Wilson Post Blogs

If questions cost a nickle, I could buy enough bird seed to get me through winter. Everyone have been asking me, where are the Hummers hiding? Finally after what seems like an eternity, some are starting to show up at my feeders. I am not sure what caused the birds to be as scarce as they have been, but the weather had to take part of the blame. You would think that heat would be no problem, since most of our Hummers spend the winter months down in South America. I'm told you can walk into the jungle canopy for one minute and then you can take off your shirt and wring water from it.

Today after church, one of my newer bird friends was telling me about her three Hummingbird feeders staying busy. Felicia Drake, who lives out the Old Hunters Point Pike, has what must seem a complete plethora of wild birds. One of her shepherd hooks supports a bird feeder that sits just off the ground, where a flock of Wild Turkeys can take advantage of it.

I've never heard this before, but someone told Felicia that if you sprayed Pam, the non-stick cooking spray, on your Hummer feeder that it would keep wasps away. Just maybe, it would make the surface to slick to hold on to. I wonder which flavor works best!

By JOE BIDDLE

Titans Coach Mike Munchak is enjoying his favorite part of the NFL calendar.

Don’t bother to hazard a guess as to Munchak’s choice.

You won’t get it.

It’s the first 10 days of training camp. Huh? This guy has been involved in 30 NFL training camps. He was a Hall of Fame offensive lineman for the Houston Oilers. He hung up the cleats and became an assistant coach for the Oilers/Titans.

Munchak is in his second season as Titans head coach. Although NFL training camps have changed dramatically in recent years, Munchak holds firm that it’s the first 10 days that give him the most satisfaction and joy.

Why? It’s all about football. Teaching football. Teaching technique. Watching his team take shape, forming what will be its identity.

Mike Munchak is first and foremost a teacher. His classroom is the football field.

“Really, it’s the first 10 days for me because there are no games to be played,’’ Munchak said on the eve of training camp 2012.

By BECKY ANDREWS
Wilson Living Magazine

There seems to be an epidemic going around. It’s an epidemic that involves our children. I noticed something off in my own household a few years ago during a school break. After a few days of hanging out at home I was going stir crazy. When I suggested we go to a movie or ‘ANYTHING you want to do’ their response was confusing.

“We don’t wanna go anywhere.”

“Are you sure?  We can do whatever you want. What about the batting cages? Or Target? Chuck E. Cheese?”  I was desperate. There’s only one mouse I hate more than the one who resides at the happiest place on earth and his name is ‘Chuck E. Cheese’. The unsupervised children, the ‘prizes’, the bacterium filled pool of filth or ‘ball pit’, it was more than I cared to experience, but I was determined to get the kids out of the house.

“We just want to stay home.”

Who were these kids? When I was growing up and the opportunity to leave the house arose, it was a death race between my brothers and sisters to see who could get to the car first and win the coveted front seat.

It leaves the plateau. Not in a rush or even a long, slow glide as the interstate highway does. It leaves in little jerks, jumps, and twitches, as a deer would leave the plateau. Later it begins to glide as it winds through the hills.

On sunny days, as the sun tops the rim and tendrils of smoky sunlight filter through the hardwood leaves and glance off the water, it winks and smiles. It seems as though it is always looking back at you and watching as you sight it through the trees. It talks to you.

By Angel Kane
Wilson Living Magazine

One Thousand Three Hundred Twenty Hours...(this is how long my kids have been out of school.)

One Hundred Sixty Eight Hours…(until peace is restored to my life!)

The countdown has begun in the Kane household and Brody and I are thrilled, thrilled, thrilled that in one short week, our lovely, adorable children will be back in school.

Don’t get me wrong, who doesn’t love driving kids around all day long between work, tennis camp, soccer camp, art camp, Wendy’s and the pool?

But all good things come to an end and the end, my friends, is in sight!

Dear Ken: When does the animated movie “Hotel Transylvania” open at theaters and who are some of the voice stars?

