Earlier this week, I discovered that a squirrel had destroyed the duct work in the attic of the commercial office building I manage. The squirrel paid for this transgression with its life, not because I managed to trap it, but because it trapped itself. Leaving its rotting corpse wedged against a ceiling vent inside the HVAC system was its final act of domestic terrorism. Little bastard. The repair estimate is $1000.

I wasn't planning on mentioning that here until I found out yesterday that ours wasn't the only building damaged by squirrels in recent weeks. The local real estate Barron had a family of squirrels destroy his overhead duct work, too. His repair bill also came to about a thousand dollars.

Ian Fleming famously said that twice is a coincidence but three times is enemy action. Is there a conspiracy of squirrels to deprive the citizens of Newnan, Georgia, of the heat we need to survive the coming winter? Can we afford to wait to find out?

The Great Squirrel Uprising of 2015 is upon us!

Believe it or not, I could find no concrete data on just how many squirrels there are currently living in America. It is past time our government addressed this growing problem. I recommend building a wall to keep those suckers out. In fact, I should probably go buy a gun — the bigger the better — so I can be prepared for the next time they try to invade my home. A man's got a right to do whatever it takes to protect his own nuts.

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Mom and I kicked off football season last night by attending the season opener of our alma mater, Newnan High School. The Cougars defeated the Carrollton Trojans 13-34, so you know the home crowd was enjoying itself.

We were accompanied by Mom's high school classmate, Bill, who played for the team in 1965. It was his first visit to Drake Stadium since 1970. When asked how he felt about returning to attend a game after all these years, he said, "old."

I'm glad I went. I, for one, am ready for some football.

P.S. I should also mention that we arrived before the game and watched 10 people — including several R.O.T.C. cadets — spend 15 minutes trying and failing to raise the American flag on the pole by the field. Apparently, the pulley had rusted since the pole was last used in November, and they couldn't get the flag up without it getting twisted around the halyard. When they finally gave up, one kid rolled the flag up in his arms like it was a soiled motel bedsheet and walked away with it. I know times change, but back when I was a Boy Scout that behavior would have been unthinkable. Back in my day, we wouldn't have stopped until we had it flying, even if that meant someone had to climb the flagpole with it. (My Boy Scout troup was known to smoke cigarettes, steal purses, and throw rocks at cripples, but we respected the flag.) #GetOffMyLawn

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More in the life and times of Mrs. W.C. McBride. Published today in The Newnan Times-Herald:

This item was published in The Herald and Advertiser, predecessor of The Newnan Times-Herald, on Aug. 14, 1914:

"Among the numerous floral offerings displayed at Mrs. Woodrow Wilson's funeral at Rome on Tuesday last, and one of the few carried into the church with the casket, was a beautiful wreath formed of magnolia leaves contributed by Sarah Dickinson Chapter, D.A.R. of this city. The wreath was designed and put together by Mrs. W. C. McBride, who [sic] artistic taste was never more prettily displayed, and we understand it was much admired."

This belated celebration of the centennial of Mrs. Wilson's death didn't come out of the blue. It was published to illustrate Newnan's ties to the former first lady, a Georgia native whose paintings are currently on display in Rome.

The city of Rome must have been very important to Ellen Axson Wilson and her husband, the future 28th President. As the supporting article emphasizes, "They met in Rome, where they met and where she gave birth to two of her daughters." That two of the daughters were born in Rome is mentioned again later in the article. It also goes on to add that she attended Rome Female College, and Mr. Wilson became "immediately attracted" to her after seeing her in church. They sound like a happy couple. I wonder where they met?

(I should also be absolutely clear on this point: Ellen Axson was the first Mrs. Wilson. Ellen was the third first lady to die while her husband was in office, and perhaps not so coincidentally, Woodrow was the third President to be married while in office. The Mrs. Wilson history recognizes as managing the nation's affairs while President Wilson convalesced from a 1919 stroke was his second wife, Edith Bolling, who so far as I know had no ties to Rome. The article gives no mention of the second, probably more famous Mrs. Wilson.)

