You’ve got to be kidding me. With all the issues with kids bringing guns to school, they’re doing this? West Virginia wants to bring back hunting education in their middle schools. Yeah, okay. That’s just a wonderful idea! The supporters of the plan below say that they would teach kids other things besides hunting skills, such as how to whittle a stick, apparently, claiming that that’s something today’s youth need to know how to do. Absolutely vital! Shoot, the last stick I whittled was a pencil. And that was years ago before I had mechanical pencils. And it was with an electric pencil sharpener, too. Anyway, the whole reason they’re considering bringing this back is because there’s a declining number of people in West Virginia getting hunting licenses. Anyone ever consider that’s because, on the contrary, there’s an increasing number of cars on the road these days and there’s more roadkill than ever? That’s the West Virginia equivalent of going to a butcher shop. Why kill the cow when you can select the best cut of meat and cook it right on up? Wait, I didn’t say that, did I?

A bill introduced by a Wyoming County [West Virginia] senator could bring hunter education back to the state’s middle schools.

“It’s about time,” said hunter-education instructor Don Shumake. “I got a big smile on my face and clipped it out of the newspaper.”

Children would be instructed in everything from survival skills to gun safety, but the guns would either have dummy ammunition or be disabled. Sen. Billy Wayne Bailey, who introduced the bill, doesn’t envision West Virginia’s middle-school students firing real guns during class time.

Hunter education in schools in nothing new. The program’s roots are in West Virginia middle schools.

The course teaches the dangers of guns and the respect one must show a firearm, it also teaches boating safety, has an extensive hypothermia section and first aid, including bleeding and respiratory management. Children also learn survival skills.

Hunter education is especially important since many children don’t receive such instruction at home, Shumake said.

“People donát have somebody to show you that when you cut a stick, you cut away from you and other life lessons,” he said. “They are getting more than just a shooting education. They learn about firearms, it’s not fair not offer it to children who really want to understand. I would rather see them look back and say `boy, I’m glad I had that class,’ instead of saying `boy, I wish I knew what I could have done.’”

Superintendent Bill Niday said some hunting classes have been taught in Wood County Schools, though they have always been optional for student participation.

“I can remember at times the Department of Natural Resources have done some classes in the schools,” he said. “I know that some physical education and health classes have touched on aspects of that. At Parkersburg South High School, part of their physical education program is archery.”

Niday said as long as such courses are left up to the discretion of administrators and students, there shouldn’t be an issue.

“If schools have a need, I don’t see a problem,” he said, “but I would hate to see that become a mandatory part of the curriculum.”

Shumake said the program would lighten the load of hunter-education classes. Those classes held in the fall, especially just before deer season in November, fill up rapidly and those who wait to long to enroll will likely miss that year’s deer season. The state requires anyone born after Jan. 1, 1975, to complete the course before buying a hunting license.

West Virginia, where roughly 320,000 people participated in the gun season for bucks, may be the only state in the country contemplating such a bill, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Hunting is a huge part of life in West Virginia, but, mirroring a national trend, the number of hunters buying permits has been declining for years.

The state sold 154,763 hunting permits to residents in 2006, according to the Division of Natural Resources, a 17 percent drop from 1997. Although West Virginia still ranks in the top six nationally for sales of nonresident permits, the decline is being felt at the state Capitol.

Nationally, the number of hunters 16 and older stands at roughly 12.5 million, a decline of 10 percent from 1996 to 2006, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

So the MacBook Air started shipping yesterday, and frankly I’m not at all impressed. Sure, it’s then, but at what cost? There’s no disc drive (even though it can uses another computer’s drive over your home network, but that’s kind of rediculous), there’s very limited ports, and all for roughly the same price at the only slightly thicker, power and feature packed MacBook Pro. But hey, I mean it fits in a manilla envelope. That’s worth $3,000, right? Ha.

It’s 10:00 PM and we’re still taping a drama at Capital One atWestcreek for RCC. Just taking a break for a moment. My computer, usedas a prop, is now dented up and I don’t feel very good. I’m so tired.Not a great night.Mobile post sent by Trevor Dickerson using Utterz.  Replies.

I recorded another Utter on Utterz at Starbucks with Tori… take a
listen.

Click here, the link got messed up.

Wow, I saw some weird things today at school. First off, there was a guy riding a unicycle down the sidewalk in what looked like a genuine attempt to get to class rather than a spectacle. Second, a group of ten guys were in the bathroom at the library standing in a line, backing up one step at a time to see how far back they could read the small print “Please wash your hands” sign. There were a couple other things, some of which I won’t even repeat on here, that I guess are just commonplace at VCU. The funniest thing about all of them, though, is that nobody even thinks anything of them at all. I’ve always found people watching to be interesting, but never so much as at VCU.

