Serving Lincoln County for more than a century!
Serving Lincoln County for more than a century!
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ODESSA — Life in a small town varies a bit from the city; it’s a bit slower. Rather than running to Wal-mart or McDonalds on the spur of the moment, you usually have to plan ahead. But one major upside to a small town is the sense of community that rises to meet adversity. Here, you have a community that will back you every step to the way in most situations. If you have lived in or around the area for any length of time, you would be hard pressed not to know Heaven Hicks by...
I first met Charleigh Cornett when she was a cute, freckle-faced eight-year-old with a brilliant smile and an adventurous spirit. From that very first meeting I had a friend. Since she loves to cook, I was able to get to know her a little when we visited two to five minutes at a time at the grocery store check-out counter. Fast-forward seven years and that cute freckle-faced girl has grown into a beautiful high-school freshman who plays volleyball, is on the track & field...
November has proven to be a very important month for Global Wildlife Conservation. In South Vietnam, November 12, 2019 the silver-backed chevrotain, once thought extinct, was rediscovered for the first time in roughly 30 years by Global Wildlife Conservation and partners Southern Institute of Ecology and Leibniz Institute for Zoo & Wildlife Research. The silver-backed chevrotain (a French word meaning "little goat), also called a deer-mouse, is a deer like species that is the...
Many of you might remember a story I wrote back in February called, "Grabbing life by the horns at the age of 15," about Charleigh Cornett and her quest to become a surgeon and the fundraising involved for the summer program she wished to attend. Since summer is over and a new school year just begun I thought it might be a good time to catch up with one of my favorite people in Odessa and see just how her summer went. Charleigh's whirlwind of a summer began not with a camping...
Did you know September 13 is World Sepsis Day? I know I didn’t. I wasn’t even aware sepsis needed a worldwide day of recognition. In fact, Monday, September 9, was Wonderful Weirdoes Day, Opposite Day, Wienerschnitzel Day and if none of those suit your celebrating mood, there are even more you can choose from. Or on September 10, if you woke up feeling festive you could have celebrated National Boss/Employee Exchange Day, National Hug Your Hound Day, Pet Rock Day, Swap Ide...
Her name was Ollie (short for Olivia), and she came into our lives seven years ago in the summer of 2012. She was half poodle, half shih tzu. She was small, blonde, puppy-like and absolutely adorable. We saw her picture on the Odessa Virtual Yard Sale site, immediately fell in love with that face and set up a time to meet her. We had tossed around the idea of getting a dog, though such a small one had never entered our minds. But once we met Ollie, we were hers. There was no...
It's just after 4:30 p.m. on June 27, and I am sitting in the crowded Phoenix airport with my mom Edith and daughter Kaitlyn, waiting for our 5:25 p.m. flight to Seattle to start boarding. We will be among the first to board due to the fact that my mom requires a wheelchair to get from point a to point b when longer distances are involved. There are both pros and cons to flying with someone who requires a wheelchair. The pros: 1. You get to withstand the dirty looks from... Full story
The phrase, “I had the pleasure of speaking to...” really and truly applies to certain people in this world. Merleen Smith is the epitome of that phrase. After talking with her I always feel like I am leaving the conversation better off than I was before I started it. I can always count on the fact I will have laughed at least twice and smiled the entire time. I had the pleasure of talking with Merleen last week about the dates that the Odessa Food Bank is open and about the v... Full story
A family of soon to be 15 members has recently taken up residence in the backyard of Tammy Tokas. A male and female quail have built a nest beneath Karen Carlson's (Tokas' sister) outdoor chimenea and laid 13 eggs. When the weather starts warming up it's not uncommon for Karen to build a fire so she and Tammy can sit outside and enjoy it. Imagine her surprise when she went to move the chimenea in order to mow the lawn and discovered the nest and eggs beneath. She quickly sat... Full story
The Odessa School District PTO recently completed their annual Butter Braid fundraiser. The money earned from the sale of the Butter Braids goes toward helping the Odessa PTO shirts for every student and staff member at the Odessa School District. Second-grader and young entrepreneur Lucien Iksic sold 47 Butter Braids, which was more than any other student in the elementary school. The first grade students sold 120 total Butter Braids, which was the most out of all the... Full story
This is the second year I’ve happily donated the balloons and my time to build an arch for Go! Odessa Recreation’s Third Annual Daddy-Daughter Dance. Since this year’s theme was the circus, Kaylene James, founder of Go! Odessa Recreation, had the idea of a yellow and white popcorn- inspired arch coming out of large popcorn bags. I thought since popcorn shapes can be pretty random that an organic garland, rather than a traditional arch might be more fitting. [Note: Organ... Full story
What was the best gift you remember receiving as a child? I'm not talking about obvious big-ticket gifts like a car or computer. I'm talking about a gift given to you when you were in grades 1 through 7, a gift that kept you not only physically active but also able to use your imagination. For me, it was a Christmas gift from my parents right around the time I was in the sixth grade and 10 years old. It was the Adventure Buggy! The Mighty Off-Road Adventure Buggy, made by Tonk... Full story
With the late arrival of the winter weather that has taken hold around the region, one might find themselves wondering when, or even if, the spring sports season might get under way. Well if you might be one such person, there is no need to wonder any longer. I received spring sports rosters from Athletic Director Bruce Todd on March 13 for the high school, along with a message that high school track & field and high school baseball practices have started. The likelihood of... Full story
This year, for me, Christmas was an extremely rare treat, I was able to spend it with both of my children. Usually when I visit Ephrata they are working opposing schedules so I can only visit with them solo and if I do happen to get them at the same time, it’s rarely for more than an hour. It was about three or four days before Christmas when one morning I receive a text from Kaitlyn, my daughter, telling me that she and Daniel, my son, both had Christmas day off and that t... Full story
Hello readers. I want to introduce you to my good friend and co-worker Dyanne Deering. Some of you may already have had the privilege of knowing who she is from her irregularly appearing feature, “Diary of a mad, fat, bipolar woman.” Others may know her simply because she grew up in the Odessa area (her maiden name is Kramer). If you do not happen to know her, you should get to know her, because when I talk about the “privilege” of knowing Dyanne, I really mean it. To have he... Full story
Have you ever missed someone but never really come to the realization of it until you met up with or spoke with that person again? Usually it's someone we take for granted and assume they will always be there just because they simply always have been. It's almost always a family member. You know the old story. You get older, move away, start a life, school, career, marriage, kids. Meanwhile, the other person, be it a sibling, cousin, aunt or uncle, has done the same thing,...
