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In our summer of Saintpaul, on my last working day before a week long romp, I was just thinking …

About a big vote. Asheboro, the Triad’s version of Mayberry, will decide in 10 days whether it can sell beer, wine and mixed drinks as well as operate ABC stores within the city limits.

It’s emotional all right. Read Rich Powell’s pro-alcohol cartoons or drive down Dixie Drive, toward the N.C. Zoo, and see what locals call “The Crane.”

It’s a 40-foot sign, held in the air by a crane outside Eric Newton’s Steel Supply & Erection . It screams: “Vote Against.”

Alcohol supporters talk about economic development; alcohol opponents talk about death, sin and damnation. So, it’s a big-time fight, featuring some of the biggest names in Randolph County.

Asheboro banned alcohol sales in 1952. Since then, four referendums to sell alcohol have come up, and four referendums have failed. Well, here comes the fifth — on July 29 .

So far, 2,042 residents have voted early. Talk to folks against alcohol sales and their response is pretty much the same. They want to keep Asheboro, the largest dry municipality in North Carolina , “the way it is.”

But is Asheboro the way it should remain? We’ll see.

* * *

About a big Bubba. You’ll see them Sunday afternoon at the Wet ’N’ Wild Emerald Pointe Water Park.

Eleven contestants, with names like T-Bone and the Boogie Woogie Man, will compete in six events to grab the crown of the Triad’s Big Bubba in Rock 92’s ninth annual Bubba ’Lympics.

The events? Spam sculpting and tossing toilet seats.

The one requirement? They gotta weigh more than 250 pounds.

And the why? The winner gets $1,000.

Go and you’re guaranteed to realize the word “Bubbafied” really means something. I mean, where else would you find a guy named T-Bone who calls himself a “316-pound hottie with a naughty little body?”

* * *

About a small bird. According to Duke University, swamp sparrows sing Southern. It seems scientists have discovered a swamp sparrow here has a different trill and pitches than, say, a swamp sparrow in Maine.

A-yeh.

Scientists say birds can acquire regional differences — like an accent for you and me — and behavioral traits brought on by where they perch. And those traits are passed from generation to generation.

OK. But can a swamp sparrow toss a toilet seat?

* * *

About Paris Hilton as a tomato. It’s Anne-Marie Scott’s new punchline .

She teaches nutrition at UNCG, and she always tells her students that fruits and vegetables need to be cared for in a natural way rather than the industrial way where spray pesticides and chemicals rule.

And that’s when she talks about what she calls the “Paris Hilton tomato,” which Scott sees as “beautiful on the outside and empty on the inside.”

“You can’t treat food like a widget,” she says. “It needs to be cared for.’’

* * *

About Guy Clark. He’s a singer, a songwriter, a MerleFest veteran and a lover of homegrown tomatoes. That’s a good thing in our Saintpaul summer of 2008.

On Thursday, after nearly three hand-wringing months, our government told us we could eat tomatoes again. Just blame it on salmonella Saintpaul , a scary kind of bacteria that’ll give you a scary stomach ache.

No one knows how it happened. But since April 1, 220 people in 42 states have gotten sick. There were 14 cases in North Carolina, even one in Guilford .

But those tainted tomatoes came from farms far away. The country’s tomato industry lost $100 million .

But not Clark’s favorite: homegrown tomatoes. The folks growing and selling their own thrived.

Just ask Larry Smith from Pleasant Garden. He used to sell 30 crates of tomatoes every Saturday at the Greensboro Farmers Curb Market near War Memorial Stadium. After the salmonella

scare, he started selling 50 crates.

Goes to show you that, maybe, Clark was right.

“If I’s to change this life I lead

I’d be Johnny Tomato Seed

’Cause I know what this country needs

Homegrown tomatoes in every yard I see.”

See you in a week.

Contact Jeri Rowe at 373-7374 or jeri.rowe@news-record.com