Despite my penchant for teasing her, the Local Controller and I have a great friendship, love affair and marriage. Yes, you’ll be reading this close to Valentine’s Day.¹Ahh, yes. A day of romance, chocolates, flowers and overcrowded dining establishments. How did this day come into existence you ask? The LC has just demurred, commenting: “No. They didn’t ask.” I heard ya loud and clear so here’s a bit of the history on who were the Valentines and how did the day come about! Let’s start with two Romans preaching the good book, one of whom was martyred on February 14, 269. Add to that perhaps as many as 12-14 Saint Valentines, a Spanish Hermit, a woman named Valencia and the English poet Chaucer. I bet you didn’t see that coming! The preacher who was martyred was allegedly named Valentine, which was a very popular name at that time. So popular in fact that his preaching partner was likely also named Valentine. What does any of that have to do with our celebrated Valentine’s Day? Nothing. Zip. Nada. You’ll recall I mentioned Chaucer earlier. He wrote a romantic poem in the 14th Century, Parlement of Foules. He needed a word that rhymed with whatever he had penned and Valentine fit the bill. That’s it, a rhyme. The poem struck a chord with the English and they began the annual celebration on February 14 of writing poems and giving gifts to those they loved. So what? A gift, that’s what. Now that we have that out of the way, let’s move on. “Please do.” says LC. Actually, she now says, “Let’s not move on from the gift part.” Yikes, I need to pivot. Pivoting now.

Many of you are familiar with the long-ago sitcom I Love Lucy.²The show starred Lucille Ball as the wife of the Cuban band leader Ricky Ricardo, her real life husband. She and her neighbor Ethel find hilarious predicaments at every turn. https://bit.ly/42ktltF For those of you who aren’t familiar with the show, I suggest two episodes that will undoubtedly tickle your funny bone. They are: “Job Switching” and “Lucy Does a TV Commercial.” You won’t be disappointed. https://bit.ly/3Okhnug The crazy situations the lead character finds herself in are hilarious. Many of her own making and others are just the karma³Karma originated in the ancient Hindu text Rig Veda written during the Bronze Age around 1500 BC. I haven’t read it. https://bit.ly/42gcKaA  she both exudes and attracts. Lucy routinely tries to become a movie star, a singing star or any kind of star, but she’s really not very talented in that way. What she is good at is setting up hilarious séances, wearing badly designed disguises, attempting to be Cupid,⁴Originally known as Eros and traced back to 700 BC, Cupid was more of a heartthrob than cherub. Fast forward a few hundred years, the Greeks and then the Romans decided the cuter cherub version better fit society at that time. https://bit.ly/3Ujce9C pretending to have amnesia and a line of pratfalls⁵A staple of slapstick comedy involves the pratfall, otherwise known as an overly dramatic (read funny) fall on one’s posterior and other such crazy stunts. https://bit.ly/49djzvH that would make even the most gifted physical comedian jealous. On occasion, I feel like I’m living with Lucy. The Local Controller routinely misplaces her glasses, cell phone and keys. In and of themselves, not big deals. It’s where we find them that brings the laughter. “Where are my glasses?” she asks. My responses have included:

• You’re looking through them.
• On top of your head.
• I found them in:
  • The refrigerator
  • In the bed covers at the foot of the bed
  • Under the cushion of a long unused couch in a small room we used for storage…a YEAR after she lost them
  • A kitchen cabinet
  • On the deck
  • On the floor

The cell phone has been found in many places. The regularity of loss caused her to tape one of my business cards to the back of the phone with a message reading: If Found Please Call Mark. Some of the calls I’ve received:

• A bike rental place in Florida. She left it in the bike’s basket.
• Dillard’s, Target, Kroger, gas stations galore and a variety of other retail outlets.
• Mother Hayes.

I’ve also found the phone in kitchen cabinets, under the couch, in the pantry behind some canned goods, on top of her car, in my truck while I was driving to work (it rang or I never would have known it), on the dog’s bed and the list goes on and on. The keys, well you get the idea. To go along with these mishaps are loud noises from a room I’m not in, followed by one of two phrases. “Whoops!” or “Whoops…uh oh.” The former signifies a drop, fall, slip, slide or other such thing. The second signifies the same thing with the addition of something being broken. It’s ranged from a wine glass to her ankle and anything and everything in between. We now own a great deal of plastic drinkware, Bubble Wrap⁶Bubble Wrap was invented, accidentally, in 1957 by Alfred Fielding and his partner a Swiss chemist named Marc Chavannes. Oddly they were trying to invent textured wallpaper that would appeal to the Beat generation. You can’t make this stuff up! https://bit.ly/3SjHJOd and various orthopedic devices. Good times.

A couple of other stories of note. She once had to chase an Uber⁷Another partnership! Travis Kalanick and Garrett Camp were attending a tech conference in Paris. The one across the ocean not the one in Logan County. I digress. Oh boy, LC is getting fired up now. “You’re making these poor people read about Bubble Wrap and Uber! What does that have to do with cities and towns?!” Oh ye of little faith. Where was I? Oh yeah, Uber. The two dudes, already independently wealthy, couldn’t get a cab one night. From that the generation of summoning rides from your phone was born! https://bit.ly/47UJV4s through a large convention center parking lot to retrieve her phone. Picture her in heels, running behind the vehicle and frantically yelling and beating on the trunk. He hit the brakes and she hit the car. She was fine! And she retrieved the item, of course.

