I just figured out why my beautiful wife keeps me – an overweight, underachieving shell of a man – around.

“Come, thou Holy Spirit, come; And from Thy celestial home Shed a ray of light divine.” —Reverend Edward Caswall Back in ’71, there were three major pop talents in my mind and culture: Donny Osmond, Michael Jackson and me, Jeff Churchwell. With much less fanfare than the other two, after supper night after night I would take Ma’s biggest hairbrush and sing to a coliseum full of adoring fans – and everyone within earshot up and down Cardinal Street.

“It is Christmas in the heart that puts Christmas in the air.” —W.T. Ellis Iowa’s got the “Pork Queen.” Maryland’s got the “Agricultural Queen.” In fact, you can bet that most all of the U.S. has some titled version of produce-related pseudo-royalty. What’s Idaho’s? The “Princess of Potato?”