In the news ...

Small towns are hotbeds for gossip: it can't be helped. It's human nature to want to know what's going on with people, and with such a small population around here, you're going to hear some gossip. However, where you find that gossip might surprise some folks ... because it's in the local paper.

There are several even teenier towns that surround my home town of Milan (prounounced MY-lun. It's true. Just go with it.), population 1,600ish. So, when Milan's main newspaper comes out every week, these little towns each have their own column, which is written and submitted by someone in their town. The column, however, for most of these towns, consists of who in the town had relatives over to their house for a birthday party (including what sort of cake and ice cream they had), or who went to someone else's house to go fishing (complete with a report on what type and how many fish were caught, and whether or not they were immediately fried and eaten for dinner). You get the drift. I'm not sure I can really consider it the opposite of big city newspapers, so much as an entirely different view of what's going on in the immediate world around us and what's important. Admittedly, it may be a bit silly and nosy parker, but it's also a good source for conversation topics when you run into those people!!

And just for fun, here are a few more of the headlines in the good old Milan Standard this week. (Note the front page pic ... the two photographs on the left hand side are: Top, a mail carrier is retiring, and Bottom: a stink bomb was found attached to a realty sign in someone's yard. No kidding, bomb squads were called. Hey, you never know, us country folk can be pretty clever with that sort of stuff!)

Milan City Council has a Light Agenda at June 18th Meeting
Helms Family Reunion Held
Country Club Bridge Group Hosts Luncheon
Red Hatters Celebrate 1st Anniversary
Marriage Licenses
Sullivan County Circuit Court Proceedings (this one was fun growing up. You could NEVER get away with a speeding ticket without your parents seeing it when it came through the paper!)

Add in some board meetings, ag news, birth, death and marriage announcements, and a couple of ads here and there, and that's the gossip ... uh, I mean news ... from Milan.