The film opens Sept. 21 and is set at a resort run be Dracula where monsters go to get away from it all. The plot involves a normal kid who flips for Drac’s daughter. The voices include Adam Sandler as Dracula, Kevin James as Frankenstein, David Spade as the Invisible Man, Jon Lovitz as Quasimodo and Cee-Lo as the Mummy. Other star voices include Selena Gomez, Steve Buscemi, Andy Samberg and Molly Shannon. 

Dear Ken: In what town did Robert Redford direct “The Milagro Beanfield War”? I love that movie and would like to visit the location.

The 1988 film was shot in Truchas, N.M., a town halfway between Santa Fe and Taos, N.M.

The NCAA dropped the hammer on Penn State football this week.

The sanctions will cripple the football program for at least 10 years.

Everything the late Joe Paterno built came crumbling down. His statue at Beaver Stadium was dismantled and hauled away.

If only Paterno and those above him had taken a stand. If only they had moved to stop former assistant coach Jerry Sandusky, a convicted sexual predator whose victims were young boys from broken homes.

While the 68-year-old Sandusky will live out his life in prison, his victims are burdened with the stigma he caused forever.

Hindsight being 20/20, Paterno should have acted on evidence that Sandusky was involved in a sordid world of child sexual abuse.

Instead, he ignored it as he and Penn State administrators tried to cover it up. Their wrongful decisions cost the university dearly. They will spend years digging out from under the NCAA punishment.

So how will Paterno be remembered? Those close to Penn State will look at all the good things Paterno did while becoming an icon who grew larger than the university.

Paterno wielded more power than anyone on campus and arguably anyone in the state. What Joe said was the final word.

Few will now recognize him as college football’s winningest coach. The NCAA stripped the school and thus Paterno of all football victories compiled from 1988 through 2011.

For Paterno, that meant striking 111 of his wins from the record. It dropped him to fifth on the FBS list, eighth overall – from 409 wins to 298. It put retired Florida State football coach Bobby Bowden atop FBS coaches.

Paterno’s legacy has been damaged forever. All the good he did was negated by what he refused to do to --  stop a heinous assistant coach on his staff from molesting young boys on the Penn State campus and in his home.

Blind loyalty, that old school male bonding between football coaches, cost Paterno his place in college football history.

South Carolina football coach Steve Spurrier got to know Paterno when their teams met in a bowl game. Before the game, Spurrier asked Paterno if he would have his picture taken with him. Paterno readily agreed.

Spurrier placed that picture in his den. Paterno was the first person Spurrier has ever asked to pose for a picture.

Paterno influenced hundreds of coaches in the profession. He ran a clean program. He disciplined his players when they crossed a line. He was for everything decent in college athletics. But when it came to making the most difficult decision of his life, Joe Paterno went against all he believed in. He tried to hide from the truth, hoping it would all go away.

In doing so, Paterno ruined his reputation. He helped put his beloved football program and his school in NCAA hell.

Football at Penn State will never be the same, and maybe that’s a good thing. As NCAA President Dr. Mark Emmert said Monday, the culture surrounding elite college football programs has to be changed.

It’s too late for Joe Paterno and Penn State. Years of civil and criminal trials are on the horizon. Yes, some of the victims who face NCAA sanctions are blameless.

The players weren’t aware of Sandusky and his demented acts.

But Joe Paterno knew enough to act on what he had been told. Alas, he chose not to.

Contact Sports Columnist Joe Biddle at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .  

Some of you might wonder why in the world I put my mailing address at the bottom of my bird articles. Even in this fast-paced world of computers and 4G gadgets, there is still several people that choose not to partake in this scientific bliss. If there were not any alternative methods of communication, besides e-mail, I would lose out on close to 1/4 of my readers.

I received a very nice card from Mary Nixon, who resides in Hickman, Tennessee, who wanted to share with me some of the critters and our feathered friends that reside at her home. My favorite part of her message had to do with a snake that was heading toward the house, until a Mockingbird drew the line in communal friendship. The Mocker must have been very brave as it actually chased the snake away. Some birds have been known to attack snakes that seem to be climbing toward their nest by pecking it on the head repeatedly. Mary said that the snake was, "moving on," sounds like an old Hank Snow song.

