I am a huge fan of technology, but there are some glaring downsides to it. Here are just a few that I have found: 1. Cell phones take away the ability to aggressively hang up on somebody. Lets say that a man and woman are arguing about who was supposed to take the trash out and the discussion get heated and one wants to hang up on the other, you know to send a message of disapproval. ...

I'm not one to complain about improvements to Fort Scott, however, there is one thing that really bothers me. It may seem minor so some, but to me it is glaring at me everyday. How difficult is it to stripe a road? I don't have any experience running any of that equipment, but I would think that there would be some way to make sure that the double line down the center of a road each start and stop at the same place, or at least close to it...

Monday evening my wife and I were exposed to the joys of being home owners. Up until then things had gone pretty well and we were almost done finishing the rooms to make them our own. Yes, things were grand, until Monday. I was leaving work at about 4 p.m. ...

Back in January, Kansas Governor Mark Parkinson made some bold statements during the State of the State Address. He made two statements that, to me, seem to be quite contradictory. The first being a statement to increase the sales tax on cigarettes as an effort to cut into the state's $400 million budget deficit; and the second being a call for a state-wide smoking ban...

I am not the type to make New Year's Resolutions, but this year I have made one ... achieve my goals. A goal is something that can be worked toward, whereas a resolution is more of just a statement. This is kind of a backward way of looking at it ... most people make a resolution and stick with if for a few weeks then forget about it...

I don't know why, but I have not been having many dreams lately. In fact, until this morning I couldn't remember the last dream I had ... well that changed and boy was it a doozy. I just have to tell the world about it. For some unknown reason my dream began with me walking onto the property where Adam LaRoche lives. ...

On my way to work this morning I heard that there are still tickets available for tonight Game six of the World Series with the New York Yankees and the Philadelphia Phillies. Two tickets were mentioned on the air as being located behind the Yankees' dugout at the price of $25,000 ... each...

It has been used to deliver well wishes, say happy birthday, display frustrations, tell friends what you are doing every ten minutes, it is ... the Facebook status. I joined the social networking site when I was in college and I have witnessed the evolution of the Facebook status from one-a-day notices on who things are going to 15 minute updates on what your friends are doing. ...

Apparently some people don't know the current economic state of our counrty. Either that, or Former Texas Tech wide received Michael Crabtree failed economics. Crabtree was selected by the San Francisco 49ers with the 10th overall pick in the 2009 NFL Draft when the Oakland Raiders selected Darrius Heyward-Bey seventh overall. ...

ESPN reported earlier today that Major League Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig is seriously considering the idea of lifting Pete Rose's life-time ban from baseball. Many sports writers and columnists are now typing away to express their opinion either for Rose or against Rose, I'm not. ...

Last week I wrote an article about the hot dog cart run by Bob and Raylene Dennis, and today I decided to take the three block walk from The Tribune to his cart and partake in a polish sausage with kraut. I have made it no secret that hot dogs are my favorite food. I'm pretty sure that I could eat hot dogs everyday for the rest of my life. I don't know everything that goes into making a hot dog and to be entirely honest with you ... I don't care!...

My fiancé and I just bought a house. We have been spending the last week and a half painting and moving all on top of planning for our wedding in two and a half weeks. The whole process of buying a home was very stressful for us. We dealt with a seller who wanted to sell and an agent who wanted more money (not our agent). On top of that we dealt with a mortgage lender who was very unaccommodating, whose office was in Branson, and would not answer her phone when we called...

I don't claim to be Bobby Flay or anything, but I like to think I know my way around the kitchen. I enjoy cooking and experimenting with different flavor combinations to see what I can create. Sunday evening I decided I was going to try my first crack at a meat loaf, sounds simple enough. ...

It is no secret that I am a fan of baseball. There is something about going to the ballpark and watching a game ... even if it is the Royals ... that just puts a smile on my face. As many of you probably don't know, there is an international baseball tournament going on called the World Baseball Classic, a.k.a. ...

In my opinion the change in minimum wage couldn't happen at a worse time. In a few months the federal minimum wage will be increased to $7.25 per hour, which could cause a severely negative impact on the already deteriorating economy. I'm all for paying people a more reasonable amount for their work but I'm afraid the current economic situation plus the consequences of an increased minimum wage will equal bad news...

This weeks pic of the week was featured in the Wednesday edition of The Tribune with the article titled "Family escapes house fire unharmed". The photo was taken by Rayma Silvers. Call me a pyro, weird, whatever but I am a fan of photos that involve fire or fire damage. Don't get me wrong, I do care about the people who have lost items due to the fire, but such an event lends to true emotion from the subjects...

This week's photo is a special photo. It was shot by Kathleen Hinkel who is a photographer from Vancouver, BC, Canada. I had the opportunity to talk to the photographer through e-mail to get a little information. This photo was taken in 2004 in a California ghost town known as Bodie. ...

There is something that has been eating me inside for a couple months now. That is the constant negativity surrounding me and my decision to get married. Ever since I decided that I wanted to get married, even before I proposed, people around me have been trying to talk me out of it. I have had people tell me, "you're making a huge mistake" or "being married is great for the first couple years." Frankly I'm sick of it...

This week's photo was taken by Katie Hueston and appeared in Thursday's edition of The Fort Scott Tribune. The reason I like this photo is not so much because it went well with the story, but because of its composition. I know that often times I stumble across a good photo without really trying to plan and compose the shot. I wasn't with Katie at the time, so I don't know if this was the case...

Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa should be in the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame. I know, I know McGwire may or may not have used performance enhancing drugs, and Sosa had the whole deal with the corked bat, but seriously I think what they did for the game of baseball should out weigh their mistakes...