Enotes

Traditions are terrific things. Whether they run in families, bring together communities or even entire nations, there is no mistaking the notion that honoring tradition is a noble and cozy thing to do, when not misguided. But let's do away with the funeral procession, shall we? In simpler, less crowded, less rude times, the funeral procession, particularly when done using the horse and carriage, was a fine way of respecting the newly-deceased. Today, it's more along the lines of a nuisance and, frankly, it can be dangerous. The journey from church (or other nonsecular place) to the cemetery or mausoleum can certainly be a somber one. There isn't a limousine leading the way with cans and string attached, with a hand-painted sign that says "Just Died." So I get it that commuting during an occasion of burial isn't the most pleasant thing in the world. And I have nothing against respecting and honoring the dead. But the funeral procession has worn out...

I think one of the most depressing parts of winter is that we spend it cloaked in darkness. It's dark when you wake up to get ready for work. The afternoons are often overcast and everyone has to drive with their headlights on. It's dark when you drive home from work. You can go days without seeing any serious sunlight. In Michigan, you can pretty much put your sunglasses in the drawer in October and not pull them out again until April---if you're lucky. It's like in wintertime, we've all forgotten to pay the light bill. That's why, when you get a day of sunshine in the winter, your eyes hurt. You spend the day squinting. Everyone looks like Robert De Niro in every movie in which he's ever appeared. But there's something called the Winter Solstice, and we actually passed it a few weeks ago---December 21 to be exact. And when you pass the solstice, you're in for longer days, slowly but surely. When I was a kid, I remember folks talking abo...

So how many Christmas cards did you get this year? Are they adorning the wall? Do you have so many that they outline the closet door frame? Or are they stuffed in a holder on the coffee table, bursting? No? Not at our house, either. The Christmas card is a dinosaur---like drive-in movies and transistor radios. Nobody sends Christmas cards anymore. It's another example of how Americans today just don't like to slap a stamp on anything and ship it via the United States Postal Service. Sending Christmas cards was a feeling of accomplishment but not of gratification. I mean, you were never there to see the recipient open yours. But getting Christmas cards? Now that was some fun. They would start to come, slowly at first, usually the week after Thanksgiving. Those cards were sent by the early bird folks. But as the month of December moved along, the Christmas cards moved along with it, filling the mailbox more voluminously as the days ticked down toward December 25...

Today's Miss Americas serve their term and then they're never heard from again. Or so it seems. There's no prerequisite, of course, that the winner of arguably the most famous beauty contest of all time needs to stay in the limelight when she hands the crown over to her successor. But there was a time when Miss America was often the springboard to bigger and better (or, at least, more profitable) things. Mary Ann Mobley was one of those Miss Americas who stuck around in our consciousness long after she sashayed down the runway. Mobley, 77, passed away the other day after a battle with breast cancer . She was the first Mississippian to win the legendary contest, and she parlayed that distinction into a pretty decent stage and film career as an actress. Like so many other women of her era, Mobley was able to star opposite Elvis Presley on screen, and like her brethren, she out-acted him. Mobley had a smile that went from ear-to-ear and her dark beauty was a star...

My bar-hopping days are long gone, so maybe I know not of what I type. So call me naive, but do we need bars to be open until 4 a.m.? A hurried-through bill by the Michigan State Legislature would allow some bars to stay open until 4 in the morning on weekends. According to the bill's sponsors, it's a matter of competition. Senator Virgil Smith (D-Detroit), the bill's sponsor, says the measure is needed so Detroit can compete with other big cities, like New York. Come again? We are going after the lush crowd? Tourists will decide their destination based on bars being open further into the wee hours? Another legislator said that the bill merely gives businesses that serve alcohol the option to stay open later. "Who are we to tell bars how late they can stay open?" was the quote. OK. That seems to be a shocking display of being short-sighted. I mean, we are talking about alcohol consumption here. There figures to be some degree of consequence to ...

In 1984, Bill Cosby helped save an entire television network. Thirty years later, he's toxic to an entire industry. It was in '84 when NBC, lagging far behind brethren CBS and ABC in ratings to the point of being a national joke, brought in Cosby and built a sitcom around him. Cosby was 46 years old and though he'd been canceled in the past with other television vehicles, his star power on TV was still heavy. Viewers still had "Fat Albert" and Jell-O commercials fresh on their minds. The sitcom idea was novel. NBC decided to cast Cosby and his TV family as well-to-do African-Americans living in a tony brownstone in upper Manhattan. This was no "Good Times" scenario. The presentation on TV of blacks living a life that wasn't in poverty wasn't new (witness "The Jeffersons"), but Cosby was a doctor and his wife was a lawyer. With all due respect to dry cleaner moguls, this was different. Plus, Cliff and Clair Huxtable had kids---...

Why does the ice cream man have the market cornered on driving trucks around the neighborhood, selling his wares? Think about his clientele---six-year-olds, who aren't exactly loaded. How much disposable income does a first grader have? This may seem like a strange time to bring this up, because we're hardly in ice cream truck season, but I say this is the perfect time to discuss this. With ice cream no longer a viable purchase option at your curb, why not consider other items that a grown up would run out of his/her house to snatch up? Liquor, for one. Can you imagine if there was a liquor truck that cruised the neighborhoods? The driver would make a mint. Adults would be lined up down the street as far as the eye could see. The possibilities are endless. How nice would it be if you could purchase an apple pie from a truck in front of your home? Or a dozen doughnuts? The items for sale wouldn't have to be limited to food stuffs. I'd have killed at tim...