Opinion

My son walked into the kitchen the other day, dressed for an evening event, and asked me proudly, “Do you like how I have my hair organized?”

Although he is gifted in language arts, he didn’t quite understand why I immediately laughed, thinking perhaps that his “organization” wasn’t all that great.

Truth is, he has extremely soft, thick hair – think of something that you would use to brush clean a fine fabric or even your own hair – and it had grown beyond its “organizational” best.

We are breathing a lot easier knowing that Shelby County is considered the ninth-healthiest among our 120 counties. It’s nice to know that our standards for healthfulness and our pursuit of those standards are valued by outside observers.

And we certainly share Shelby County Judge-Executive Rob Rothenburger’s goal of being No. 1 – what does Oldham County have that we don’t, except for more people? – and we encourage the aggressive pursuit of that lofty ranking.

I was very interested to read the article The Sentinel-Newsthat started out talking about beef prices but ended as a discussion about organic livestock (“Shelby’s beef prices jumping,” March 23). My husband and I own Earth's Promise Farm. We are among the state's first certified organic farms, and we raise certified organic pastured poultry for meat and eggs, certified organic pastured pork and certified organic produce.

For more than a decade now, Jewish Hospital Shelbyville has been in the proactive health business for Shelby Countians.

The hospital sponsors the Women’s Wellness Affair – the seventh edition was last week – and in June will have its annual Men’s Health Fair.

Each event is designed to illuminate good health, offer encouragement for healthy practices and, in many cases, provide free medical screenings for individuals who otherwise wouldn’t get them.

This week, our so-called one percent is made up not of an economic group but of those Kentuckians who are not incorrigibly immersed in college basketball.

Are you thinking of anything other than Saturday’s big game in New Orleans? Can you wait? Breath bated? Bets down? Pride bursting? Have family gatherings, civic events and, oh, nuptials and funerals fallen off your Super Doppler?

To heck with Florida vs. the United States Department of Health and Human Services. This is UK vs. UofL in the NCAA semifinals.

The turf malfunction that has rendered unusable the athletic field at sparkling new Collins High School sadly will cost this year’s senior class access to the facility.

The senior football players and soccer players long ago lost their home edge and crowds, and now the track & field athletes have as well.

Sadly, the great Caterina Karas, perhaps the most accomplished female athlete in Shelby County’s history, won’t be able to run a competitive lap on her home track.

“Grading procedures do not reflect today’s teaching standards,” said Thomas R. Guskey from the University of Kentucky at a recent training session for principals in Shelby County. He could prove his point with a 1917 report card that belonged to his grandmother, which looked pretty much like a report card issued today.

He and Lee Ann Jung, also from UK, shared their expertise in standards-based grading for Shelby County Public Schools because we have completed a study of their book, Grading Exceptional and Struggling Learners.

State Sen. Paul Hornback got it right, and he deserves our applause.

Whether or not you think Sen. Hornback’s telecommunications deregulation bill – dubbed the “AT&T bill” in the corridors of his state Senate – was a good thing or a bad thing is not the issue here.

What Sen. Hornback (R-Shelbyville) did that so many don’t do is this: He listened.

He withdrew his bill on Thursday, and his reason for so doing was prime goodness: He said there was a public outcry against the bill.

The city of Shelbyville’s determination to begin an aggressive crackdown on property owners who don’t follow the city’s ordinances is both strong in might and clear in hindsight.

City leaders said last week that they plan again to pursue homeowners who aren’t making required repairs in sidewalks that abut their property and that they would foreclose on property owners who are arrears in their taxes.