... On the particular day of my commitment to a lifetime of how-could-that-have-happened and tell-me-that-didn’t-happen turns of events, a reliable ISU kicker yanked the 20-yard extra point to the left, snatching a kiss-your-sister tie from the jaws of victory: Iowa State 23, Nebraska 23. ...
 
Brad Hicks shares his personal thoughts about being blown around by a Cyclone in his Dec. 17 Advance column, On the Side.

...Indescribable in their realism and variety are its 212 granite and bronze animal and nude human sculptures depicting various activities and situations by Gustav Vigeland completed between 1924 and 1943. Dominating the scene and its focal point is the elevated 46-foot-tall monolith containing 121 entangled human figures. ...
 
Find out where Jim and Marsha Sloter are in this week's Travelogue in the Dec. 17 Kossuth County Advance.

Two letters in this week's Kossuth County Advance center on the recently completed election, and they are quite different. Here's a sample of each:
To continue these unsubstantiated and unproven allegations is an insult to the effort of those thousands of local election officials across this country. You asked election officials to do their jobs: they did. And under some of the most difficult circumstances, they did their jobs well. 
 

With the holidays and year end upon us, many are thinking of how they can help others or support causes they care about. Now is a great time to consider a gift to a fund of the Kossuth County Community Foundation, an affiliate of the Community Foundation of Northeast Iowa. Giving a gift through the Foundation is an easy way to impact Kossuth County communities and the nonprofits serving the people who live there while also providing unique tax-benefits to the donor.
 

Ever wonder how the season of Christmas was begun? So, have I. I’ve done some research on this day of gift giving and celebrating the best gift ever, the birth of Jesus. 
The word ‘Christmas’ is derived from the Mass of Christ first recorded on December 25th in the year 336, when the Roman Emperor, Constantine, reigned. He was the first leader of the Roman world to be a Christian. Why the 25th? 
 

I sort of jumped the gun on decorating for Christmas this year. As in, I put up the tree and all the trimmings a month ago, two weeks before Thanksgiving. Don’t judge. This year has been like no other, so it seems to me that anything goes. Anything, in this case, being early, very early, Christmas decorating. The thing is, coming downstairs in the morning to a house sparkling with tinsel, tree lights, angels and assorted other adornments makes me ...
 

...Around $240 million was spent in the race between incumbent Republican Joni Ernst and Democrat challenger Theresa Greenfield. Earlier reports indicated the money broke about 60 percent to 40 percent in favor of Greenfield. That $240 million represents about $80 per man, woman and child in Iowa. All of us know, however, Iowans in general are more practical – some say cheaper – than that. 

“It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas” is one of my favorite songs. Pair it with one of my favorite Christmas traditions and it is a night of bliss. 

Remember, even though the world, Satan, and our flesh want us to believe it’s still night time, and that Christ hasn’t come yet, the truth is that we’re children of the day since Christ has already come. “The night is far gone; the day is at hand… Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarreling and jealousy.”
 

There are three letters to the editor in the Dec. 3 Kossuth County Advance. The topics and writers are:
In the wake of the election, Iowans’ responsibility is to remain engaged, by Jan Libbey
 
Sad to miss Tacos for Tots, grateful for years of help, by Noe Villareal
 
State officials need to do their jobs to ensure elections, by Kandi Doyle
 

As you listen to the news and watch what is going on around us, it can cause questions about what we are doing at West Bend-Mallard Community School District in response to COVID and keeping everyone safe. 
 
Read all of Superintendent Amanda Schmidt's "Our Kossuth County" column in the Dec. 3 Kossuth County Advance.

... It’s a problem because if you are going to have fact checkers and limit political content based on some sort of criteria, then you are meeting the definition of being a publisher, not a Section 230-protected social media internet platform. 
What's Brad Hicks writing about in his On the Side column this week? See it in the Dec. 3 Kossuth County Advance.

The traditional Western, a genre that saw its height from the 1940s to the 1960s, seemed to go out of disfavor for various reasons. Regionalism, a trademark of many Westerns, somehow took on a bad name. Modern society also seemed to forget the Western, deeming it colloquial. While Louis L’Amour seemed to weather the storm, even well past his passing, many other Western authors seem to have struggled to place their books on bestseller lists.

Excerpts from this week's letters to the editor are:
Pro-life means pro-life
I am puzzled as to why the person in the recent letter is so puzzled by the pro-life signs. The signs state: Pro Woman, Child, Life; and Life, Respect it, Protect it. They do not say pro-pregnancy or freely vote to populate the planet. I’m puzzled as to what she saw. So many say because we are pro-life we are only pro-birth or one-issue voters. This is so far from the truth. 
 

Prior to the 1990s, trained journalists who wanted to investigate something were taught to follow the money. The only money-following today is chasing the cash that comes with internet clicks, which apparently don’t add up very fast when the truth is revealed, particularly if it doesn’t fit your readership’s or viewership’s demands.