Mark Knows It All

Do you remember the movie Deliverance? What a great flick, and one that gave me nightmares for many nights. I can remember that dead hand shooting out of the lake at the end of the movie like it was yesterday. Although Dueling Banjos is still one of my favorite tunes, I never watched the movie again. Once was enough. Of course, nothing like that can happen around here…bein’ all urbanized and everythin’…or can it? I must have led a fairly sheltered life when I was kid because my family rarely drove south (or north for that matter) for any family trips. We tended to drive east or west. It was only after my friend moved to Steubenville that I discovered the beauty of the Appalachian part of Ohio. West Virginia is just about 30 miles away…so Dixie is just 30 minutes down Route 11. It was originally part of Virginia, after all, and they owned slaves there clear to the end of the Civil War. Between here and there lies Columbiana County. It is a beautiful part of Ohio, with stunning views and...

Jim Traficant has been in the news lately as he will be returning home in September after his unfortunate incarceration. I read all sorts things about the man in the Vindicator. He certainly is unpopular with certain Vindicator columnists. The radio commentary seems to be mixed. And no one knows what the impact will be on the local political scene when he gets back. The Scrappers scrapped a Traficant Release Night. But the welcome home dinner seems to be close to sold out if not sold out entirely. I only voted for Traficant once. I thought he was an embarrassment to the community. He certainly got this area some notoriety, lots of it bad, from his bad hair and television tirades. No one, including me, condones any illegal behavior while he was in office. As a lawyer, I certainly question his judgment on his decision to represent himself in his last legal entanglement that ended up with him in jail. Not a good thing!!! But in light of what has been going on in Congress, I have been thin...

My wife is a gardening dynamo. She loves to get out and dig in the dirt. Some of the plants and shrubs around my house have been moved so many time they keep teeny tiny bags packed right next to their stems. “Taking root” is not an understood concept among our fauna population. That being said, we take great pride in our back yard. It backs up to small woods which we have landscaped. It has a lot of old growth trees and shade, so getting anything to grow means manipulating branches and scarce sunlight to hit just where you want. It is a continual work in progress. I am always amazed at how the garden grows. It is fairly bleak and glum during the winter. Because of falling branches and trees, many of our new evergreen plantings have been damaged. It really shows in the winter. But the critters love them so we leave them alone. At the beginning of March, I look at the barren yard and wonder will anything grow this year. Then comes mid-March, and the little shoots start to poke their head...

What does one do with Andy Warhol, aka Andy Warhola, aka Andy Varchola? Such a talent! Such a life! Such a perversion!! This past weekend my wife and I visited the Andy Warhol Museum, operated by the Carnegie Museums, on Pittsburgh’s north shore. It took us about 2 ½ hours to get through the thing, and mostly wife told me to get that look off my face. Let’s start with the facility itself. Costs $15.00 per person to get in (not worth it) unless you are over 55 making the cost $9.00 (worth it) or a member of the Carnegie Museums…free and worth it!! It is in the old Volkwein’s Music Publishing Building on the north shore. There is a parking lot cattycorner with a $6.00 fee unless there is a sporting event at either the baseball or football stadiums about 3 blocks away, then the fee goes to $12.00. The museum occupies the top four stories of the seven story building, with offices and restoration facilities occupying the bottom three floors. Elevators are available to get you the top. There...