assuage that decision, hired a firm we’ll call Firm XXX to help us all get our own supplemental Medicare insurance. Mind you, I am...
Bean counters try to control us
This is the ongoing story of how the greedy medical prescription drug insurance companies prey on us older retired people, who they presume won’t fight back but will just lay down and get steam rolled by them. No one seems to have our back! This is my story so...
Bean Counters: A multipart saga of dealing with the Medicare Part...
This is the ongoing story of how the greedy medical/ prescription insurance companies prey on us older retired people, who, they presume, won’t fight back but will just lie down and get steam rolled by them. This is my story, my experience, so I am here to tell...
Shysters Extraordinaire
Shyster: A person who uses unscrupulous, fraudulent or deceptive methods in business.
I am often contacted by individuals locally and from other states and asked to inspect a Model...
Progress At Mantua Center School
Mantua - “There is much community energy. We have a need for a community center like this, to let people know what is available, and a connection to it. Here is a place, a location where people can come in, find support for families, drug problems, a place for...
Preserving the Past and Looking Forward in Mantua Township
Mantua Twp. - In most ways Mantua Township is probably very much like the majority of other cities, townships and villages going into the upcoming election season. Which is to say that one party advocates this, the other party advocates that. Regardless of who wins one hopes that there...
Collecting Fossils in Thermopiles, Wyoming
Perfect silence. It is 10:15 in the morning and I am on a hill twenty miles north of Thermopolis and a half a mile off the highway. We got here at 9:30 AM and the temperature was about 70 degrees. It was 49 just before dawn at the motel. ...
Mantua Center School Building Found To Be Structurally Sound
Mantua - It has now been officially determined that Mantua Center School is indeed structurally safe and basically built like a fortress, putting to rest a topic that has been the focus of debate in recent years. Mantua Township trustees and the Mantua Restoration Society (MaRSI) are working hard...
Mantua’s Center School Funding Grant Moving Forward
Mantua Twp. - The Mantua Township Trustees committed to the elevator project this fine June first morning thanks to Mantua Restoration Society member Cal Brant having drummed up enough backstop-type funding to make up the difference between what the commissioners have offered and what is needed for the project....
Mantua Restoration Society Recognized for Efforts
The Mantua Restoration Society is a volunteer group of township citizens who value and seek to preserve the historic center of Mantua Township as heritage, inspiration and a focus of township life.
Saving Mantua’s Center School… Fighting In The Trenches
Make no mistake, the whole initiative to Save the Mantua Center School has divided the current township trustees—split them three ways as to what to do with the old school building. This not a new development either, because historically there has been much mud-slinging since the purchase of the school in 2004. The community has demonstrated overwhelming support for saving the school and making it into a community center.
Like A Frog Trying To Ride A Bicycle
“Hey Dad, why don’t you think about taking some courses at Kent State. You are a senior citizen so you could take them free. You would meet some people and you might just like it.” So said my daughter Carrie who is also a Professor at Kent. Yeah, but...
To Add Hydraulics or Not – Part II
I made the decision to have hydraulic brakes put on my 1930 Model “A”. The task is beyond my capabilities due to my age, arthritis, and a lack of machining capabilities. It is not as if there are antique auto restoration places on every corner and most modern...
Feedback and Food For Thought
We are some six weeks into this topic of 65 and Single Again. I have gotten a great deal of feedback about the articles via e-mail, over the phone, and more often than not, in person. A great many people seem to identify with this predicament of life. The column mirrors their struggle and they are searching for solutions. As well, it has generated a good bit of thought on my part, re-thinking certain things, postulating new, and contemplating where to go next.
Trying To Embrace The Dating Dot Coms Part 5 ...
The Dating Dot Com phenomenon came on the scene in the 1990s and since then has developed exponentially into a massive industry. You can’t watch evening TV or pick up a popular magazine without encountering advertisements touting this or that dot com which all but guarantee that they will...
The LAFSOMe Group Takes on Cambridge
Our tour guide explained that at the turn of the new century (2000) a group of townspeople and businessmen, recognizing the English heritage of Cambridge, got together, planned and implemented a Dickens Christmas theme that encompassed the whole downtown. This, they surmised, would bring in business. They decked out the downtown in Edwardian style with over 180 Dickensonian life-size manikins in various scenes lining the sidewalks and in shop windows. These scenes depict real life situations of the time, such as a photographer taking a picture, groups caroling, people standing on a corner, and sitting on a bench. These are all lifelike manikins with fairly realistic faces. But there are also various real people dressed in the period clothing walking about. More than once I had the BeJesus scared out of me by a manikin that began talking to me and moved like a human. I wondered if Father Christmas was responsible for any heart attacks or strokes.
Trying To Embrace The Dating Dot Coms Part 4 ...
How many times has it happened that I am notified that an attractive lady with a moniker such as NANNAN69 has just favorited me and would like to talk with me. The posted time is 7:15 PM. At 7:16 PM I respond and immediately a screen flashes that, “NANNAN69 is no longer available but here are 8 more people just like NANNAN69. Give them a response!” Now, tell me how, in 60 seconds, NANNAN got swept off her feet, married off and managed to get the Dot Com to take her out of contention when the rest of us can’t seem to even get the Dot Com to respond to us.
