By Roger Bluhm, Publisher 

I refuse to ever get sick again.Not because I’m afraid of illness, but I’ve suddenly become very frightened of medicines. Let me explain.I spent much of last weekend fighting the flu – much like a lot of you around the area have lately – and when having that much time on your hands and not wanting to make the headache worse by reading or being on the Internet, I watched a lot of television.Do you know how many prescription medicines are advertising? They all say the same thing, “Ask your doctor about (insert brand name medicine here).”Of course, it’s not the ailment that worries me, it’s the side effects that come with the medicine you take for the ailments.The announcer often states that “side effects are often mild and may include” and then the next words are frightful. I’m positive I heard such side effects as eyeballs popping from sockets, the inability to hold your head up, uncontrollable sneezing, male pattern baldness for women, menopause for men, reverse growth of fingernails and athlete’s foot.
It seems the cure may kill us. I’d rather keep the headache, thanks.
At what time did our government start approving medicines with such a long list of horrible side effects? And since when is male pattern baldness in women a MILD side effect? I’m convinced I got over the flu faster because I was afraid to stay sick. I know one thing, I’m not asking my doctor about any medicine – for any condition – if the side effects are worse than the ailment I have.
I had to laugh when other commercials came on. Viagra – and we all know what that is for – warns if things last for more than four hours to see a doctor immediately. So, in other words, if the little blue pill works too well? The other warning is even better. It tells the potential user to make sure they are healthy enough to have sex before using Viagra.
Maybe it’s just me, but wouldn’t that make a heck of a CSI episode? “Death by Viagra” would center on just which one of the suspected ladies convinced the man with the heart condition to swallow a Viagra and risk death for some fun. I can almost hear the barrage of bad puns already.
Let me comment on one other thing I got from being sick, including a couple of days off from work. Now some folks are going to get mad when I say this, but it has to be said. Soap operas are the worst things on TV. I’m serious. Plot lines that take eight months to move in a direction, women and men on the shows who change husbands and wives every six months or so, kidnap and murder plots that are so far-fetched even Tom & Jerry or the Road Runner and Wily Coyote would scratch their heads in confusion.
After a short time of listening to my wife explain each character, whom they had been with, what they were doing and whether they were a good or bad person on the show, I decided a nap was much more prudent that trying to digest whatever it was she told me.
I lay down, but couldn’t sleep. I considered a sleep aid, but after listening to a long list of side effects from medicines, I decided the best course of action was simply to go take a shower, proclaim myself well and do something else – anything else.
So, I went to look up truth on the Internet.
I know, it sounds far-fetched. But, if I’m going to consider putting something in my body that can cause my eye-balls to pop out of my head, I have to then believe something I read on the Internet.
After all, I’ve already made the leap to gullible, haven’t

Bluhm is publisher of the Times-Record.

By Dennis Stillings 

One of the great advantages of having two nine-hole golf courses located across town from each other is that, when one wishes to play 18 holes, one can finish nine, then take a brisk, healthy walk (with bag) to the other course to finish up. Why this has not caught on, I cannot imagine.  
    Too many other towns have blundered ahead, putting both nines together and thereby depriving the local golfer not only of salutary exercise, but the chance to stop by and visit a neighbor or two, or perhaps get a haircut.
    But I digress.
    The main topic of today’s column is the Bjornson Park Public Golf Course. I played this course within a year or two after it was completed and was favorably impressed.
    It is by no means a championship layout, but it is definitely “sporty,” as they say.  The first hole is excellent, and would rank high on just about any links. The first time I played the second hole (from the tips) I birdied it with a three-wood and a five-footer, so I have fond memories of that one. The rest of the holes all have a definite character; the fourth and ninth are outstanding.
    Another important virtue of Bjornson’s is that it makes good use of the river. The course and the park itself represent one of the few attractive recreational river settings unblighted by FEMA.
    What is truly great, however, is the condition of the course. I have played a few pretty good golf courses (Whistling Straits, Black Wolf Run, Winged Foot, Kapalua, and Interlachen, to name a few) and the condition of Bjornson’s fairways and greens at their best (or maybe even at their second-best) would match any of them.  I remember playing a scramble at Bjornson’s when the greens must have stimped at about 25, yet they were flawless.
    Now I must embarrass myself. About eight or 10 years ago, I was reading a golf sportswriter’s account of his tour of famous golf courses around the country.  The embarrassing part is that I cannot remember the name of the author or the book. In any case, this fellow started out playing at the Harbour Town Golf Links, traveled through the South and Southwest playing, I believe, Hogan’s home course in Ft. Worth and Southern Hills in Tulsa. He played up the coast of California at such venues as Pebble Beach and Spyglass, then went on to Seattle to finish up the tour.
Heading back east from Seattle (I believe he was from New York), the writer connected to I-94 at Billings and took this road across North Dakota, finally reaching Valley City.
    He did not intend to stop anywhere to play golf on his way back. Bjornson’s, however, caught his eye, and he tried it out. He thoroughly enjoyed himself. I sent a photocopy of what he wrote about the course to Bjornson’s and, I believe, to the Times-Record as well.
    I guess the moral of the story is that Bjornson’s is in a location that can be exploited a lot more than it is. It could be expanded to 18 holes, and serious golfers would come off  I-94 to play it. I know that I would. A decent restaurant with beer and wine would not hurt either. The Peanut Bar looks like it could be the perfect place.
    Of course, making Bjornson’s an 18-hole course does not mean that golfers should forego the excellent added exercise of walking across town to do another nine.