I’ve needed to write this update for awhile now, and every time I have started it I end up stuck. I know what to say, but the words don’t want to come out as eloquently as I feel they should. So with that said and having it be crunch time, here it goes. I am really sorry to have to give this bit of information, but LuLu’s story has to end because she is no longer with us. A couple months ago she managed to get out of the yard and wander away from both human and canine companio...
I watched a news segment a week or so ago. When it was over, I remember sitting there shaking my head in amazement at what I had seen, while tears were streaming down my face. I cannot tell you the specific reason I was crying, but I can tell you they weren’t tears of joy. I have not been able to shake the overwhelming feeling of sadness that came over me that day, because the segment could easily have (turned out differently)been a different scenario it just would have t...
On Saturday, March 24, I had the extreme pleasure of donating and building, with the much needed help of Tammy Tokas, a 25-ft.-long (give or take) balloon arch for The Mad Hatters Ball, the second annual daddy/daughter dance hosted by Go! Odessa Recreation. I absolutely love creating these rubber works of art and it had been almost exactly 10 years since I had last built one. Although I know balloons haven't changed much in the last 10 years I was still extremely nervous. I...
Hey Odessa! I thought it was time to give you another update on LuLu, the brindle puppy found shortly after Christmas frozen to the ground, starving, so emaciated that even the word emaciated didn't seem to fit. The sight of her was so tragic that my heart broke every time I looked at her. I would sit and sob for what seemed like hours. She'd been shot, not once but twice, was badly wounded, smelled of infection and, to be completely honest, wasn't far from death. Thankfully,...
On January 20, I finally saw LuLu for the first time since that cold morning of December 28, when the first thing I did was check to make sure she had survived the night. That Saturday morning I went with Tammy to the Carlson farm. When she parked her truck I looked up and saw Karen walking out with LuLu in her arms. I can only imagine how I must have sounded because I imagine my scream probably sounded a lot like a teenage girl meeting Justin Bieber. I think it was something...
Last week, as many of you know, we wrote about meeting LuLu, a brindle pup that was found after being shot twice and left for dead. LuLu was taken to the veterinarian by sisters Karen Carlson and Tammy Tokas. LuLu was so emaciated she weighed only 11 pounds and was put on a feeding schedule, starting with a mere 40 calories a day. She was given antibiotics due to infected and abscessed wounds. The vet also indicated that she was more than likely blind in both eyes. On January...
Although the rest of my family met her Wednesday night, I first met LuLu (although she was nameless at that time) the morning of Thursday, December 28, when I went to our laundry area to make sure she was still alive. When I opened the door, I was greeted with the sickening sweet smell of infection and a wagging tail that was attached to a sightless pup so emaciated I was instantly brought to tears. My first thought was, "How could anyone be so cold-hearted and cruel to a...
Santa loves Odessa and all the good boys and girls who live here (both young and old). He made a return visit on Saturday to Rolling Thunder Pizza just to make sure everyone was able to visit with him and tell him what they wanted for Christmas. Between 2 and 4 p.m., about 15 to 20 people showed up to greet Santa. Most of them made requests for iPads, iPods and cell phones, but one little girl, five-year-old Nevaeh Hicks, challenged Santa for about 20 - 30 minutes. Nevaeh...
If you need to speak to Stan Dammel these days, you may need to make an appointment. Life keeps him so busy that the odds of catching him on the spur of the moment are just about slim to none. This has been a very busy year for Dammel, who describes himself as somewhat of an underachiever in his youth, saying, "I really only did what was necessary to get through, no more." Time sure has a way of changing things. Along with working part-time to help out a friend, Dammel also...
