The small town my husband and I have chosen to adopt as our retirement community is one hopping place. Maybe it seems that way because the paper is only published weekly.

Nary a week goes by when a traffic death isn’t recorded on the front page. This week it was a house burning down. Last year it was a dog mauling death. A few weeks ago, it was a drowning from someone carried away in a low water crossing. And drugs. This place must be a major corridor for drug traffic, because someone is getting busted every week just because they’re driving through town.

My husband and I shake our heads at the juvenile/twenty-something young men who commit various acts of mischief. For instance, rural mailbox bashing. They may get away with it once or twice, but the cops catch them.  The cops seem to be real good.

A year or two ago they had a train derailment at the crossing on our paved road. Incredible response by all emergency personnel and the auxillaries.

This week’s paper seems to have more than the usual activity. The dog mauling trial is getting ready to start. A traffic stop netted the biggest drug bust in county history.

There’s a proposal before the County Commissioner’s Court to lease the old jail to the state for a sex offender rehabilitation facilty. While the idea of 35-40 sex offenders just off the town square makes my skin crawl, I also realize their rehabilitation needs to be done somewhere. The people will not be allowed to leave the facility. When they complete their term, the will be returned to the jurisdiction they came from. I sincerely hope the treatment will help them not commit sex offenses again. It would bring 15-20 jobs to the community. It’s not supposed to cost the community anything. In theory, it should be a good thing. This will be interesting to watch.

If that wasn’t enough news for the week, a drunk driver took out a power pole.  The lines were over the railroad tracks.   Somehow, even though the railroad said all trains were stopped, one came roaring through town before they could get the low-hanging power lines off the track. The train caught the lines and pulled them and everything in attached to them along with it until the lines snapped. What happens when lines under pressure snap? The whip back with a great deal of force. They were fortunate nobody was killed, but houses near that area were without power for 24 hours — some of them had the meters pulled off the side of their homes.

For a sleepy little small town, they sure have a lot going on.