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A.C. Snow

A.C. Snow's column appears each Sunday on Page 2 of the Journal section. He can be reached at 881-8254 or asnow@newsobserver.com



Tempted to say, 'Let them eat cake!'

One cold morning when I was a wee lad, a neighboring farmer rode his horse into our yard. Sitting straight-backed in the saddle, he was an imposing figure.

Updated: Nov. 30, 2008 5:34 AM | Full story

It's a concession to cruel ritual

This year's election reinforced my feeling that the traditional concession speech should be abolished. It constitutes cruel and unusual punishment of the worst kind.

Updated: Nov. 23, 2008 1:40 AM | Full story

It's hard to rise above the put-downs in life

The fellow who shares my office suite displays on his wall a framed declaration: "Behind every successful man stands a woman telling him he's wrong!"

Updated: Nov. 16, 2008 1:42 AM | Full story

Impromptu roadside reunion for veterans

Snow:Bill Warren was running late for an appointment in Kinston when, breezing along the bypass between Wilson and Goldsboro, he spotted an elderly man with a cane on the roadside by his car.

Updated: Nov. 9, 2008 1:40 AM | Full story

Epiphanies abound on field

Snow:Baseball is not my game. Never was. As a kid, I was the last chosen as we teamed up for cow pasture baseball.

Updated: Nov. 2, 2008 1:48 AM | Full story

SAD season is almost upon us

A.C. Snow:A week from today, the "depression" begins. No, I'm not speaking of the economic doldrums -- which are already upon us -- but of the end of daylight saving time.

Updated: Oct. 26, 2008 5:39 AM | Full story

Giving only to the 'deserving poor'

Snow:We were leaving a rest stop on Interstate 40, west of Statesville, when a neatly dressed woman in the next car honked her horn, rolled down her window and said, "Look, I'm out of gas and need to get to Greensboro. Could you spare a little money... ?"

Updated: Oct. 19, 2008 1:39 AM | Full story

Wait until the large lady sings

Snow:It's that time again. Campaign yard signs are blooming all over America's lawns like dandelions in spring.

Updated: Oct. 12, 2008 1:49 AM | Full story

Breaking the IRS' First Commandment

Snow:My friend Dave Jones once owned a dog named Baci. He was a good dog, basically -- obedient and staying within the confines of the lawn, which was surrounded by one of those invisible fences.

Updated: Oct. 5, 2008 6:03 AM | Full story

Sleepless in Raleigh; bye, Delbert

Snow:In the 1960s when we borrowed $15,000 to build our dream house -- modest dreams were in vogue then -- I lay awake nights for weeks worrying about a $103.20-a-month mortgage. Eventually, sleep returned.

Updated: Sep. 28, 2008 1:49 AM | Full story

Susie, say it ain't so

Snow:It is said that sex sells -- whether it's in a book, a movie, magazine or just plain gossip. But never in my wildest imagination would I have thought that sex might help sell a biography of the late N.C. Supreme Court Chief Justice Susie Sharp.

Updated: Sep. 21, 2008 1:50 AM | Full story

Young solicitor had a worthwhile idea to sell

A. C. Snow:I sometimes wonder if our house isn't marked with some secret sign, visible only to door-to-door salespeople, that reads: "Stop here. Soft touch!"

Updated: Sep. 14, 2008 1:54 AM | Full story

I've grown accustomed to her face

A. C. Snow:You've heard the anecdote in which the wife suggests to her husband that they renew their marriage vows and he responds with uncommon delight, "You mean they've expired?!"

Updated: Aug. 31, 2008 4:43 AM | Full story

How to write a column

Not long ago, I mentioned that my newspaper reporter son-in-law, while stopping off in Smithfield on a political assignment, met a native who admitted to reading this column.

Updated: Oct. 24, 2005 11:56 AM | Full story

Green eggs and ham are not so bad

How many of you as parents have stuffed spinach and other disagreeables down your children's throats while pleading, "Try it, you'll like it!" The slogan rarely worked with my two, whether it was spinach, going to bed on time in summer or picking up debris on the lawn after a hurricane.

Updated: Oct. 24, 2005 9:42 AM | Full story

Plowing up mall does not Cinderella make

no matter if it's changing a baby's diaper, the volume on a restaurant sound system spouting noise posing as "music" at unbearable decibels or even traipsing along the multilane highway of cyberspace. But Raleigh will rue the day it plows up the Fayetteville Street Mall. This oasis of beauty in all seasons but winter is the only bright spot in the otherwise dreary landscape that is downtown Raleigh.

Updated: Oct. 24, 2005 9:15 AM | Full story

Ice, snow, cabin fever and a flurry of finches

After three days of confinement, you don't need to take your temperature to diagnose the ailment: Cabin fever! The symptoms mount. Pacing. Has the newspaper come? Tired of reading. Sick of TV, including the New Hampshire slugfest and the hoarse, hollering "Hardball."

Updated: Oct. 24, 2005 12:28 AM | Full story

Marriage, as we knew it, is on the wane

'I hate to tell you, but I think I'll be voting for George Bush this Fall," she said, almost apologetically. I suppose you could call my older sister a "closet Independent," the only one in a large family that is 99 percent Republican, down the line. "That's OK by me," I said. "But what has caused you to make up your mind so early?"

Updated: Oct. 23, 2005 11:41 PM | Full story

Not an easy trek for 'boys on the bus'

Because of the national obsession with this year's Democratic primaries and caucuses, I've been been re-reading Timothy Crouse's "The Boys on the Bus," a compelling account of what life was like for the pack of political reporters who in 1972 trailed across America with the men who would be president. There is good writing here; on Page 1: "While reporters still snored like Hessians in a hundred beds throughout the hotel, the McGovern munchkins were at work, plying the halls, slipping legal-sized handouts through the cracks under the door ... According to one of these handouts, the Baptist Ministers' Union of Oakland had decided after 'prayerful and careful deliberation' to endorse Sen. McGovern."

Updated: Oct. 23, 2005 11:27 PM | Full story

After ice, I hold with those who favor fire

Finally, February folded. But cold memories of not only the "longest month" but the entire wicked winter linger on. Remember Robert Frost's dilemma?: Some say the world will end in fire,

Updated: Oct. 23, 2005 3:35 PM | Full story

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