One of social media’s beautiful features is that it quickly reminds you of whatyou were doing a year ago.
My posts from last January feature disgruntled sel-fies of me standing in mydriveway with salt and a pitiful electric snowblower that I thought would be enough. It was not.
By the end of last winter, there was a solid two feet of snow in my yard. The ice walls that formed from shoveling my driveway were so formative, that I began reading George R.R. Martin’s Song of Ice and Fire series to seek a suitable comparison
in literature.

When discussing the upcoming budget cutting the New Prague School Board will begin in the weeks to come, some might feel Matt Goldade ought not have noted the plainly obvious – the more costly the contract with the district’s unionized teachers, the larger the amount the district will have to cut.

It took some time, but we finally have snow and freezing temperatures. So, winter is here. Again, just like last year.
Just like last year, people are not happy with the cold temperatures. Maybe the complaining is a little more understandable this year as December and the first few days of January had temperatures above normal.

She sat through hundreds of meetings over a dozen years, considered thousands of decisions with an untold number of options. For Jeanne Kubes, it all came down to one foundational premise as she saw it – the good of the community’s public schools, the children attending them and the staff working in them.

There’s little doubt 2023 was a good year in New Prague. The community is continuing to grow and, arguably, prosper. Its school children display their talents on many stages on a regular basis. The community has many reasons to look forward with great enthusiasm for its future.

One thing I’ve sometimes found baffling are people who make comments at public meetings and then don’t want it reported on. It’s the one word, “public,” that some people forget is in that aspect of a meeting.

We learned this past week consumer spending in Minnesota has been at a level contributing to yet another projected budget surplus.
Wasting no time, Education Minnesota, the union representing teachers in the state, offered its opinion the state should continue to help fund teachers’ wages at a level able to address the shortage of instructors. E-12 education is already among the largest line items in the state’s biennial budget. Being a teacher is challenging and at times under-appreciated yet vitally important work.

I have a sibling who doesn’t eat anything with pork products in them. Strangely enough, you will find pork products in places sometimes you don’t always think of — one of them being store-bought gelatin.
This sent me on a hunt of how I could make my own gelatin and the results were surprisingly simpler, more flavorful and more nutritious than I realized. In fact, if you can somehow make anything into a liquid, you can make it into gelatin. It also sets firmer.

I took my father to see a show with U.S. Navy Glee Club Men’s and Women’s Chorus with the Minnesota Orchestra at Orchestra Hall earlier this month. Preceding the show, we sat down in the lobby next to a couple, approximately in their seventies.

Saturday, Nov. 11, is Veterans Day, a time we should especially remember to honor the service of our country’s military veterans, men and women who have given so much so we can enjoy our daily lives in relative ease and comfort.

Your New Prague Area School District has offered a case voters should approve an additional $450 per student levy for 10 years – not “forever” as Director Dan Call told the board he had been telling constituents back in August.
Call, who told the school board he opposed the levy request, was corrected on the misinformation. Hopefully, he has since touched base with all those folks and provided them accurate information.

Sen. Bill Lieske, R-Lonsdale, recently authored a column published in our Oct. 12 edition reminding people who took out federal student loans the pause on repayment issued during the pandemic has been lifted. For those concerned about repaying their loans, he offered a couple of short-term options.

My “luck of the Irish” came to a screeching halt this past St. Patrick’s Day when I lost my soulmate, Chuck. Who would have thought as I walked into his hospital room that morning and he was complimenting me on my new shamrock shirt that by late evening he would be gone! I lost the love of my life. But I wasn’t the only one who experienced this unthinkable loss…so did our family and friends…and so did New Prague. This community lost one of its stellar cheerleaders.

The New Prague Area School District’s board of directors have asked district taxpayers to support an additional $450 per student levy amounting to about $2 million in annual funding adjusted for inflation over the next 10 years.
It’s an important question, a big ask of taxpayers. We won’t suggest you should vote for it or against it. That’s a decision you get to make. We’ll only ask you make your decision based on facts and the answers to every good, tough and fair question you can think of.
That is your responsibility as one with the privilege of voting.

The occasional meeting of the Get The Heck Off My Lawn Society will now come to order.
Today’s agenda includes a rant on how a business uses technology to serve more people efficiently, while at the same time telling those not ready to embrace a certain level of technology, sorry, this is the way things are: Get on board or get out of the way and go someplace else.

Having just witnessed my first Dozinky Days and car cruise, the amount of work and planning for the event was impressive. Well done, New Prague.
The weather drew a huge crowd downtown, perhaps bigger than expected. The event of course benefitted from near-perfect weather and the experience the Chamber of Commerce and volunteers have to draw upon.