Mark R Hunter's Blog Posts Tagged 'slightly' (77)

SLIGHTLY OFF THE MARK

            Years ago, when I first got started in the emergency services, an old medic told me, “Son, if you plan to stay in this business, you’d better learn to love coffee.”

I never did (although I certainly did grow to love caffeine). The following story may be one of the reasons why. I first heard it years ago, but it took me this long to get enough guts to write about it:

            Would you like a nice…

SLIGHTLY OFF THE MARK

            Many challenges face a couple in modern society. Raising children, paying bills, sharing a bathroom, having a conversation …

            Assembling furniture.

            Yeah, that’s right up there. There was a time when a home didn’t have much expensive furniture, but the occupants could build the whole house themselves.

            Then, one day, the average head of the household went from being a…

SLIGHTLY OFF THE MARK

            I try never to write two serious columns in a row – this is supposed to be, after all, a humor column. After last week’s diatribe about terrorism, I wanted to get back on the humor horse.

            But I was hamstrung by the fact that this column lands just days before the 125^th anniversary of my fire department’s organization. Marking that meant being funny about something specific, something not…

SLIGHTLY OFF THE MARK

            One thing I find interesting about history is the way things come together in unexpected ways.

            Yes, I find history interesting. That hasn’t done me much good – I always seemed doomed to repeat myself, anyway – but as spending time goes it beats the heck out of smoking pot, watching grass grow (the other grass, not pot), or a scintillating episode of “Water Polo With The C-List Celebrities”.

           …

SLIGHTLY OFF THE MARK

            “The Pope is a sissy,” said my friend, Howie Dunnit, who’s always full of interesting ideas.

            I took a few steps away from him. That’s usually a wise idea when speaking to Howie, especially on religious matters. He doesn’t worry much about offending Anyone.

            No, I explained to Howie. The new Pope is named after St. Francis of Assisi, who gave up his wealth and was famous for helping…

SLIGHTLY OFF THE MARK

(My wife wrote a column for me this week because I was indisposed, which is to say I was in the hospital with agonizing abdominal pain. Emily tried to write it the way I would have, as if it was me writing. But it was shorter than my normal, and since I’m feeling a bit better now I thought I’d comment on her story. If you see it in parenthesis,…

SLIGHTLY OFF THE MARK

            Parents should never have to bury their children.

            That’s not the way life’s supposed to work. Parents should go to their death beds knowing their children are well, their grandchildren carry on the family name, and they’ve left behind a world just a little better than the one they were born into.

            But it doesn’t always work that way.

            Across the world, every day, young…

SLIGHTLY OFF THE MARK

            By the time you read this, the world may have ended. At least, that’s how some are treating the Sequester, which is apparently Latin for Apocalypse.

            The Sequester is an agreement between the President and Congress, by itself amazing enough. It means that, if our government can’t agree on a budget by a certain date, draconian spending cuts kick in and all the oxygen will be sucked out of the…

SLIGHTLY OFF THE MARK

            I spent a lot of time in recent years thinking of cancer, which is strange because most of the men in my family seem to drop dead of heart attacks. You’d think I’d spend all my time making sure everyone around me updates their CPR training.

            Five years ago, after allegations that I was a pretty good writer, I was approached about doing public information work for the Noble County Relay For…

SLIGHTLY OFF THE MARK

            Well, it finally happened: President Obama said something I agree with.

            He wants to get rid of the penny.

            A penny for your thoughts, Mr. President? “The once-cent piece has Lincoln on it, and our Founding Fathers are no longer relevant.” I’m kidding; he didn’t really say that – sounds more like something Joe Biden would say. No, the POTUS has – brace yourself – a practical reason…

SLIGHTLY OFF THE MARK

Daddy was a cop

on the east side of Chicago

Back in the U S A

back in the bad old days

“The Night Chicago Died” was one of my favorite songs when I was a kid. Sung by the group Paper Lace, it was on my favorite 8-track up until I got the “Star Wars” soundtrack. In fact, I assumed at the time that all their songs must have been huge hits, only to…

SLIGHTLY OFF THE MARK

            My wife sent me some articles about pain management, indicating to me either that she’s concerned about my well-being or that I complain too much, or possibly both. Apparently “just live with it” is no longer an acceptable plan on my part.

            In fairness, though, I usually bring pain on myself. For instance, there was the snow shoveling incident that caused both back and head pain, and also proved the old…

SLIGHTLY OFF THE MARK

            In my eagerness to be loved, I signed up in mid-January for a two week weight challenge.

            Well, it must be in my eagerness to be loved, because I can’t imagine any other reason why I’d do it.

            Originally I thought it was a challenge to see how much weight you could gain in two weeks. I mean, what else can you do in January? Ice fish? That’s like sticking your hair in a fan or trusting…

SLIGHTLY OFF THE MARK

(I wrote this back in 2005, but news of an arctic air mass heading this way made me think of it again. Also, I couldn’t write a new column … my fingers are frozen.)

My friend, who I’ll call Howie Dunnit, has some interesting ideas.  For instance, he was the first to come up with the concept of reality television, many years ago.  He wanted to take the ten celebrities he hated the most, put them on an island with large…

SLIGHTLY OFF THE MARK

            The Lake Superior State University 2013 list of banished words is up, and I’d be remiss if I didn’t talk about it.

            (I’ve dedicated myself in this new year to using one word every column that I don’t usually use, thus the “remiss”. And the “thus”. Guess I’m ahead, now.)

            I know what you’re thinking: Why is it Lake Superior State University, coming up with this list? Well, have you ever been…

SLIGHTLY OFF THE MARK

            I was puzzled about why the government started naming winter storms, until I realized it isn’t: The Weather Channel is.

            The Weather Channel – it could be some people don’t know this – is a private company, not a government agency. The Weather Channelers looked at named tropical storms and said, hey: Shouldn’t winter storms be named, too?

            No. No, they shouldn’t.

            Oh, I…

SLIGHTLY OFF THE MARK

The first of the year is a great time for making predictions, mostly because so many other people are making predictions that no one will remember how wrong you were.

    I’m writing this on 12/12/12, which I figure will give me some kind of magical ability to see the future. Unless the world ends on December 21st, in which case this will be wasted effort … didn’t see that coming. (Note: The world was…

SLIGHTLY OFF THE MARK

            This being Christmastime, I thought it might be a good time to discuss Christmas. Yes, my mind does sometimes flow in logical, if obvious, directions.

            Christmas is, again obviously, a celebration of the birth of Christ. Or maybe not so obviously. In fact, that might be one of the single most forgotten facts of the Christmas season, and in today’s politically correct world we’re often encouraged not to mention…

SLIGHTLY OFF THE MARK

            This being Christmastime, I thought it might be a good time to discuss Christmas. Yes, my mind does sometimes flow in logical, if obvious, directions.

            Christmas is, again obviously, a celebration of the birth of Christ. Or maybe not so obviously. In fact, that might be one of the single most forgotten facts of the Christmas season, and in today’s politically correct world we’re often encouraged not to mention…

                “Words With the Big Guy” was originally a gift to readers who bought my novel Storm Chaser last Christmas; this year, it was printed in the Christmas insert of the Albion New Era, Churubusco News, and Northwest News newspapers. The story was inspired by “Santa’s Spirit”, which I wrote in 2006 for the Christmas edition of my column, “Slightly Off the Mark”.

“Words With the Big Guy” features Beth Hamlin, a popular character from…