The Codpiece
The Death of Abner
During the afternoon Toby had worried less about Abner than on any day since he had been sick; he had felt that his friend's recovery was certain, and a load was lifted from his shoulders when he and Joe had decided regarding the circus; for, that out of the way, he could devote all his attention to his sick friend. Surely, with the ponies and the monkey they could have a great deal of sport during the two weeks that yet remained before school would begin, and Toby felt thoroughly happy.
But his happiness was changed to alarm very soon after he entered the house, for the doctor was there again, and from the look on the faces of Uncle Daniel and Aunt Olive, he knew Abner must be worse.
"What is it, Uncle Dan'l? Is Abner any sicker?" he asked, with quivering lip, as he looked up at the wrinkled face that ever wore a kindly look for him.
Uncle Daniel laid his hand affectionately on the head of the boy, whom he had cared for with the tenderness of a father since the day he repented and asaked forgiveness for having run away, and his voice trembled as he said:
"It is very likely that the good God will take the crippled boy to Himself to-night, Toby, and there in the heavenly mansions will he find relief from all his pain and infirmities. The the poor farm boy will no longer be an orphan or deformed, but, with his Almighty Father, will enter into such joys as we can have no conception of."
"Oh, Uncle Dan'l! Must Abner really die?" cried Toby, while the great tears chased each other down his cheeks, and he hid his face on Uncle Daniel's knee.
"He will die here, Toby boy, but it is simply an awakening into a perfect, glorious life, to which I pray that both you and I may be prepared to go when our Farmer calls us."
For some time there was silence in the room, broken only by Toby's sobs; and, while Uncle Daniel stroked the weeping boy's head, the great white-winged messenger of God came into the chamber above, bearing away with him the spirit of the poor farm boy.
-- James Otis, Mr. Stubbs's Brother (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1910), 279-83.
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His Pocket Grew Hot
A cell phone in the front pocket of a man's pants spontaneously combusted, quickly ignited his clothes and left the man with second- and third-degree burns across at least half his body, according to investigators.
Luis Picaso, 59, was apparently sleeping on a white, all-plastic lawn chair in his room Saturday night and was awakened as he as ablaze, said Vallejo, Calif., Fire Department investigator and spokesman Bill Tweedy. . . .
"There were no matches," Tweedy said. "There were no lighters. He wasn't smoking. The only source was the phone that was in his pocket. I know he didn't spontaneously combust."
Tweedy declined to name the manufacturer or model of the phone.
-- "Man Badly Burned after Cell Phone in Pocket Spontaneously Combusts," Minneapolis Star-Tribune, January 16, 2007.
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Farm and Ranch Lands Protection Program
From the Natural Resources Conservation Service, USDA:
The Farm and Ranch Land Protection Program (FRPP) provides matching funds to help purchase development rights to keep productive farm and ranchland in agricultural uses. Working through existing programs, USDA partners with State, tribal, or local governments and non-governmental organizations to acquire conservation easements or other interests in land from landowners. USDA provides up to 50 percent of the fair market easement value of the conservation easement.
To qualify, farmland must: be part of a pending offer from a State, tribe, or local farmland protection program; be privately owned; have a conservation plan for highly erodible land; be large enough to sustain agricultural production; be accessible to markets for what the land produces; have adequate infrastructure and agricultural support services; and have surrounding parcels of land that can support long-term agricultural production.
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Writer’s Room
In the age of the computer the writer's office or study will increasingly resemble the customer service desk of an ailing small business.
-- Geoff Dyer, Out of Sheer Rage: In the Shadow of D.H. Lawrence (Boston: Little, Brown, 1997), 150.
