Barbara J. Hamby

The Daily News

For some reason I’m not as driven to read every single page of the daily newspaper as I was for years. With television news and on-line news—the comics, the Jumble puzzle, and the obituaries are my only priorities when scanning the “black and white” that’s not “red (read) all over” by most people these days.

I hear that newspapers are in trouble, so evidently I’m not the only one who doesn’t read them much anymore. We still get the paper every day, so Floyd can read the sports section and I can do the puzzle, but the rest of it piles up and gets recycled.

Our local Lions Club picks up stacks of newspapers and catalogs, magazines, etc. every Tuesday morning from our front porch. That’s the easiest part of our recycling efforts. The cans, bottles, loose papers and glass have to be carried a block or so to a large bin. We try to recycle everything we can. The thought of the huge amounts of stuff in landfills boggles my mind.

Usable discards generally go to Goodwill or food drives. We have had a lot of clothes to discard recently, as well as household items that are surplus. I still have a lot of winnowing down the contents of drawers and closets to do, but we have a good start.

I hate to think that newspapers are becoming obsolete, but I know some have already folded, in spite of being in demand for birdcage liners and fish wrappers.

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