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by Paula Johnson Vocabulary words are a favorite with me. During high school years, I used the family’s Roget’s Thesaurus almost to the point of a third appendage.     The 1946 edition that we had, not only was “the complete book of synonyms and antonyms in American and British usage,” but many word choices also […]

by Jim Hightowerjimhightower.com    Let us embrace the darkness.    Not the political dark ages being pushed on us by today’s regressive right-wing forces, but nature’s own pure darkness of night. Unfortunately, we Homo Sapiens have largely blacked out nature’s billions of beacons in the night sky, which have both dazzled and guided Earth’s creatures […]

by Cal ThomasCalThomas.com For the Evangelical Christians who have given – and still give – overwhelming support to President Trump while refusing to criticize him for language and behavior they would presumably denounce in a fellow church member, here’s an easy one for you.    There’s a heretic inside the White House. For those not […]

From the Editors of E – The Environmental Magazine Despite the SDWA’s provisions, many communities in the U.S. face challenges maintaining safe drinking water. Credit: Pexels.com. Dear EarthTalk: If we’ve had the Safe Drinking Water Act in effect for 50 years already, why are so many municipalities having problems providing safe drinking water? – Mary Ford, […]

“Compassion asks us to go where it hurts, to enter into the places of pain, to share in brokenness, fear, confusion, and anguish. Compassion challenges us to cry out with those in misery, to mourn with those who are lonely, to weep with those in tears. Compassion requires us to be weak with the weak, […]

This Day in Music HistoryApril 3, 1959: Because of its references to bad behavior in school (writing on the wall, throwing spitballs), The British Broadcasting Corporation bans The Coasters song “Charlie Brown.” The ban is lifted two weeks later. ###

Michigan honey production for 2024 totaled 5.00 million pounds, up 30 percent from 2023, according to Marlo D. Johnson, Director, USDA NASS, Great Lakes Regional Office. This estimate included honey from producers with 5 or more colonies. Yieldsfrom Michigan’s 82,000 honey producing colonies averaged 61 pounds in 2024, up 6 pounds from the previous year. Michiganhoney price averaged $3.04 per pound, down $0.06 from last year. Value of production totaled $15.2 million, up 27 percent from 2023. Honey stocks totaled 850 thousand pounds, down 8 percent from 2023. Nationally, honey production in 2024 totaled 134 million pounds, down 4 percent from 2023. There were 2.60 million colonies producing honey in 2024, up 3 percent from 2023. Yield per colony averaged 51.7 pounds, down 6 […]

Michigan’s total hog and pig inventory on March 1 was estimated at 1.15 million head, down 40,000 head from a year ago, according to Marlo D. Johnson, Director, USDA NASS, Great Lakes Regional Office. Breeding hog inventory, at 110,000 head,was down 4 percent from last March. Market hog inventory, at 1.04 million head, was down 3 percent from last year. The averagepigs saved per litter for the December to February quarter was 10.95, compared to 11.40 from the same period last year. United States inventory of all hogs and pigs on March 1, 2025 was 74.5 million head. This was down slightly from March 1, 2024, and down 1 percent from December 1, 2024. Breeding inventory, at 5.98 million head, was down 1 percent from last year, anddown slightly from the previous quarter. Market hog inventory, at 68.5 million head, was down slightly from last year, and down 1 percent […]

Dairy herds in Michigan produced 950 million pounds of milk during February, down 1.7 percent from a year ago, according to Marlo D. Johnson, Director, USDA NASS, Great Lakes Regional Office. Production per cow in Michiganaveraged 2,140 pounds for February, 60 pounds below February 2024. The dairy herd was estimated at 444,000 head for February, up 5,000 from a year earlier. Milk production in the 24 major States during February […]