The first Mrs. Wilson's paintings are now on display at the Oak Hill & The Martha Berry Museum in Rome, GA. That museum is no relation to the Oak Hill Cemetery where the aforementioned Mrs. McBride rests.

So that's your Jennie Hardaway McBride update for 2014. For a woman who died 90 years ago, she still gets around!

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Overheard at the supermarket:

"We Scorpios, we can see through bullshit."

I'm sure he meant bullshit other than astrology, that is.

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On Friday, August 2, The Newnan Times-Herald published a feature piece on Heroes, the town's only comic book shop. The article describes the owner as "friendly and... a dedicated comic collector since eighth grade. When he says Heroes just had its best two months in store history, coinciding with his taking over, it doesn't sound like chest-puffing."

Now, it happens that I know the owner of Heroes. We graduated from high school together. We've been roommates. I've met his kids (who think I'm great!). I can say with 100% certainty that even if it didn't sound like "chest-puffing" to the writer of that article, it totally was.

I was prepared to write a point-by-point response to the article here at Wriphe.com. A salacious expose of the underbelly of the local comic and gaming scene might be just what this dull blog needs. Sex, drugs, rock and roll! I'll be like TMZ: Newnan Edition!

But when I went to Heroes to tell the owner what I planned, he gave me a great deal on some backstock comics. I'm not stupid. I know a bribe when I see one.

Therefore, I'm not going to say anything negative about the "hotshot" owner or his store. I'll even endorse Heroes as the best place to buy comic books in Newnan, GA. But that store manager guy, Tim? What a slob.

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I just repaired my riding lawnmower by replacing the broken PTO belt. That may not sound hard to do, and it shouldn't have been. However, the Operator's Manual failed to mention anything about the PTO tension spring that had been dislocated when the belt broke. Funny, that. I wouldn't have been able to remove the cutting deck to replace the belt if the spring had been in place, so you'd think that the manufacturer would mention something about it. But no, I had to guess where the spring attached. Mower seems to be working fine, so maybe I guessed correctly.

Before that, I took apart the plumbing for the downstairs sink. This nifty bit of PVC plumbing hasn't been "up to code" since the house's previous owners installed it from leftover pieces of a Mousetrap game. It has never drained quickly, and lately it had barely been draining at all. Fortunately, plumbing is easy when you have the parts (plumbing repairs are almost always a problem of access and strength, not complication), and now my sink is draining better than ever.

I figure I'd've had to pay a mechanic and a plumber at least $200 each to do those jobs, so it's a good thing I could do them myself; I only made $150 in June! ("The check is in the mail," they say. Sigh.)

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The Newnan Kennel Club Spring Dog Show was Easter weekend. Mom woke me up so that she could see the scottish terriers. I got out of bed so that I could see the standard poodles.

Nice day for a dog show.

Poodles are like potato chips: you can't have just one.

The owner of this beautiful chocolate poodle says she vowed "never again" to own a white poodle.

The Best in Breed winning scottie (Lena from Atlanta!); she had a hard time keeping her tail up in the Terrier Group competition.

Best in Show winner, Miniature Pincher Grand Champion Marlex Classic Red Glare (aka "Classie"). She was cute!

Reserve Best in Show winner, Grand Champion Jaset's Satisfaction (aka "London"). She was robbed!

This poodle, London, is the reigning 2012 Eukanuba Non-Sporting Breed American champion! He's the top-winning black male poodle in American Kennel Club History. He has his own Facebook page. We were in the presence of poodle royalty!

(Though I joked above that London was robbed, Min Pin Classie is a monster in the ring in her own right. If you can stand the cute, you'll find a bunch of pics of Classie here.)

I should also mention that we were introduced to a large black dog of a breed that neither Mom nor I had met before. It was a beautiful and friendly Black Russian Terrier. We didn't find out until later that his name was Zil (officially Grand Champion Zilya's Chicago Blues Fusion at Runes CD RN, CGC, TT, which is why they probably call him just "Zil"), and he's the winningest Black Russian Terrier in American Kennel Club history. More dog royalty, and to think I didn't snap a single picture of him! Arg!

