http://http://www.kentucky.com/139/index.xml News, sports, and entertainment from Kentucky.com en-us Copyright 2009 Kentucky.com Merlene Davis 60 Mon, 05 Jan 2009 04:10:51 EST http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss McClatchy Interactive's Workbench webmaster@kentucky.com http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/634095.html http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/634095.html Sun, 21 Dec 2008 06:59 EST
She takes no excuses, accepts no labels and sets high standards. She believes she is a good teacher and she loves teaching.

Because of that, and because she realizes there's a lot that new teachers need to know and older teachers need to be reminded of, Luck wrote a book: A Lesson Plan for Teachers, New and Old: A Guide for Student Teachers, New Teachers, and the Experienced Ones!

It is a simple, bare-bones, meat-and-potatoes, easy-to-read, self-published how-to book that is comfort food to those who, like Luck, think they were born to teach. ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/630604.html http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/630604.html Thu, 18 Dec 2008 06:32 EST
That is astounding to me. Unfortunately, cases like those might not be all that uncommon.

"I suppose it has been around forever," said Steve Fisher, manager of the Adult Safety Branch of the Kentucky Cabinet of Health and Family Services. "But we'd like to think it is shocking and deviates from the norm we are accustomed to."

However, "we often see this as a familial problem," he continued. "A live-in adult child or grandchild exploiting or abusing an elderly parent or grandparent. It's a hidden problem." ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/628283.html http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/628283.html Tue, 16 Dec 2008 06:43 EST
Several people in the Bluegrass think that is a good reason to celebrate, and they are inviting you to join in.

"Historic Salute to President-elect Barack Obama" is the pre-inaugural event being held Jan. 9, which will let Lexington get a head start on all the festivities in Washington highlighting the swearing-in of the 44th and only biracial president of these United States.

"We would be remiss if we did this in a quiet manner," said Wilma Peeples, one of the organizers. "We need to showcase this tremendous event that has occurred in our lifetime. It's about bringing this country together and focusing on the well-being of this country, nationally and internationally." ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/625743.html http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/625743.html Sun, 14 Dec 2008 06:48 EST
It didn't take me very long to learn all that.

But what I didn't know is what his mother fully appreciates: Giovanni is much calmer now because of the opportunity he has been afforded to learn to play the violin.

He has received free private lessons at Central Music Academy in downtown Lexington since he was 2. ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/622874.html http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/622874.html Thu, 11 Dec 2008 06:29 EST
Oprah has mansions, money and influence. She has a chef, a personal trainer and probably some of the best gym equipment made. Most of us who struggle to avoid our doctor's wrath about our weight don't have anything approaching that.

Still, Oprah relapsed.

And if all of us who have lost weight and regained it were to raise our hands, we could block out the sun. ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/620577.html http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/620577.html Tue, 09 Dec 2008 06:29 EST
Some of that attention has been negative. But some has been a glimpse of a positive transformation for our children, our country and how we are seen throughout the world.

The negative attention is worrisome.

Excluding the case in Kentucky, which was about as embarrassing it could get, there are at least two other cases in which folks are demanding the judicial system examine the authenticity of Obama's birth certificate. ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/618682.html http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/618682.html Sun, 07 Dec 2008 06:16 EST
No one bothered to tell Suzy Wampler or Cindy Bain.

Wampler has been looking for a teaching job since she was pink-slipped by Fayette County Public Schools in June. Bain has been looking for a manufacturing job since she lost her job at Amazon.com in September.

"I never thought I would be in this position," Wampler said as she waited Tuesday to see an unemployment representative at the Central Kentucky Job Center. "When I got the pink slip, I thought I'd find another job, no problem. ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/583653.html http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/583653.html Fri, 07 Nov 2008 07:16 EST
From the doubts of Obama's experience, through the repetitive barrage of The Rev. Jeremiah Wright's sermons, to the torrid final charge by Sen. Hillary Clinton's campaign, and despite the viral e-mails that painted Obama as the anti-Christ, my friend never wavered. Obama's going to win, he said. You watch.

He had to say that frequently because I was not one filled with hope. I was more in the "don't dare to dream such a thing" mode. I didn't want to jinx Obama's chances, and I didn't want to ride the emotional highs if there were going to be lows lurking around the corner.

"Do you believe now?" he would ask weekly, particularly after a persuasive speech or poll number indicating Obama was outdistancing his opponent Sen. John McCain. "I'm not there yet," I would reply. And I wasn't. ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/568207.html http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/568207.html Sun, 26 Oct 2008 06:55 EDT
So for nearly 40 years, as other neighborhoods with substandard housing received upgrades, the possibility of Davis Bottom's being razed because of the road project kept conditions there deplorable.

Walls of homes were slanted, indoor plumbing was suspect, and landlords were unconcerned.

It has long been the community Lexington forgot. ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/559896.html http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/559896.html Sat, 18 Oct 2008 13:08 EDT
I was raised in a house that sat a few yards inside the boundary that separated the city of Owensboro from the county in which I shared fenced farmland, rocky roads and paved streets with cousins, with the white grandchildren of neighbors who didn't mind living in an integrated neighborhood, and with the occasional feisty goat that dared you to step on your own front porch.

