A couple weeks ago, I was at the office on Sunday afternoon when I received the most peculiar phone call. A gentleman, who I instantly noticed had an accent that was far from that of any of my friends and neighbors, out of the blue, started yelling at me as soon as I picked up the phone.

Labor Day is an opportunity to acknowledge and show appreciation for the contributions of the American workforce. Unfortunately, American workers don’t have much to celebrate this Labor Day. According to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 1.2 million workers have been unemployed for twenty-seven weeks or more. Some 5.2 million workers across the United States are “not in the labor force who currently want a job.” Real wages have decreased four percent since President Biden took office, overall prices are up over sixteen percent, and interest rates are soaring. This is the reality families everywhere are faced with as the Biden administration touts “Bidenomics.” No wonder a recent CNN poll found the majority of Americans are feeling pessimistic about the economy.

Early last month, I was at a party with some friends, when one of them had to excuse themselves. They had gotten a phone call, and their cows were out.

A couple of weeks ago, a brown patch started to show up in the middle of my front yard. Ample rain this summer, and relatively little trouble with sprinklers, had kept my yard green and lush all year.

We should know soon if a group called Support Our Schools Nebraska was successful in gathering enough petition signatures to allow voters to decide the fate of the Opportunity Scholarship Act passed by the Legislature in its tumultuous session.

Over the years, I have written a lot of unique stories. However, on Friday evening, I believe I was confronted with writing one of the most unexpected and toughest stories of my career.

In May, ten Nebraska State Patrol troopers went to Texas for two weeks to help with drone surveillance of the border with Mexico. Recently, sixty Nebraska National Guard members went to Texas for a month for a similar assignment.

It is such a nuisance that there have been entire plot lines in sitcoms about it. There has been advertising created for it.

As the youngest of four children, you would think I would be the black sheep of the family. Well, in some regards you would be right.