By Bill Anderson

For those who are old enough to remember Al Capp’s “Li’l Abner” comic strip, today, Friday, November 2, is Sadie Hawkin’s Day, the one day in the year when it was permissible, at least in Li’l Abner’s home community of Dogpatch, for a spinster lady to run down and capture any bachelor she could lay her hands on and drag the hapless creature to the Finish Line where Marryin’ Sam, the local preacher, would pronounce them man and wife.  Times and customs have changed, but in this year, 2018, the national equivalent of Sadie Hawkin’s Day is Election Day, when it is not only legal, but encouraged, for any candidate to run down citizens and drag them to the polls to perform their patriotic duty. Thankfully, unlike Marryin’s Sam’s pronouncements of life sentences in Dogpatch, commitments made in a polling place or voting booth, like the promises of the candidates, are short term, for no more than 2, 4 or 6 years. Some of the promises don’t even make it past the vote counting.  Well, the election campaign of 2018 will be over when the polls close on the evening of Tuesday, November 6, and the election campaign of 2020 will begin at the same instant. In Sargent County, citizens have the ability to end the pursuit by utilizing Vote By Mail to mark their ballots at home and mailing them in to be counted; by voting early, prior to election day, at the Sargent County Courthouse in Forman; and, by casting their ballot on Election Day at the County’s centralized polling place at the Sargent County Courthouse in Forman. In Dogpatch, Li’l Abner’s mother, Mammy Yokum, was the undisputed boss, the power who settled disputes, righted wrongs and imposed order. When Mammy Yokum made her decision and laid down the law she concluded her pronouncement with, “I has spoken!” Every voter who casts their ballot in this election is entitled to quote Mammy Yokum, and there will be another chance to make a pronouncement in only 2 more years.

Rainfall has been scarce during the past week, but cool mornings and heavy dews have been no friends to those trying to harvest the 2018 soybean and corn crops. Thunder and lightning rolled through the area at about 6:30 in the evening on Saturday, October 27, and left behind just enough of a sprinkle to make the combines growl as they chewed through the soybean fields. Paul Anderson’s electronic rain gauge recorded.15 of an inch of precipitation on Sunday morning. The rain gauges of Norbert Kulzer and Roger Pearson have been retired for the season and will record exactly the same amount every morning from now until next Spring. Although most local producers are still concentrating on the soybean harvest, some corn has also been combined, and reports of both yield and quality indicate an excellent crop.