All the youngsters donned the mandatory tattered clothing because all adults — regardless of color — believed play clothes need not be fashionable. All the youngsters shared what treats we might be given because all adults — again, regardless of color — believed sharing was a responsibility that should be taught early and displayed often. And all of us youngsters laughed together and explored together without any thoughts of inequality, modeling what we saw in the adults around us.

Then one day, my brother, who was about 6 years old, came into the kitchen where I was climbing on a stool as discretely as possible to snag some raw oats for a snack.

“Mama,” he said to the woman who then spotted me and ordered me to get down, “what's a nigger?”]]> http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/537991.html http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/537991.html Sun, 28 Sep 2008 06:40 EDT
We traveled to various churches and gave concerts throughout the year to a variety of audiences.

At one of our concerts, a minister spoke of diversity and inclusion, characterizing the various cultures and colors of people on this Earth as fingers on a hand that held the world together.

He said by segregating one finger because it was smaller or the thumb because it was fatter, the hand would become dysfunctional. The world would then fall apart and the hand would have no reason to exist. ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/533615.html http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/533615.html Tue, 23 Sep 2008 07:48 EDT
They came here looking for good veterans health care, for good neighbors and for a sense of community.

They had visited four years before moving here and left with a sense that Lexington is where they wanted to be and where God was leading them.

"Given where we were living, Lexington was as close to paradise as we were going to get," Rita Badger said. "We had looked at the Carolinas and other pretty places, but everybody from where we were was going there, and they were taking their ugly with them. ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/525425.html http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/525425.html Tue, 16 Sep 2008 09:46 EDT
Some of the blame can be placed on inactivity and dietary choices.

But a four-part PBS documentary, Unnatural Causes: Is Inequality Making Us Sick , which first aired in March, shows mounting evidence that sometimes economic status, race and environment can be better predictors of health than our own poor choices.

The documentary demonstrated how at each economic level rich to middle class to poor health declines at the same rate as our money. ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/520397.html http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/520397.html Sun, 14 Sep 2008 08:20 EDT
It wasn't exactly the definitive loosening of chains that abolitionists and the slaves themselves would have preferred. In fact, no slaves were freed.

"It was a preliminary move, giving those states 100 days before he would emancipate the slaves if they didn't come back into the union," said Yvonne Giles, a historian and chairman of the board of Lexington's Isaac Scott Hathaway Museum. "He was playing politics."

Kentucky, Maryland, Delaware and West Virginia, the border states, plus any state or any part of a state under the control of Union forces, were exempt. ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/511839.html http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/511839.html Thu, 04 Sep 2008 08:35 EDT
The most recent shocker was Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain's pick for his running mate.

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, a former mayor and the mother of five, came out of nowhere to land at the top of his list.

Now, because that is what we do when presented with a puzzle or a challenge or the unknown, journalists all over the world are trying to figure out just who this woman is. ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/510380.html http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/510380.html Tue, 02 Sep 2008 01:49 EDT
Apparently filled to overflowing with pride in a day not many people expected to see in America, a day when a black man would have a legitimate chance to be president of the United States of America, those people knew they had witnessed history unfolding.

We've had so little to celebrate since arriving in America, when compared with other ethnic groups.

All black people, despite our political leanings or affiliations, should take a bit of pride in Obama's success. ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/496936.html http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/496936.html Thu, 21 Aug 2008 08:23 EDT
Yes, there were tears and moisture-laden tissue tightly squeezed in trembling fists.

But there was also joyous laughter, and there were good memories that flowed so easily and so continuously that the minister was left only a few minutes to remind people about God, Jesus and heaven.

My brother, the oldest of three siblings in the Davis clan, died peacefully Aug. 11 after fighting pancreatic cancer for nearly two years. ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/489788.html http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/489788.html Thu, 14 Aug 2008 07:53 EDT
Pausch, famous for the last lecture he gave last September that subsequently was turned into a best-selling book, was diagnosed with that cruel disease in September 2006, shortly before my big brother, Anthony L. Davis, was.

Pausch, 47, died July 25 despite his valiant efforts to overcome his disease. My brother, 60, died Monday morning.

Some sources estimate more than 37,000 people will be diagnosed with pancreatic cancer this year, and more than 34,000 of them will die as a result. The five-year survival rate is less than 5 percent, and it is the fourth leading cause of cancer deaths in the United States. ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/487529.html http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/487529.html Tue, 12 Aug 2008 10:03 EDT
He was scheduled to join other World War II veterans as they traveled, free, to the World War II Memorial in Washington, D.C., courtesy of Honor Flight Network.

There were 50 of us from Dayton and another 50 from Columbus, and we met in Washington, Stoner, 82, said. It was great. All of them were World War II veterans like myself. We talked about what outfit we were in and where we served. We had something in common.

Back then, he said, he was the only veteran from Kentucky on the flight. ]]> http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/480585.html http://www.kentucky.com/139/story/480585.html Tue, 05 Aug 2008 09:29 EDT
The cost of supplies, the aggravation of having to entice sleepy kids out of bed at dawn, and the need to save vacation days to tend to a sick child are enough to drive parents bonkers.

Things are different for the parents of college students, however.

I'm supposed to talk about some of that, what with my many years of experience in that area, but I'm sorry, I simply cannot concentrate. ]]>