I was out in the back yard next to my Bluebird house when I noticed that the Bluebirds were raising their 4th brood. It seems that the strange early spring must have really messed with the Bluebird's hormones, and jump-started them into nesting over and over. This pair has already fledged twelve babies from this one house. It is in a better location than last year’s nest as it is out of sight of my house and the only times that they were disturbed was when I sat out back watching the Tree Swallows.

By PATRICK HALL
The Wilson Post

Director and co-writer Christopher Nolan concludes his Batman trilogy with a finale that maybe falls short of masterpiece “The Dark Knight” but delivers such an outstanding conclusion, it’s only fault is being less-than perfect.

In “The Dark Knight Rises,” which picks up eight years after 2008’s “Dark Knight,” Gotham City is without organized crime and believes Batman responsible for District Attorney Harvey Dent’s (Aaron Eckhart) death.

Thus Bruce Wayne (Christian Bale) is a recluse in his mansion, visibly incapable of adjusting to a life without Batman. Trouble brews as the unstoppable mercenary Bane (Tom Hardy) moves in with an elaborate plot to turn Gotham into a chaotic mob-rule “society.”

At almost 3 hours long, “Rises” begins with scenes that jump around introducing Bane, new gung-ho Gotham Police officer John Blake (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) the mysterious "cat burglar" Selina Kyle (Anne Hathaway), businesswoman Miranda Tate (Marian Cotillard) and the usual suspects we already know: butler Alfred (Michael Cane) and Police Commissioner Jim Gordon (Gary Oldman).

Friday marks the completion of director Christopher Nolan’s trilogy of Batman films with “The Dark Knight Rises” and his first two installments look at real world terrorism, the pursuit of bringing them to justice, and whether sacrificing an ethical code in the process is justifiable.

Since the start in 2005, with “Batman Begins,” Nolan has set Bruce Wayne/Batman (Christian Bale) against villains and their schemes that are reminiscent of real world terrorism.

Plots by villains in the films include bioterrorism in “Begins” to blowing up buildings, using suicide bombers and holding large passenger ferries hostage with bombs, in “The Dark Knight.”

Following 9/11, anthrax attacks killed five people and infected 22, terror suspects were arrested in Denver for attempting to poison water supplies and terrorists have been using suicide bombers and blowing up buildings for decades. Nolan's films ask the tough question of whether unethical means are allowable when hunting down such evil individuals.

In upcoming “The Dark Knight Rises,” the villain Bane (Tom Hardy) exploits a more recent fear, economic ruin by attacking a stock exchange. He’s also seen blowing up a football stadium and assuredly creates even more death and destruction.

The terrorist villains possess goals ranging from lofty ideologies to the simple desire for wanton destruction and societal decay. “Begins” villain Ra’s Al Ghul (Liam Neeson) wanted to destroy Gotham City using a massive biological attack, while “Dark Knight” villain the Joker (Heath Ledger) was out to show how inadequate authorities are in dealing with terrorism given the lawful and ethical boundaries they must operate within.

It is really nice to have Carole Young back where she belongs. We missed her very much as she tried her hand at living in East Tennessee, but she decided that she belonged here around us. Me and her friend, Maggie Whiteaker, were invited to a hamburger dinner this past Friday out to Carole's home.

She pretty well lives in a heavily wooded area and you know what that means, Birds and other wildlife. A virtual plethora of things that I enjoy watching. Her property has a large field where you can find Bob White Quail, another species that is getting lost in this ever growing need for people to move out into the country. One of these days, we will have to go out farther into the wilds to enjoy the familiar whistled call, "Bob White!" 

As we made the trip down her driveway, which has washed out with all the rain and looks like a war zone, there were numerous species that followed us to the house. Field Sparrows and Indigo Buntings escorted our hungry group down all the way to the small "crick," which is northern for creek, where the woods begin.

