Baker's heartbeat

In 1976, the top song in the "American Top 40" was 'Don't Go Breaking My Heart,'  a  Grammy-Award winning duet by Elton John and Kiki Dee. In August of 1976, the most popular song in America was 'Don't Go Breaking My Heart,' by Elton John and Kiki Dee. It was an anthem for some of us, who are now 60 years old. That song was playing when a tight-knit group from Tipton High School in Tipton, Iowa, was about to leave for college. Forty-two years ago, three friends talked about the challenges ahead one August night as we sat on swings by the Tipton school. We visited about new college roommates, and what we wanted after graduation. It was an exciting yet scary time in life. That memory was triggered recently after hearing 'Don't Go Breaking My Heart' on the radio, during a Casey Kasem "American Top 40" show originally taped in the 1970s. After Kasem announced it the top song for August 1976, I recalled the hot summer ...

Jerry Van Dyke who starred in television and movies, was one of those remembered during Monday's Emmy Awards ceremony. Here we are with Van Dyke in Mexico, after playing beach volleyball. After sitting (pretty) still and watching the television awards ceremony for more than three hours on Monday, this occurred to the blog author: The Emmy Awards event is mainly a validation of one's personal viewing choices. Is it not? The 70th annual awards ceremony tonight was the 70th annual one; dating from 1949. So it's gone along 10 more years than the author has been alive. Back in the day, our family of seven had a black-and-white television set, and as a family, I remember watching "Bonanza" on Sunday nights. Much of the other early television memories are muted as our father forbid television watching (in favor of reading books) for about three years. Yep, we Cox children went without in the 1960s, even as we lived in a neighborhood full of homes with televisi...

Paperwork from the voucher program; if you need a voucher for a mammogram, prepare to review your monthly income level with the staff. At 60 years of age, women like me are deeply encouraged to get a yearly mammogram test for breast cancer. It is a test many of us hate. Going through a mammogram is extraordinarily uncomfortable. But it's a necessary pain, we are told, and gritting our teeth, we do it, year after year. This year I'm without an health insurance plan that covers preventative tests like a mammogram. Called a "skinny" plan, it's affordable and covers me in accidents, etc. Thankfully I've been very healthy to date. I work hard at staying healthy, especially with this "skinny" insurance plan. But I also know a lot about mammograms, mostly because for 10 years I focused on health and wellness as a daily newspaper reporter. In that time I wrote numerous stories about breast cancer, including to promote the Race for the Cure, the...

            Dad's gravestone at National Cemetery at the Rock Island Arsenal, Rock Island, Ill. When my father, a veteran of World War II, passed away unexpectedly in 1989 he failed to give his five children any idea of where he'd like to be buried.
 My husband, Steve, suggested National Cemetery at the Rock Island Arsenal. It was the perfect choice for Dad, who was proud of his service in the U.S. Navy. He retired as a lieutenant commander, having had served in the Navy's intelligence services during the actual war years. On a recent Sunday my brother and his family came to visit us, and we all decided to visit Dad's grave. I was at the cemetery in May, but that was part of an organized bus trip. In May, we were told to have our driver's licenses ready in case the guards would need identification, but it turned out no one checked the bus riders. That was not the case when I had my brother, sister-in-law and nephew in the car. They are from St. L...

Bulletin boards in a second-grade classroom; there is black fabric on the walls outlined in colorful borders. This is typical of many classrooms in Iowa. School starts in just a few days in most of Iowa's public schools, and a few tips could help parents get the school year off to a strong start. According to scholastic.com, the publisher of books for school-age children, regular bedtime and wake-up routines are to be established ahead of the actual first day, which in this area is Thursday, Aug. 23. This includes reading to the children on a regular basis, perhaps, just before bedtime. Reading aloud is a proven way to raise readers, perhaps the greatest indicator of academic success. In the mornings, it's most important to provide the child breakfast, or to direct the student to free breakfast at school if it is offered. Hungry children do not make ideal students, and there should be no hungry children in a state like Iowa. Other suggestions from Scholastic: * Wa...

                             This is an example of a bulletin board that took two days to build. While most children in Iowa will be starting school next week there's a very good chance that their teachers started preparing for the youngsters almost a month earlier. 
 This is particularly true in the primary grades, where our state's youngest students are learning to read, write, do math and science projects for the first time. 
 In Ankeny, Iowa, second-grade teachers got a jump on the season, where classes are to start Aug. 23. In one elementary school in this fast-growing district, the four teachers all changed classrooms, which meant they had to build new billboards in each room. This would be a dozen billboards or more. Tasks like this preparation take more than 65 hours of time ahead of the school year, and cost each teacher more than $300 out-of-pocket in costs. 
 Each of the four teachers brought...

Japanese beetles loved this part of the yard which includes day lilies and a sunflower grown from seeds acquired free at a highway welcome center in Kansas. It might have been the fourth time I found a Japenese beetle in my thick hair, screamed, grabbed it by my fingers and threw it as far away as I could. Or maybe it was when I was walking down the driveway, holding a dish of hot soapy water, and a Japenese beetle fell from the Linden tree above ... right into it. Score! At a point I decided to blog about several benefits to fighting the Japanese beetles, one at a time. Humor helps when you do a chore you hate. With regrets to David Letterman, I offer ... FUN benefits re: A  beetle fight 9. Tree leaves: When the Japanese beetles make the leaves of your trees look like a spider web, the leaves will fall off your trees, and tidy tree owners will have at lease a month's edge on neighbors who also need, eventually, to rake up leaves. Bonus: The trees will look like they do...