January 22, 2009
Halfway through Matt Barr's film comes the awkward scribble. Good Bye All This Tim and Dennis Signs Out Over And Out Over And Under Who are Tim and Dennis? It doesn't matter. The grease board fades from view, William Stanley goes on about the "dead...
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January 20, 2009
GREENSBORO — You can bet they’ll think of Barack Obama today at Gillespie Park Elementary. If snow doesn’t cancel school, they’ll watch his inauguration. And you can guarantee they’ll spot their principal, Gail Brady, hear her familiar greeting...
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January 17, 2009
On any given day, you’ll find Don Brame with his three saxophones. He’ll stick the cases on his wheelchair, push them down the hall and stop by someone’s room to play. Other times, he’ll camp out in the community room and play almost anything, esp...
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January 15, 2009
GREENSBORO - Kenneth Brown keeps the small, red book in his small, cluttered office at the Salvation Army Family Store. He and Nicole "Nikky" Slaughter, his assistant manager, use it to record the names of any new student who comes in for community servic...
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January 14, 2009
GREENSBORO -- Louis Allen loves a food adventure. He scours the city for ingredients that will work with something he's cooking in his second-floor kitchen. He starts early on Saturday at the Greensboro Farmers' Curb Market on Yanceyville Street and goes...
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January 13, 2009
GREENSBORO - I hate these goodbyes. This afternoon, we'll gather in the newsroom for Lex Alexander, our veteran reporter, editor, blogger and resident curmudgeon. We'll tell dumb stories and deliver a mock front page that'll poke fun at everything Lex. O...
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January 10, 2009
GREENSBORO - They're the doctors of dirt. Every year, they come into the biggest arena in central North Carolina and create a mud-packed playground for behemoth machines with wheels as big as any boulder at the N.C. Zoo. They speak in sign language only t...
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January 8, 2009
GREENSBORO — Let's talk food — and a skinny can of mango juice. It's really Louis Allen's idea. He's a criminal defense attorney, famous for his "Andy Griffith defense," who runs the Federal Public Defender office for the Middle District, or 24 count...
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January 6, 2009
Kay Hagan, you've got a big day today. You'll place your hand on your own Bible, and with 20 members of your family and closest friends around you in the storied halls of Capitol Hill, you'll become the first U.S. Senator to ever come from Greensboro. It......
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December 27, 2008
I once kept Natalie Osborne’s photo thumbtacked beside my computer. I wanted it there to remind me that every victim has a story. For years, I’d be deep into another tale about another tragedy, I’d see Natalie’s smiling snapshot, and I’d tell my...
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December 25, 2008
Today, on Christmas, I've got John Lennon on the brain. We're at war, we're bailing out everybody in a fancy suit and we're seeing in excruciating detail how one smooth-talking trickster on Wall Street has crippled everybody he caught in his cross-hairs.
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December 24, 2008
ASHEBORO — Meredith Kandies got an early Christmas present Tuesday. A Randolph County judge dismissed an involuntary manslaughter charge against the 16-year-old high school student in connection with the Dec. 12 shooting death of Jeremy McMillan. Distri...
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December 23, 2008
GREENSBORO - Two days before Christmas, let me tell you about Martha and Rose, Tim and John. They're participants at the Adult Center for Enrichment. And they like to bowl. They're not all that good. They'll tell you that - and laugh. But they have a good...
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ASHEBORO - Meredith Kandies got an early Christmas present Tuesday. A Randolph County judge dismissed an involuntary manslaughter charge against the 16-year-old high school student in connection with the Dec. 12 shooting death of Jeremy McMillan. District...
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December 20, 2008
Up N.C. 61, where the fields stretch forever, you'll find a burning candle for Bobby Lee. Down Interstate 85, to the far busier world of Friendly Center, you'll see a sidewalk full of flowers and cards for Juan. Drive five minutes toward the heart of Gree...
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December 18, 2008
In the big print by the bar, Tom Warth looks flyboy tough. He’s no more than 23, newly attuned to the dangers of war. He’s standing in England during World War II, wearing his bomber jacket, beside the fighter plane he named after his wife. How time f...
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December 16, 2008
GREENSBORO - Adrienne Cregar Jandler calls herself a "huge nerd.'' When she was 27, she started her own Web development company in her house. She had three clients. Twelve years later, two months shy of 40, she has six employees, hundreds of clients and a...
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December 13, 2008
GREENSBORO - Wel Jok flew home Friday night. He carried one suitcase , along with his Bible and his U.S. certificate, and trekked halfway around the world to see his mother, brother and two sisters in Sudan. He hasn't seen them in 22 years . Jok doesn't...
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You wouldn't want to be Amos Quick today. Even in his special T-shirt. This afternoon in Winston-Salem, he'll watch Dudley High battle Kannapolis Brown for the state 3A football crown. And more than likely, he'll watch the action on the sidelines more tha...
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December 11, 2008
GREENSBORO - Norman Smith has finished planting his garden beside his house. It's not much. But it will be. He's planted fruit trees, blackberries and at least a half-dozen vegetables - lettuce, onions, spinach and even Chinese cabbage - in a raised bed...
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December 9, 2008
GREENSBORO - Nancy and Roger Kimbrough have bought the Bestway, the seven-aisle grocery store at The Corner, the place of many names. Their experience? Well, let Nancy tell you. "When we had to eat, I went to the grocery store." That could qualify any of...
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December 8, 2008
Sen. Phil Berger, an Eden Republican who represents parts of Guilford County and all of Rockingham County, will serve a third two-year term as his party's leader in the Senate. Democrats hold a 30-20 advantage in the chamber next session, so Berger will o...
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December 6, 2008
HIGH POINT - On the corner of Gary Simon's desk, below the artwork from his 5-year-old son, sits a small statue of Don Quixote. Now, think back to your high school English class - when you didn't go to sleep. Quixote, one of literature's greatest charact...
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December 4, 2008
HIGH POINT — Paul Szydlik loved that bass. He called it “The Other Woman.” He bought it 14 years ago in California for $2,500. A 1963 Fender bass, beautiful blue, with a beautiful tone. Paul played it so much that his belt buckle rubbed the wood raw...
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December 2, 2008
GREENSBORO - It all began with a letter from a little girl with braids. Breanna Washington was a third-grader when she wrote a letter last year to "any U.S. soldier" in Iraq. She thanked them, slipped in a packet of Kool-Aid and mailed it halfway around t...
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