Dear Ken: Where is Noomi Rapace, who plays the archaeologist in “Prometheus,” from?

Rapace, 32, was born in Sweden. Her mother is a Swedish actress and her late father was a Spanish flamenco singer. She moved to Iceland at 5 where she made her first movie at 7 before moving back to Sweden at 9. Since 2009, she starred in “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo,” “The Girl Who Played With Fire,” “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest” and “Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows.” The latter was the first film in which she speaks in English. Divorced, she has an 8-year-old son.

If you are like most college football fans, you take your favorite team’s upcoming schedule and go down the list.

You give out wins, losses and tossups and total them up for a best case-worse case scenario for your team. It’s a great way to pass the time before that first kickoff and the season starts to roll downhill.

BeyondTheBets.com is one of several on-line sites that provide projections and let you decide.

There has been a lot of chatter among Tennessee fans as to how many wins Coach Derek Dooley needs to save his job.

Certainly current Athletics Director Dave Hart has given no indication as to what that number is, or if he even has a number.

One thing for sure: Dave Hart is looking for improvement in all aspects of the program and winning games is the best defense Dooley has.

Beyond The Bets has Tennessee’s line at 7½ wins. Which side of the fence do you see the Vols on?

Let’s play the games on paper, admittedly a risky proposition.

The Vols need to get out of the gate with a win and it won’t come easy against N.C. State in the Georgia Dome. I think this game is a must win if the Vols are going to have a solid season. A tossup.

They have three pastry opponents including Georgia State, coached by Bill Curry. The program is still in its infancy and the Vols won’t stumble here.

Akron and Troy are must wins. I wonder how full Neyland Stadium will be for these three games?

Now, let’s get to the meat of the schedule.

After Georgia State, Florida comes to town. Will Muschamp is feeling the heat in Gainesville. In a Knoxville New-Sentinel poll as to which SEC coach’s seat is the hottest, Dooley gathered 66 percent of more than 2,000 voters. Muschamp was a distant second at 17 percent with Kentucky’s Joker Phillips at 11 percent.

Florida is a swing game, one Dooley has to win to convince Hart there is progress being made. I think the Vols outscore the Gators and keep hope alive.

After Akron, the Vols go Between the Hedges, a place Dooley became most familiar with during the years his father, Vince, coached the Dawgs.

It’s another swing game, one I believe the Vols will lose.

After an open date, the Vols stay on the road at Mississippi State. This is a must win for both programs -- one I think the Vols will find a way to win.

Next up is defending national champion Alabama in Knoxville. Won’t be a fun time in K-town. Tide rolls.

A trip to South Carolina is no place to lick your wounds. The Gamecocks won 11 games last year for the first time in school history. Vols lose here.

Now it gets easier. After Troy, the Vols welcome SEC newcomer Missouri. Vols show the Tigers what it’s all about.

A trip to Vanderbilt should be a pivotal game for both programs and how long has it been since anyone said that? The Commodores couldn’t find a way to beat what was arguably the worst Tennessee team they will play, but this one is a tossup.

The Vols finish with a win against Kentucky.

I have them winning seven games, with N.C. State and Vanderbilt as tossups.

I predict they will split those games, giving them an 8-4 season and a bowl invitation. Dooley survives.

Contact Sports Columnist Joe Biddle at  This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

We should be catching a break this week on these extreme high temperatures. It seems that every day for the past week has been in the 100s, and now the humidity is so high you can chew it. I am in hopes that this year at the Wilson County Fair it will not get as hot as it did several years ago

I took a side trip out to the blown out bridge on South Dickerson Chapel Road this past Friday, and every few yards had an Indigo Bunting singing its little heart out. They must be one of the most prolific birds in the county. I wanted to get some pictures from there to go on my facebook to share with my friends that subscribe to "If you grew up in Lebanon, you remember" page. An old friend, BC Yahola, is on there and we try to share photos and our memories with all the others. Check it out.

