Here's a brief biography of myself. I guess that makes it an autobiography. Of course, a true auto-biography would be writing itself, wouldn't it? Let’s hope this works out because I flunked biography in high school. I refused to dissect the frog and I never did get a handle on the reproductive system. To this day I am convinced we all start out as tadpoles or maybe pollywogs.
“Hill of Beans” is my column. Wonder why it’s called that? Well, just read it once and you’ll figure it out. Then you can help me figure it out.
The column has been running for about 20 years. And I’ve been running about 19 years off and on because of the column. It first appeared in the Palmyra (MO) Spectator weekly and then in the Hannibal (MO) Courier-Post daily newspaper. At the Spectator I was a reporter and photographer. Then they found my hands fit well around a broom handle and I swept out the place for a few extra bucks. At the Courier-Post I was an editor, and then a department head in several capacities. And then, without benefit of a broom handle, I was swept out of the place due to a visual impairment disability. I didn’t write for almost a year. And some people concluded themselves lucky. Thanks to adaptive equipment, and some really big fonts, I am writing again.
At age 51, I have returned to school to pick up a degree in organizational management – or in whatever other major happens to be lying around.
Did I mention my column won a first-place award once. Well, that’s enough about that. It was voted best humorous column. Well, that’s enough about that. Best in the whole state. Well, that’s enough about that.
My wife and I are now grandparents for the first time. My daughter, the new mommy, grew up in public through my column – ask her about the lady who identified her as the reason I bought aspirin by the bulk – so little Savannah has so much to look forward to.