Do write your articles with a laptop? Looks like you do from the occasional word that jumps from one sentence to another, for example "TheWe." I have the same problem when I write articles. I am constantly proofreading and making corrections

I'm snowed in here in western Kentucky. I am spending my time posting articles on my daily blog, working on a project that involves a lot of research and writing, taking naps, eating noodles in steaming hot broth, drinking hot coffee and tea, and otherwise trying to stay warm.

The folks in my neck of the woods--the Jackson Purchase in westernmost Kentucky--are OBSESSED with basketball. This obsession even affects small children. The little boy who used to live down the street from me spent ALL of his free time practicing shooting hoops even to well after dark. He could not reach the net at first but he persisted.

My mother and grandmother said nothing like that to me. They would quote various proverbial sayings or Scripture verses to emphasize a point or to convey a truth--such as "cut your coat according to your cloth," do unto others what you would have done unto you," "if at first you don't succeed, try, try again," "a still tongue in a wise head." They never said anything denigrating of my older brother and I like what you quoted in your article. My mother was school teacher and my grandmother's father had been a school master. They didn't say things that belittled the child but sought to pass on the precepts by which they lived themselves.