On a kind of sad note (for me), it looks like my best friend, Jen, is probably going to end up going to Liberty next year… if so it’s really gonna suck here without her. We’ll see what happens.

Pastor Rick started a new message series entitled Time a few weeks ago, and I’ve got to say it’s probably the most impacting series he’s done to date (and he’s done a lot). The first week he talked about just how quickly life goes by. He made several analogies comparing your age with the time of day. I don’t remember exactly the ages and times he referenced, but if you take the waking hours (8:00 AM - 11:00 PM), if you’re 15 years old it’s about 10:30 AM. If you’re 30 it’s 12:00 noon. If you’re 50 it’s around 7:00 PM. Scary, huh? Time passes by more quickly than most of us realize. Today, Pastor Rick talked about how you should invest your time in things that have an eternal value and in things that will have a long-lasting impact.

All this got me thinking about just how funny time is. Sometimes I’ll do something and a few days later think that it feels like it’s been a week or two since I did it. Then, some event that comes around only once a year, take Christmas for example, and I feel like it just happened and the year flew by. It’s funny how different people perceive time in different ways.

One of the most interesting things Pastor Rick said is that people get along (or don’t) and associate with one another based on their time style. Some people prioritize their schedule. Others schedule their priorities. I’m definitely the first style (and sometimes I don’t have them in the right order at that) and I’m trying to become the second. It’s difficult, but I know I can do it if I keep at it.

To find out more about the Time series, visit www.highimpactliving.com.

Better late than never. Here are the photos from the National Theater on Monday night where I accepted my award for Virginia’s 2008 Young Preservationist Of The Year. Governor Tim Kaine as well as other prominent Virginia leaders were in attendance. It was a very nice evening. I was both humbled and honored to be given this award and will continue to do preservation work. To see what I do, visit my history website at www.shortpumphistory.org. These are some pictures from the ceremony. The last one is a scan of my page in the event program.

Click each picture to view it larger:

Well, I think Hannah Montana is as annoying as the next guy does, but this guy took it to a whole new level. This guy wanted to hijack a commercial airliner and slam it into an arena where she was performing in the middle of the concert. I mean I know people have been scalping her tickets for upwards of a thousand dollars, but come on, dude. Chill out!

(CNN) — Authorities have charged a teenage boy who said he planned to hijack a commercial jetliner in an attempt to commit suicide, an FBI spokesman told CNN late Thursday. The 16-year-old was taken into custody by airport police without incident on Tuesday evening after flying from Los Angeles, California, to Nashville, Tennessee, on Southwest Airlines Flight 284. “His stated intent was to hijack the airplane and commit suicide,” said George Bolds, an FBI spokesman in Memphis, Tennessee. “He did indicate he intended to die in Louisiana. It appears he had a ticket to Louisiana.” Bolds said the boy indicated he had lived in Louisiana.

The teen wanted to crash the plane into a Hannah Montana concert in Lafayette, Louisiana, two CNN television affiliates in Nashville, WSMV and WTVF, reported, citing unnamed sources. The concert is scheduled for Friday night at the Lafayette Cajundome. Bolds said he had no information on whether the concert may have been targeted as part of the plot. In the teen’s possession were handcuffs, duct tape and a type of rope or yarn, according to the FBI. Authorities noted that those are not prohibited items. “His plan contemplated overpowering the flight crew,” Bolds said. The teen is being held on unspecified state charges and could face federal charges as well, Bolds said. CNN affiliate WTVF reported the teen has been charged with felony terrorism and is being held at the Davidson County juvenile detention center.

“It is my understanding that at no point in time during the course of the flight there was ever any safety concern,” Southwest Airlines spokesman Chris Mainz said. Bolds also said nothing threatening occurred on the flight from California to Nashville. It was not immediately clear how police became aware of the teen’s presence on the flight or his alleged suicide plans. “Hannah Montana” is a hit Disney Channel show — which stars 15-year-old Miley Cyrus and her country singer dad, Billy Ray Cyrus — about a teenage girl who is a typical high-schooler by day but has a secret pop-star alter ego by night.

So this kid in Fairfax just to our north called up a school board member recently and left a message asking if there was school or if it was canceled because of snow. His wife then called back and left a mean and nasty message for him. It’ll be interesting to see if any disciplinary action will be taken against him simply because of his wife’s actions. Someone took the phone call and animated it. Pretty funny, but wow, what an angry message!

I’m on the verge of launching my own business and a website that’s been a dream of mine to create for the past three and a half years. It’s finally coming together and I could actually make a living off of it if I do it right. Only those of you really close to me probably know about it. I’m going public with it very soon, maybe even in the next couple of days. I’m really excited about it! Check back in the coming week for the public debut in the next week or so.