Curt Lies My last name is often misspelled. People want to put another s in it as in Isles. Like the Islands. Sometimes they want to insert a double ss at the end. The worst troublemaker is that a capital I and lowercase l look identical on a laptop.  No one wants to be known as Curt Ills. But I …

Please don’t take my Gas Stove! I’ve read with interest an effort by the US Consumer Product Commission to ban gas stoves.  I’m always alarmed by the government’s long-armed reach into our lives. Especially when it concerns our homes. I don’t know if “A man’s home is his castle” is a law, but it should be. Before talking about gas …

  “Where Everyone is your Uncle or Aunt” I grew up in a rural community where it seemed every adult was my uncle or aunt. I knew they couldn’t all be kin, although they seemed to be.  They’re two of the sweetest words in the English language: Uncle. Aunt.  In Dry Creek, these terms of respect were given to our …

A Patteran for others to follow. I’ve always been fascinated with Gypsies. There are so many stories, tales, and legends about these traveling people. My favorite story is about patterans. Gypsies (known as the Roma in Europe) had a unique method of communicating with fellow travelers. At a crossroads, Gypsies would build a small pattern of twigs, leaves, or grass. …