Roger Bluhm’s cri de coeur—the search for
a golf partner
    
    I would be happy to volunteer as a partner in Roger’s 2008 golf adventure season. Here are the possible pluses and minuses.
    1. I have been known to cuss.  I start out with “Gol durn the dash-blasted blankety heck” and from there it gets worse, if you can imagine that.
    2. For health reasons, I do not drink or smoke—well, maybe the very occasional small cigar.
    3. I do not react well to slow play.
    4. While not adverse to the occasional 18-in. “gimme” under informal conditions of play, I am not amused by gross rule-breaking: no mulligan on the first tee unless you didn’t get to warm up on the driving range.
    5. In my experience, most scratch golfers ( I have played to a 2-handicap) rarely comment on the swing of a 20-handicapper without being asked. There is nothing to be done once out on the course.  Often, however, it is the 20-to-30-handicapper who, for some perverse reason, feels free to make bonehead comments on the swing of the single-digit player. (“You looked up!” “You’re trying to kill it!”  “Not enough wrist!”)
    6. I live 15 miles out of town, so I have to plan my golf excursions. I probably need a regular tee time as an incentive.
    7. Having become mildly addicted to championship 18-hole golf courses, I have a big interest in hitting some of the great N.D. courses such as Bully Pulpit, Red Mike, Hawktree, and Kings’ Walk.  The Jamestown courses are not bad, either. There are, however, some great nine-holers around, if they aren’t flooded: Lisbon, Gackle and Grand Rapids can be great fun.
    8. If I am set to play a great golf course in good weather, not only will I skip NFL games and forgo fishing, I will even pass over watching Tiger Woods play in a major championship. I will, however, tape it.
    9. Tournaments in North Dakota can be huge fun. I would just as soon spend the summer playing scrambles around the state.
    So, Roger, I’ll be by for our mutual interview.

