I bought a 1970 Ford Maverick in 1979 from my half-sister, Bonni. You could start the car without a key, as something was wrong with the ignition switch.

In the summer of 1982, I was transferring from Ferris State to Central Michigan University, because I’d completed the associate’s program at FSU and wanted to go into a 4-year journalism and broadcasting programs at CMU.

There was a mandatory orientation in June ‘82 at CMU for students enrolling for the fall semester. I was staying at The Towers residence halls for three days. On the first night, I left the residence hall to visit a friend of mine who wrote for CM LIFE. When I got out to the parking lot, the car was gone. I phoned police. They confirmed the car was stolen and filled out a report.

I went back into the dorm in a rage. I anguished for about two hours, and finally said to myself, "Mount Pleasant’s a small town, maybe if I walk around town, I’ll see someone tooling around in my buggy." So, I walked out of the dorm, and right there at the front of the parking lot was my Maverick. I put my hand on the hood, and it was warm. I dared not go back inside to phone police, for fear the joy-riders might take it again.

So, I drove over to my friend’s apartment (Roger Hitts) and hung out there for a couple hours. I phoned police to let them know I’d found the vehicle. That night, I made sure to park far away from The Towers when I returned to the dorm, because I didn’t want the car ripped off again.

The next day, orientation ended, and I visited an old friend (Mary) in Big Rapids, about 40 miles away. Then, I got into the car and was going to head back home to Grand Rapids. As I was driving through downtown Big Rapids (a very tiny town), a police officer pulled me over. He approached the vehicle with a hand on his holster, and told me in a real nervous and demanding voice, "Get out!".

For a second, I thought, "this cop’s crazy. He might shoot me. What should I do? I’d better do what he says."

When I got out, he ordered me to walk towards the back of the car. "What’s wrong, officer?", I asked. "Do you know this car is stolen?", he replied. I didn’t know what to say. I looked at him, then the car, then him again.

Then it hit me. "Ohhhh. I know what happened," I said. "Last night at orientation at CMU, someone took my car for a joyride." The officer asked whether I’d reported it recovered, and to which police agency. "The Department of Public Safety at CMU," I said.

He got it all straightened out, and politely apologized for the confusion and his initial behavior. I was just relieved. "It’s okay," I said. "I understand where you were coming from. It appeared to be a stolen car."

Yeah, I remember that car well. I had one other interesting experience with it in March 1982 driving back from a Black Sabbath concert in Saginaw. I was actually on M-20 between Mt. Pleasant and Big Rapids in 15-degree, snowy weather when it ran out of gas. Pretty much in the middle of nowhere, around 1 a.m. I thought we (Kelly, Rich and myself) were going to freeze to death. I stood in the middle of the road to flag down the driver of a pickup, who darn near hit me. But it got us a ride back to FSU. I got the car towed back to campus the next day.

I couldn’t figure out why it had run out of gas, as I’d filled it up before the trip back to campus after the concert. Later, I discovered that it had a fuel leak. Believe it or not, the fuel line was visible running through the trunk of the car! That’s the way they actually made those Mavericks. The sleeve on it had worked loose, and simply needed to be tightened by hand.

Hey, what’s Kerm’s photo doing up there? Ha!

Most charities line the pockets of their well-to-do directors first, and save the crumbs for the masses. But even that little piece of cheese would be removed Grinch-style, if they could get away with it.

I’m happy my contributions to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital help a tiny tad. The cure-rate for heretofore "deadly" cancers for kids has climbed extraordinarily high over the decades - solid proof that a great job is being done there.

I occasionally kick in some cash to a food pantry, too, to feed the hungry. I’m confident that’s helping.

One of my pet peeves, though, are all the 1-800-toll free "religious" groups shucking for money. There’s no way to know where a lot of that money is going. Cheers.

Record (digital or tape) the illicit conversations, so you can document the evidence - in court, in case you’re fired.

Ferris State’s in Big Rapids. Western Michigan University is in Kalamazoo. I went to Ferris State and Central Michigan (Mount Pleasant).

That’s interesting about your grandmother. Yep, it was called Ferris State College when I was there.

I remember when we got word-processing computers at a radio station I worked at in Kalamazoo around 1992. We thought we were finally going "high tech", because we didn’t have to use typewriters, anymore.

One thing I remember about typewriters was having to use carbon paper. That could be a real chore. For the college newspapers I wrote for back in the early- to mid-1980’s, they needed two copies of every story written. One of them the editors used to make editing marks, this type of thing. Also, everything was written double-spaced, to leave room for editing marks, cutting and pasting (scissors!).

 As managing editor for The Ferris Torch, it often required major surgery to put all of the necessary editing marks on a reporter’s copy or cut things up. That was mostly with the rookies. At the print shop, those edited stories had to be re-typed and printed out a special type of laminate paper that was now "camera ready" (to be sent to the big printer). Then they were run through a pasting machine so they could be pasted onto light tables. The copy was a lot bigger than a regular newspaper page on the light table. One or two pages for each table, with a series of tables around the room. A special pen whose ink would not show up in the next day’s newspaper was used to make editing or proofing marks at that point. The copy where proofreading marks were necessary was then cut with a razor blade, removed from the table and re-typed, re-pasted, and laid back onto the lighting table.

Nowadays, all of that can be done on a computer. No need for razor blades, paste, cameras, any of it.

When I wrote for The Grand Rapids Press in 1985-‘86, we stringer-reporters all had to buy TRS-80 Radio Shack computers. The thing looked like an over-sized calculator. It was flat (no raised screen), and the screen was dot-matrix. It did have a nice keypad, though. Funny story: around 2002 I was in the press box for a Grand Valley State football game, and ran into a G.R. Press reporter who was still using the TRS-80. Now, this computer had about 8k (8-thousand bytes) memory, 16k for the best models, so it could only store about 8 to 12 pages of written copy. I asked the reporter, "Why in the world are you using a TRS-80, when the laptops today have millions of bytes of RAM (memory)?!"  His reply? "This computer never freezes up. I need a computer that I know I can write and send my stories from right after the game."

Thanks, Sharon. I’m touched by your memory of your husband. Radio is truly a unique entity in that it is, potentially, the best vehicle for breaking news. TV and the Internet sometimes are, but a good news department is one of the elements that made radio grand back in the day.

 Fortunately, I sense that the good old days could be returning to some small degree in radio. People are sick of hearing "Stairway to Heaven" and what-not 500 times a week on the FM dial, not to mention the non-stop commercials. One of the prime reasons that radio conglomerates are going bankrupt and belly-up — beyond the sour economy  —  is that people can now get most of their music needs met online, or through iPOD’s and other technology. So, how can radio survive? Answer: by going back to a local emphasis. Local news, local talk. I even think there could be a future niche for old-time type of radio plays.

Radio has been dead for so many decades in so many respects that most people, including radio-station owners and managers, don’t even know what a grand thing it once was - and could be again.