Our own Reed Vanderpool is recognized in Jim Wood’s latest book, "Riding the River" for having designed the book cover. This e-book, published by Amazon is a sequel to "Rangers of the Rio Grande", stories taken from the experiences of the Texas Rangers Jim served with while living in Fort Worth. Other books he has written are "The Boys of the Black Hand", and "One Yankee at a Time" all available on Kindle readers and computers. Congratulations to Reed and Jim Woods.

The cooler weather has got here. But I am still waiting on the rain. Everything is so dry. Tennessee is on alert for fires and drought. I did see on the news Sunday were there was a fire at Sumner County. People were calling in wondering where all the haze was coming from. We need to be extremely careful.

My roses are blooming again I hope when we get a hard freeze it doesn’t kill them. With this weather the flowers, bugs and snake do not know when to hibernate.

I know everyone is gearing up for Thanksgiving. I will be attending my family’s dinner this coming Saturday, I am excited. Thanksgiving only comes once a year so I think everyone should enjoy it. Growing up Thanksgiving was always a big day for my family. With my parents gone my brothers and I still carry on that tradition. I know as we grow older and have children and grandchildren of our own it makes things harder to get together. But we always manage to get together. Thanksgiving is a day to be thankful not for what you have but who you share it with. I am very close to my family and as I get older I cherish the time I get to spend with them all. One thing I learned at an early age is don’t take things for granted we are not promised tomorrow. I am blessed to have two families to celebrate with and wouldn’t have it any other way.