By Carla Kelly 

It occurred to me after last week’s column on the history of bathing that there might be readers who wonder why I read such weird stuff.
Perhaps I have a trivial mind that is as interested in road food as in the Weightier Subjects of Our Age - You know, books that look good on a coffee table when we’re trying to impress house guests. I mean, besides my sister Karen, has anyone ever read Stephen Hawkings’ A Brief History of Time?  A lot of folks must have bought it because it was on the best seller list for quite a while, but did they read it?  
As a professional writer, I operate on the you-never-know-when-you’ll-need-it theory. A few years ago, I bought a book called Rough Medicine: Surgeons at Sea in the Age of Sail. I didn’t read it at the time. It went to the shelf and waited patiently for four years. It’s been joined by two books on scurvy; the excellent Medicine under Sail; and Men of Steel: Surgery in the Napoleonic Wars.
“Men of Steel” is written by a surgeon who isn’t much of a writer, but his information is priceless. And oh, the gruesome pictures of surgery, and almost scarier, the surgical instruments of 200 years ago. I think even Hannibal Lector would turn green. There are others, but these are the ones I’m referring to now, as I write.
It helps to save research papers, too. Years ago in graduate school, I came across a fascinating account of a Union soldier wounded in the Battle of Stones River near Murfreesboro, Tenn. He lived to tell the tale of his serious neck wound, lying on the battlefield, rescue to an aid station, time in a regimental hospital, and recuperation in a general hospital. I wrote a paper for class, then expanded on it for another presentation a few years ago at a Northern Great Plains History Conference in Sioux Falls, S.D.
I used the paper again last week, because that neck wound has come in handy in my current manuscript. The victim this time is a sailor in the Channel Fleet in 1809. I kept all that Civil War research, and have now applied it to the Napoleonic Wars, because hey, a neck’s a neck.
A few years ago I was second historian on a massive research project involving Fort Buford. The best records were kept by the various post surgeons, so I mined them like they were gold. My previous knowledge of 19th century medicine helped a lot then, and it still does, as I continue to write fiction. It’s safe to say I own one of the best 19th century medical libraries around.
What this has led to is a huge respect for those doctors. Even with their strange ideas about noxious odors being the principal transmitter of disease, and, earlier, the importance of balancing body humours, these men cared. They cut and bled and cupped to the best of their limited knowledge.
Since I am writing now of the era right before the widespread use of anesthesia, I’m hugely impressed with the surgeons’ abilities to amputate rapidly, and spare their patients as much pain as possible during procedures that must have been excruciating.
Some of their patients wrote later of what it was like to lose a leg without benefit of anesthesia. In our pampered age, it’s difficult reading.   
I keep learning. The above is not recreational reading, by any means. I do it to make my novels accurate. Reading for fun often takes me to World War II. Recently, I read about the German army’s attempt to capture Moscow, and how the Wehrmacht launched itself at the Soviet Union on the same day when Napoleon, 129 years earlier, began his own ill-fated campaign to occupy Russia.
The results were the same: Soldiers froze to death in the snow, unable to defeat General Winter.
Why read this morbid stuff? Historians should be experts in the study of human nature, because we see people through the ages at their best and worst. Some – most, I think -develop vast appreciation for the resiliency of mankind. Historians Will and Ariel Durant expressed it well: “In life and in history, we have found so many good men and women that we have quite lost faith in the wickedness of mankind.”
I feel that way, too. I’ve learned a lot from my weird and wonderful books, but even more from people.

By Katie Hajicek
Extension Agent

Do you think you might have a few pounds to lose?
Here’s the good news: Being healthy isn’t necessarily about losing weight. Taking small steps toward a healthier diet and lifestyle can result in heart health benefits.
You may not need to lose as much weight as you might think to get heart benefits. Some people, especially those with high blood pressure, may benefit from small reductions in weight. Losing as little as 10 pounds can lower blood pressure, research shows. People who are overweight and have high blood pressure achieve the most health benefits from moderate weight loss.
Eating at least three 1-ounce servings a day of whole grains may help with weight management. Whole grains are high in fiber, so eating whole-grain foods makes you feel full faster and satisfied longer.
To spot whole grains, look for foods that name one of the following first on the label’s ingredient list:
* Brown rice
* Bulgur (cracked wheat)
* Oatmeal
* Whole-grain corn
* Whole oats
* Whole rye
* Whole wheat
The Food and Drug Administration allows certain food products to carry health claims. Look for the whole-grain health claim: “Diets rich in whole-grain foods and other plant foods and low in total fat, saturated fat and cholesterol may help reduce the risk of heart disease and certain cancers.”
To increase fiber in your diet, use the Nutrition Facts labels on food and choose products with a higher Percent Daily Value for fiber. Also visit www.MyPyramid.gov and learn about ways to add more whole grains and fiber to your diet. My Pyramid has new guidelines and valuable tips for weight management and making healthy food choices.
Celebrate with this heart-healthy dessert featuring Golden Delicious apples, yams and walnuts:

Golden Apples and yams
2 yams (large) or sweet potatoes
2 Golden Delicious apples, cored and sliced crosswise into rings 1/4 c. firmly packed brown sugar
1 tsp. cornstarch
1/8 tsp. ground cloves
1/2 c. orange juice
2 Tbsp. walnuts

Heat oven to 400 F. Bake yams 50 minutes or until soft, but they still retain shape. (This also can be done in the microwave.) Cool yams until they can be handled. Reduce oven to 350 F. Peel and slice yams crosswise. Place in shallow 1-quart baking dish, alternating apple rings and yam slices, overlapping their edges slightly. In small saucepan, combine sugar, cornstarch and cloves; stir in orange juice and blend. Heat orange juice mixture, stirring until thickened; pour over apples and yams. Top casserole with nuts and bake 20 minutes or until apples and yams are tender.
Makes six servings. Each serving has 180 calories, 2.5 grams (g) of fat, 4 g of fiber, 41 g of carbohydrate and 25 milligrams of sodium.
Sources: Julie Garden-Robinson, food and nutrition specialist; Sarah Wells, student dietitian.
At Home with Extension is written by staff of the NDSU Extension Service-Barnes County.