Of all the birds here on my side of the road, there is one who stands out with his singing. It lives across the street where Holly Boyd resides with her husband, David, and two children, Ayla and Atticus. Their back yard is fenced in with lots of plants growing there. That makes her back yard a paradise for a Song Sparrow. Sometimes it will visit me to feed on the ground where I toss out mixed seed for my ground scratchers.

By ANGEL KANE
Wilson Living Magazine

The first words out of Neill’s mouth when we hit the beach were, “Nikoli, do you want to dig a hole?”

And so it went for a solid week. Each morning my youngest would rise and his day would go something like this.

Get up whenever he naturally awoke.

Breakfast was served to the little master. His only decision being, would it be Cocoa Puffs or eggs and bacon?

Decisions, decisions.

Immediately thereafter, he would put on his swim trunks and grab a newly washed and dried beach towel and would race out the door to the beach.

There he would find waiting, just for him… chairs, umbrella, pale, shovel, kite and a boogie board. Together with his friends he’d spend hours and hours… digging a hole, running into the surf, catching a few waves and then back to… digging a hole.

Texas A&M and Missouri officially became new members of the Southeastern Conference on July 1.

Their real induction comes next week when they join 12 other teams, each represented by their head football coaches and three players at the annual SEC Football Media Days in Birmingham.

I was there the day then-SEC Commissioner Roy Kramer welcomed Arkansas and South Carolina to the conference in 1992.

I had known and covered Kramer during his days as Vanderbilt’s athletics director. But the day he wore a large plastic Razorback snout on his head, was indeed groundbreaking.

It was totally out of character for Kramer, who was always dignified in his role at Vanderbilt and as the SEC’s commissioner.

Perhaps it’s too early for a reboot of the Spider-Man franchise, which Sony began in 2002 with “Spider-Man,” but the restart with “The Amazing Spider-Man” features a side of Peter Parker that’s welcome and more interesting, making his web-slinging hero side, that much more powerful.

Sony went back to square-one with ‘Amazing,’ starting with Peter Parker, played by Andrew Garfield, watching his scientist father and his mother leave unexpectedly. Peter grows up with his Aunt May (Sally Field) and Uncle Ben (Martin Sheen).

Peter meets a scientist, Dr. Curt Connors (Rhys Ifans), who worked with Peter’s father Richard on cross-genetic research. He also develops a friendship and love interest in Gwen Stacy, played by Emma Stone.

But when Connors uses a revolutionary serum that he and Peter co-create to repair his amputated right arm, using reptile DNA, the good doctor turns into a misguided monster, “The Lizard.”

The film separates itself well from the previous trilogy, showing a more troubled Peter Parker than before. While Tobey Maguire’s Parker was smitten by his love interest, he isn’t necessarily displayed as a teen struggling with the obvious issues that would come along from losing his parents so early.

Last Sunday, our church family hung around talking about this and that after a great service. My old bowling partner, Anthony Walker, started asking about how the birds in my life were doing and when will I write about the Belted Kingfisher. It’s strange that almost everyone that has anything to say to me always gets around to asking me something about birds.

Many years ago an old friend, Neal Blackburn, photographer for The Lebanon Democrat, pinned the name "Birdman" on me as I was taking pictures for the articles in the "About Birds" featured each week in their newspaper. I'm not sure if he knew my real name, but he taught me quite a bit about taking pictures and developing my own negatives and prints. Barbara Manners also started calling me her “Bird Guru” which Karen Franklin picked up real quickly. That is quite a reputation for me to live up to.

For the first time in Vanderbilt basketball history, the Commodores saw two players taken in the first round of the NBA Draft.

John Jenkins went No. 23, to the Atlanta Hawks. Festus Ezeli was the last first round player taken, No. 30 by Golden State. The Commodores could have made it three, but Jeffery Taylor was the first player taken in the second round.

The only draft picks to get guaranteed money are first rounders. Those in the second round start their NBA careers behind the 8-ball, as their teams don’t have significant money invested in them.

Prior to Jenkins and Ezeli, the Commodores have had only three first round picks, dating back to the first year of the draft, 1957.