The Perfect Vacation

Got that 2019 vacation behind you? The one you’ll still be making payments on in 2023? Oh, I know all about the beach/mountains family thing, and especially when it comes to epicurean delights. After all, if you’re not allowed to kill or catch something on this family sojourn, what else is there to do other…

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Wayne County Catfish Tournament Draws 120

The world is a different place in those hours between midnight and daylight. While most of the surrounding region is blanketed in silence and sleep, Ronnie Kent and his wife Melissa are fully aware of activity abounding as they sit in their pontoon boat atop the mighty Altamaha River. They’re awaiting “the bite.” When, or…

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Panther Puzzle Solved!

Never fails. Once a year. Every year. We run a cover photo of a panther/cougar/puma/somebody’s overfed house cat, and I get the same question lemmemtytwo times for the next month: “Ever seen a panther?” And they ask it with a challenge in their eyes, you know? As in, “We’ve had suspicions of you being a…

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Who Needs A Turkey?

It ain’t even gray day yet, and I’m a’thinkin’ we’re about to scrap! Boy’s taking me to kill a turkey he called up to nine steps the day before: all I gotta do is shoot. Yeah, right. He knows me better than that.  The problem, in the dawn’s early light, is whatever he’s apparently putting…

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One Year Removed

So. It’s been a year now. WHEW! There were times there… Here’s the deal in a nutshell: Twelve months ago, I was lying on a table beside my guts in an Augusta hospital while a brilliant surgeon rummaged through them and took out what he wanted without overly disturbing the rest. If you’ve had major…

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Turkey Time Is Here

The old doe was tipping along like she’d just painted her toenails and didn’t want to muss them in that muddy ol’ creek bottom. I was purely proud that she was all daintied up, and I was hoping even more her beau was en route to what they both believed to be a clandestine rendezvous.…

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Jake And His ‘Ont’ Bone

It was one of those rare, early March mornings… glowing sunshine and a zephyr from the south that was sheer pleasure to bask in following the biting brutality of February. All in all, during this ninth year of my existence, things couldn’t get much better as I tipped the old wooden chair back to the…

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Playing It By Ear

Picture a knitting needle. No clue? So stroll over to grandma’s and she’ll show you. Or look it up on your phone. Should you be participating in a recliner sprawl or reading room experience, just think  No. 2 pencil made out of steel with a backward-reaching hook on one end. Got it? Good. Now you…

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New Year’s Bucket List

It’s going to be a great year! Because I’m upright. As opposed to prone. I was prone for a brief bit in 2018. And prone, in case you’re wondering, ain’t much fun. Upright once more, it’s time to look forward to what we’ll be harrying, harvesting and dining upon over the course of the next…

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100 Years At Thompson Pasture Hunting Club

As the memories begin to flow, so do a few tears; but like those recollections, they spring from joy.  Eighty-nine-year-old Dent Newton can’t hold them back, and that’s OK. The big crowd on hand to honor the oldest member of Georgia’s oldest deer-dogging club has nothing but respect for this gentleman—a word that fits him…

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