Discover More from This Category: Columns

February is National Pet Dental Health month

February 9, 2022
The RCHS would like to remind you that February is National Pet Dental Health month. An astonishing 80% of dogs and 70% of cats show signs of oral disease by age 3. Symptoms of gum disease in dogs and cats include yellow and brown build-up of tartar along the gum line, red and swollen gums,…

Mushrooms in winter

February 2, 2022
By Frank Kaczmarek Winter is far a far cry from being prime mushroom hunting season. Most fungi stop producing mushrooms, or fruiting bodies, in early autumn, and their hyphae (filamentous structures that are the main part of the fungal body) are out of sight, inside wood or in the ground. However, you can still find…

Clarity is coming

February 2, 2022
By Cassandra Tyndall The space weather changes a lot this week. If January wasn’t quite the productive goal-achieving month you anticipated it would be, then the first week of February looks quite different. The combination of a New Moon and Mercury winding up its retrograde phase brings a feeling of renewal. Plans and ideas that…

Cold adventures uphill

February 2, 2022
By Merisa Sherman It started like any other tour. I had my backpack full of goodies, including the best puffy coat in the entire world. It’s the coat that enables me to forgo my fear of the cold, knowing that no matter the temperature there is a nice warm bundle of heat waiting for me…

The keys to life

February 2, 2022
By Dom Cioffi I grew up under two extremes. My father’s parents (my paternal grandparents) were hard-working, blue-collar laborers, with my grandfather being a self-employed plumber and my grandmother the quintessential mother and housewife. They lived in a small two-story house directly across the street from a large factory and right behind the city’s largest…

Tax planning changes in retirement

February 2, 2022
By Kevin Theissen It’s not uncommon for people to pay more in taxes than anticipated because our tax system treats various income types differently and has tax and penalties that many are unaware of. One way to consider the stages of retirement could be: first, your pre-retirement or work and saving years, usually before age…

Weekly horoscopes for Feb. 2-8, 2022

February 2, 2022
[vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image="194740" img_size="full" alignment="center"][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row css=".vc_custom_1582852508329{margin-top: 40px !important;}"][vc_column][vc_row_inner][vc_column_inner width="1/3"][vc_raw_html]JTNDc3BhbiUyMGNsYXNzJTNEJTIyaWNvbmlmeSUyMiUyMGRhdGEtaWNvbiUzRCUyMm1kaS16b2RpYWMtYXJpZXMlMjIlMjBkYXRhLWlubGluZSUzRCUyMmZhbHNlJTIyJTNFJTNDJTJGc3BhbiUzRQ==[/vc_raw_html][vc_custom_heading text="Aries" font_container="tag:h2|text_align:center" use_theme_fonts="yes"][vc_column_text css=".vc_custom_1568082984251{margin-bottom: 0px !important;}"] March 21 - April 20 [/vc_column_text][vc_column_text]You may be feeling the pressure and the relief at the same time this week. Mars, your guiding star, forms a link to benevolent Jupiter. Not the strongest of connections, nonetheless, it may be enough to…

Emptying the room

February 2, 2022
The Funologist's guide to getting ‘unstuck’ By Sandra Dee Owens The smallest room My brain is approximately 6” long. A rather small space to keep organized it would seem, yet of all the rooms I own, this one is the most cluttered. Merriam Webster’s definition of clutter is "to fill or cover with scattered or…

Time to try something new

January 26, 2022
By Cassandra Tyndall The week is the final week of the first month of the new year. It’s amazing how fast that time flew by. It’s quite possible that just a month ago you were feeling focused about your goals and the possibility that 2022 promises. It seems that for many of us Jupiter in…

Starting to seek out seeds

January 26, 2022
By Mary Ellen Shaw Just in case you aren’t an enthusiast of snow covered ground, let’s look ahead this week to spending time in the garden. When the second half of January arrives my thoughts turn to playing in the dirt. Granted it will be about four months before I can even consider spending time…

Weekly horoscopes for Jan. 26 – Feb. 1, 2022

January 26, 2022
[vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image="194740" img_size="full" alignment="center"][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row css=".vc_custom_1582852508329{margin-top: 40px !important;}"][vc_column][vc_row_inner][vc_column_inner width="1/3"][vc_raw_html]JTNDc3BhbiUyMGNsYXNzJTNEJTIyaWNvbmlmeSUyMiUyMGRhdGEtaWNvbiUzRCUyMm1kaS16b2RpYWMtYXJpZXMlMjIlMjBkYXRhLWlubGluZSUzRCUyMmZhbHNlJTIyJTNFJTNDJTJGc3BhbiUzRQ==[/vc_raw_html][vc_custom_heading text="Aries" font_container="tag:h2|text_align:center" use_theme_fonts="yes"][vc_column_text css=".vc_custom_1568082984251{margin-bottom: 0px !important;}"] March 21 - April 20 [/vc_column_text][vc_column_text]After a period of rest and reflection, you’re now ready to strike out in a new direction professionally or make choices concerning your major life plans. If you’ve been dealing with any relationship difficulties, confusion or…

Downy woodpeckers are well adapted to winter

January 26, 2022
By Lee Emmons On winter mornings, I often venture outside to photograph the assembly of birds that visit the feeders in my front yard. One of the regular visitors is the diminutive downy woodpecker, which clings to my peanut feeder, takes a nibble of suet, or forages in the nearby maple trees. Fairly comfortable with…

For the love of the game

January 26, 2022
By Dom Cioffi When I was in middle school in the early 1980s, I played in a flag football league sponsored by our city’s recreation department. The league brought together kids from all the local schools and organized them onto eight teams. I was a skinny, unassuming kid, but I was fast and coordinated, which…

Market predictions for 2022

January 26, 2022
By Kevin Theissen By any measure, 2021 was a strong year for investors. But what’s in store for 2022? From my perspective, I expect that many of the same forces that influenced markets last year will play a role again in the year ahead. COVID-19 remains tragic and unpredictable. The pandemic was one of the…

Enjoying togetherness on the ride up

January 26, 2022
By Merisa Sherman We shuffle though the lift line, our neckies pulled up over our noses in the crowd. I look over one shoulder, then the other, to see if we have moved up any relative to the strangers on either side of us. I work my skis forward, just a bit, unable to break…