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All my experiance as a homeowner has been from the past 12 years of living in coastal Virginia, living in the tiny city-suburbs of Newport News. Having moved to a small village in central Ohio to a comparatively large quasi-country lot (surrounded by corn & cows) has been quite a learning experiance for me. With a little over a year under my belt as a home-owner here, I can't seem to help but approach every issue with the nievity of a city-slicker. But I am learning... I have slowly been learning to appreciate the value of the tools I see all my neighbors using regularly. :-) Last summer was the summer I fell in love with my lawn-tractor (no joke) and I soon after quickly learned the importance of a good snow-blower. My backyard alone is about an acre that transitions into woods. The trees are beautiful. That scene alone is one of the reasons we bought the house here. As a home owner, I have made my peace with the unavoidable reality of yardwork (a chore which I have loathed my...

...did he just say what I think he just said?!?! At the end of an incredibly intense and precision-executed evening of kick-butt thrash-metal by super-band Metallica, the rough and tough lead vocalist and rhythem guitarist James Hetfield says with genuine and tender love and with sincere affection to the crowd... "Thank you very much Columbus [Oh]... Metallica Loves You... Goodnight!". and I think he sincerely wanted to give us all a hug that night. ...and then I had my epiphany. ...but let me come back to that in a minute. Some obligatory background details: I used skateboard to Metallica when I was 12 years old (in 1984) in my nice safe suburban neighborhood. I loved them. My mom was worried about the music I listened to. In all fairness to her, I don't blame her. Metallica was dark, angry, sang about death, violence and suicide and pioneered a whoally new genre of music defining crazy, hard-core, thrashing in music while we were trying to be hard-core (lol) and thrash...

Hi. My name is Rich... and I'm an NPR-aholic. Happily, this is not a bad thing (says I). For those of you who don't know, NPR is "National Public Radio" and before you roll your eyes and hit the back button on your browser..... please... no really... please... listen-up... If you have, like me, for one reason or another, taken stock and found yourself emotionally exhausted here at the end of the 2008 presidential election process; weather you are elated or deflated about the outcome and either way don't know if you can continue to follow the our worlds current events with the same earnest interest you have had up til now... I have to tell you about something I listened to on NPR on Tuesday that gave me pause and compelled me to write this blog in order to share it with you. It's not anything decidedly deep or philosophical. It's just a short (7 min) radio bit that NPR put together to showcase a genuine cross-section of the American public's passion for...