Tuesday, November 16, 2010

Oh, Kentucky

Kentucky reportedly ranks ninth in fourth-grade reading. Rah! That's the happiest news in the Prichard Committee's "Achieving the Top 20 by 2020" report. The most interesting to me was the gulf between our rankings in higher-education funding per pupil (12th) and elementary- and secondary-education funding per pupil (42nd).

The most obvious ramification of Madisonville's change in mayors so far is a turnover at police chief. Please note that this iSurfHopkins.com link was written by the mayor-elect.

On pretty much any drive across the county with a local of more than five years, you can count on being shown somewhere that the gash of this giant tornado is still evident. Incidentally, some folks will go only so far to say that it immediately killed no one.

We're down to one week until deadline to apply for Kentucky Division for Air Quality/U.S. Environmental Protection Agency funding of diesel-reduction projects. Following the lead of Bell County, Daviess County, Franklin County, Montgomery County, Paducah and Somerset schools, Lexington-Fayette Urban County Government will use the money to retrofit 15 2006 refuse trucks to cut emissions of diesel-particulate matter "by nearly 90 percent. Particulate matter is linked to increased risk of stroke, heart attack and other serious health problems."

I was so excited about this initiative, as I imagined tracking the birds through Ballard and across Kentucky's other 119 counties. Alas, just as so many of us have, Turner and Kelly flew the Kentucky coop as soon as they could.

John Herndon digs the Anderson County High band, too. (The 9-3 Bearcat football team hosts 12-0 John Hardin of Radcliff in the KHSAA Class 5A playoffs Friday night.)

2 comments:

  1. Michael Vick is one of the topics on today's Joe B & Denny Show. "If somebody in prison painted beautiful oil paintings, you could appreciate the work without honoring everything the man has done," Joe B said.

    A caller from Lexington subsequently drew equivalency between Vick's crimes and the activity that the University of South Carolina's Gamecock mascot glorifies. "There are people who would say that Denny is the cruelest person on earth for catching those fish every day for fun," the caller said.

    "The caller brings up a good point," Joe B said. "We know that I fish to feed my family, but you're cruel."

    Denny got the joke but still took time to explain the different tactics he uses to save the fish pain.

    "Yeah, but I've seen how you squeeze them when you pull them off the hook," Joe B joshed.

    This, then, led to a conversation about the morality of squishing a cricket vs. squishing a spider.

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