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Mark Richt came to my town on Tuesday as by coincidence I went to Athens. Richt was in town recruiting Newnan High School senior Trey Wiggins for the 2013 Georgia Bulldogs football team, and he took the time to visit with local schoolchildren at the elementary school where Wiggins' mother works. But what really seems to have stirred up the locals was Richt's dinner at the local Texas Roadhouse restaurant. Word on the street is that Richt is apparently "a really nice guy."

Mom and I had dinner at Texas Roadhouse on Wednesday. I wore my "G" hat and a "Dawgs" shirt. The waitstaff assumed that my attire marked someone who wanted to hear their stories of waiting on Richt the night before. Over the course of my main course, two waitresses approached me with their stories of meeting Richt. I sat patiently through an iPhone slideshow of Richt trying very hard to tolerate people interrupting him as he tried to eat his steak. At that moment, I knew what it felt like to be a famous head football coach.

I don't mean to be dismissive of their hero worship. I understand the appeal of meeting Coach Richt in person. I spent a decade in Athens, and the one time I bumped into him while walking across campus — in about 2004 — he asked to borrow my pen briefly to sign an autograph for a booster. As I recall, he was a really nice guy.

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Here in Newnan, GA, there has long been an intersection at the edge of downtown where two one-way streets meet head-on. (This is at the edge of cemetery, because the Newnan city planners, although corrupt and inefficient, are not stupid.) Not too long ago, the state of Georgia, responsible for all U.S. highways in its territory, stepped in to renovate the intersection. This renovation including replacing the aging traffic signals with a new pole and removing all the signage telling motorists which lanes would end up on which roads. As you might imagine, this has turned into something of a fiasco.

The biggest problem is that the former red traffic lights have been turned into red traffic arrows. In the state of Georgia, it is legal to turn onto a one-way street once you have come to a full stop if the signal is a solid red light. However, the same action is illegal if the light is a red arrow. Other intersections with red arrows tend to have signs expressly noting that turns on red arrows are illegal, but as I said, in its infinite wisdom, the state has taken away all but the street name signs. It doesn't help that the locals have been turning on red lights here for decades.

The local police didn't realize there had been a change, so the local paper ran a story telling us all it was okay to turn on the red arrow. Someone from the state didn't like that and told the local police that they had changed the lights and that turns on the arrows were illegal. The police petitioned the state to restore the red lights and in the meantime were not ticketing people who turned at the intersection after a full stop as they always had done before. It seems that the state has finally had enough of that, too.

There is now a sign at the intersection, but it's just a temporary flashing sign warning us not to turn on red arrows. I'm sure so far as the GA Department of Transportation is concerned, the problem is now solved. At least now while waiting for the light to turn, I some something to read.

I also have plenty of time to think about how I used to be able to turn here. Sometimes the Good Old Days really were better.

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Last year I went to the Coweta County Fair, and I failed to post the pics I took of it. For example, I took pics of the Chicken-N-Dressing competition -- a 4H Club beauty contest featuring chicken in costumes -- but you won't find them on this website. Now that I've lost those pics, I don't think you'll ever see them anywhere. This year, I won't make the same mistake. Presenting my photos of the 2012 Coweta County Fair (taken Wednesday, September 26):

Even Mom loves the fair.

It's the temporary barricades that make it safe.

I waited for 5 minutes just to get this picture.

Why is a giant swing ride decorated in biohazard stickers?

The classics never go out of style.

But what would pictures of the Coweta County Fair be without barnyard animals dressed in silly costumes:

The winner of the 1st annual goat dressing competition (and his boy)!

P.S. Mother wants me to make it clear that the goat in that last pic is supposed to be wearing a dragon costume. Goats, it turns out, are no more fond of playing "dress up" than chickens.

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