Opinions

To a kid growing up on a dairy farm, “teats” is not a naughty word! We had a barnful of ’em, and they were our bread and butter, so to speak.

Twice a day, seven days a week, 52 weeks a year, we went to the barn and washed, massaged and squeezed ‘em. Our livelihoods were inextricably mingled with mammaries!

Dairy farming when I was a kid was more than a full-time job; it was a lifestyle. It was our life! Those stupid cows had to be milked twice a day, seven days a week, throughout their lactation periods. Why? Because dairy cows, stupid as they are, liked routine, I guess; it made them feel comfortable? I don’t know about animal psychology, but I’m guessing the routine made them more relaxed. They knew what to expect, so their milk flowed more easily? Maybe!

To the editor:

I’m submitting this letter to the editor in response the decision made recently by the City Council in Oconto Falls to stop adding fluoride to the community water supply. I am a registered dental hygienist and serve as the associate director of Children’s Health Alliance of Wisconsin.

Fluoridation is safe and effective, and there are more than 3,000 peer reviewed and published studies supporting this. Information provided at the City Council meeting inaccurately noted that cities across the county and Wisconsin are eliminating their fluoridation programs and now it is nearly a 50/50 split. This could not be further from the truth.

The percentage of people across the United States who use a community water supplies that fluoridate continues to rise. Between 2000 and 2014, the percentage of U.S. residents receiving optimally fluoridated water rose from 65.0 percent to 74.4 percent.

Did you know know that Aug. 15 was National Lemon Meringue Pie Day?

Well, neither did I, but Marilyn came home from Piggly Wiggly with a pie with about 3 inches of meringue on top. “It was on sale,” she said with a big smile on her face, “and I had a coupon!” She loves sales and coupons, and she loves lemon meringue pie. What a great day!

So, then I went looking for some quirky stuff about lemon pie because a friend challenged me to write a column about lemon pie. I found out that Aug. 15 was also National Failures Day. I suppose that could mean that the meringue on a lemon pie fell, right?

I also found out that there’s a novel, published in 2011, titled “Lemon Meringue Pie,” by Keith Watson, but I couldn’t find out why the book was given that title from the brief blurb that was given on Amazon.com.

Another book I found was called “Lemon Meringue Pie Murder” by Joanne Fluke. Again, no clue for the choice of title. What’s up with that?

To the editor:

I am the Oconto County health officer, however, I am writing this as a citizen of Oconto Falls. On Aug. 8 the Oconto Falls City Council approved a motion to stop adding fluoride to the community water supply. This has been done since 1967.

Adjusting fluoride in the water to a level that prevents tooth decay (cavities) is the single most effective public health measure to prevent tooth decay. This adjusting of fluoride is called community water fluoridation.

Tooth decay is the most common chronic disease in children. The pain caused by tooth decay affects a child’s ability to concentrate in school and limits which foods they can eat.

To the editor:

I wish Michigan had the “Prove It First” law that Wisconsin has. The world also wishes that, because we hear from various places that are also fighting mines on rivers but they don’t have that law either.

Wisconsin, please don’t let Sen. Tiffany get away with abolishing that law just because he and others want money.

We all want clean water, not the money that will help investors but will cause mines to contaminate our pure Michigan water. We don’t oppose all mines, only mines that want to be located near water. Water is life, and once it is contaminated, it can’t be cleaned up again. No mine has left clean water, and most are not even next to water.

Trail supporters thank sponsors, volunteers

To the editor:

The third annual Oconto Falls Area Chamber of Commerce “Run for the Trails” took place on June 24. Events included a timed half-marathon run, 10K run, 5K run or walk through beautiful Oconto Falls. The family friendly quarter-mile fun run/walk took place on the new track at ST Paper Stadium.

Adult participants received a ticket to enter the drawing for a Fitbit and other prizes, and the Fun Run participants received an extra entry into the kid bike giveaways that took place at the Health & Safety Fair held at the elementary school.

We send out a big thank you to all who helped and supported this event. Without help from our volunteers, Oconto Falls School District, city of Oconto Falls, Oconto Falls Utilities and the Oconto Falls Police Department this event would not take place.

How often have you heard someone say, “If I had a nickel …”?

I heard someone say it recently in regards to our flamboyant and unpredictable president.

That expression jogged my memory. When I was a little kid, helping Dad do chores in the barn, Dad would often sing songs. When I think about it objectively now, I realize Dad wasn’t a great singer and didn’t have a very large repertoire, but you know how memories are, don’t you? We remember the things we want to remember the way we want to remember them, not necessarily the way they really were. They get bigger and more wonderful than might actually have been.

Anyway, like I said, I heard somebody say the old “If I had a nickel” line recently and it reminded me of a song Dad used to sing sometimes. I can’t even remember for sure how it all went. There were many verses, but they all meant essentially the same. The chorus was something like:

It’s football season again, and the Pack looked pretty good in its first preseason game, even though we didn’t get to see some of our stars play. The coaches are necessarily playing their new recruits to see who will make the the squad for the season. Even so, it was fun to watch the Green and Gold beating Philadelphia fairly handily.

I have been a Packers fan since I was a little kid. I have also been an avid Badgers fan for as long as I can remember, so football season is exciting to me. I’m one of those guys who has paraphernalia to wear while I watch the games.

It’s an interesting phenomenon, isn’t it, the way Wisconsinites support “our” Packers? I read an article once a couple of years ago that said that the average person in Wisconsin has something like 14 pieces of Packers paraphernalia. Look around in church on a Sunday; it’s amazing how many people are wearing the green and gold or the cardinal and white.

Here we are, in the first week of August, and the back-to-school merchandise has been on the shelves in the stores for several weeks already. Going back to school in the fall was always kind of a happy time for me. I loved school, and I got a chance to see the “city” friends that I’d hardly seen all summer.

When I was a kid, I walked 10 miles uphill both ways in the rain and sleet and snow to get to and from school.

I’m kidding, of course. We lived about 2 1/1 miles from school. But walk I did, along with most of the other kids in the neighborhood, and we didn’t think much of it. There was a big group of us – all my Konitzer cousins, the Lutzes, and my sister, Joyce, and me, and along the way we’d pick up another Konitzer family, the Steffens kids and the Ostrengas as we made our way to St. Anthony’s in town.

Those were the days before parochial school kids were allowed to ride the buses that carried the public school kids to school. So we walked.

A lack of love

To the editor:

We have so many problems in this country and in our state! And they all center on a lack of unconditional love for our fellow humans.

For instance, in Wisconsin, we now spend well over $1 billion annually on the Department of Corrections; far more than we pay for education. Rolls off the tongue until one bothers to calculate it takes 32 years to live one billion seconds! Each of us pays hundreds of tax dollars annually intentionally inflicting pain and suffering while helping almost no one.

We have over 22,000 incarcerated and the number is increasing – again. It’s all part of a financial growth industry and perverted/unholy/evil psychology that specializes in cruel and inhumane treatment.