She’s been lost a couple of times. At the Biltmore House⁸I’m pushing my luck, so I’ll make this quick. Go visit. It’s spectacular. https://www.biltmore.com/ Oh, and I wrote about it in an issue or two ago if you’d like some additional details. LC’s arms are crossed and the toe is tapping. Moving on…. in Asheville, North Carolina, which has large forests and huge parking lots as well as a few dead cell coverage spots. She began walking to find cell coverage to summon a cab or an Uber. Instead, she managed to find every one of the “no signal available” zones and kept walking. Her walkabout included cutting through a wooded area trying to get back to a parking lot she thought she’d been in. She came upon a steep hill filled with large rocks at the top of which was the parking lot. She climbed, in her sundress, on all fours to the top and came out of the hedges with twigs in her hair and dirt on her hands and knees. Disheveled, to put it mildly. I’m sure the folks that first saw her thought she’d been abandoned in the woods for weeks. That or they figured she was a very small version of Bigfoot.

Parking and driving are the thing of legend. The controller has noted many times: “Ya know, I useta could park.” A personal favorite is leaving the car running in a parking deck during an entire concert. “I thought I cut it off!” I’m not kidding. The entire concert. All of it. It was a great show I must admit. If you get a chance to see Arkansas’ own Ashley McBryde⁹She was raised in Mammoth Spring and went to my alma mater, Arkansas State University. She was in the marching band which likely means I saw her before she was famous! https://bit.ly/42gdP28 Also of note, she’s related to family of a certain mayor in our fair state. I’m keeping that on the down low unless I get permission to share! jump on it! She’s a great entertainer. We’ve also experienced near misses of cement poles, garbage cans, mailboxes and people with LC behind the wheel. After one particularly harrowing moment she said: “Ya know, I scare myself sometimes.” Life with the Local Controller is always entertaining!

I’m getting the eye. The stare. All couples know of it. In fact, I’ve written about it before. “They know. Get to the point funny man. And don’t forget you’re still coming home to me every night after work so move it along.” Aye Aye Admiral! To the point it is. The title of this column is “A Classic Re-Boot.” I’m not referring to making another sitcom. The point of the first part of the column is simply to note, in an admittedly over-the-top way, that many things in our past are important and still impactful. Additionally, while honoring those traditions we also chart new courses. Cell phones and Ubers are good examples and they sometimes lead to humorous situations like those I find myself in with LC.

The League’s big meetings, convention and conference are places we can honor tradition and embrace the new. The Winter Conference held just a few weeks ago was by all measures an enormous hit. It’s your conference, of course, so please share your thoughts with League staff. And not just your thoughts but your ideas as well. No single individual has cornered the market for good ideas. So please share! I’m sure it isn’t lost on any of you the many differences between this year’s Winter Conference and previous years. Those changes were deliberate and much needed. Some highlights from the surveys y’all filled out:

• Popcorn¹⁰Corn was likely cultivated around 9,000 years ago. In 2012 however archaeologists discovered evidence of popcorn in Peru. They found 6,700-year-old corn cobs with puffed kernels! I’ll go ahead and beat everyone to age jokes. Yes, that’s about the time I graduated from high school! I’ll be here all week. Tip your servers. https://bit.ly/42eAb49 is back!
• Thirty-minute breaks are much needed.
• The new layout and accoutrements of the exhibit hall were fantastic! Including:
  • Did I mention popcorn?
  • The new entryway and location of League Services.
  • Comfortable couches and chairs.
  • The games! Connect Four, Jenga and Tic-Tac-Toe led to some fierce and fun competition. Just wait for summer…Baggo!¹¹Connect Four was created in 1974, Jenga in 1983, Tic-Tac-Toe in ancient Egypt and Baggo in the 14th Century. Who knew?! Google, that’s who!
  • Mixing exhibitor booths between state and federal agencies and private vendors was terrific. Each exhibitor got more foot traffic and they were far more engaged.
  • The swag was awesome!
  • So were the door prizes!
• The Happy Hour before the banquet was great!
• As was the Inspire Breakfast. Coach Nutt is still at the top of his game!
• The sessions were informative and entertaining!
• The new Learning Management System is wonderful!

There was much more but I’m running up on my word count and deadline! Guess who just muttered: “Thankfully.” Again, back to my point. While we did so many new things, we also honored many of our traditions. The classics if you will! The opening session paid tribute to our country and each of you and the service you bring to the community. We stood reverently when the color guard marched through and posted the colors. We put our hands over our hearts for the National Anthem and Pledge of Allegiance. We listened and learned. We engaged in both the ways we’ve done in years past and in ways we’ve never done.

Much like each of you does at home, the staff made significant efforts to better your experience and to give you more tools for your jobs. On a daily basis you adjust and are creative. You do so because you care about your city or town. You make your community better. While there are setbacks and bad days, your resilience and willingness to embrace new things makes a difference. Let me tell ya, it’s not easy planning a meeting for over 1,000 of our closest friends! The logistics alone are enough to make any person a bit dizzy. Add to that creating programming that’s fresh, well it’s a big, big job. Of course, I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know. You tackle the seemingly impossible and find a way to make a difference. As you are proud of your city hall team, I too am proud of the League staff. They made the conference a reality and a creative engaging reality at that. Tell them thanks if you get the chance. They really are the best in the business.

The League will celebrate its 90th birthday at this summer’s convention. I’ve taken to saying we’re 90 years young! As we did in January, the summer meeting will be new, fresh, engaging and better than ever! You’ll be hearing a great deal about the 90th in the weeks and months to come. We’re going to show the state of Arkansas why your communities are the backbone of the state’s economy and shine a light on all the good you do! Great Cities do indeed make a Great State!

P.S.: The League’s 90th Annual Convention is just a few months away! We hope you’ll join us June 12-14 at the Statehouse Convention Center. Registration information and other details are coming soon.

• 1
  Ahh, yes. A day of romance, chocolates, flowers and overcrowded dining establishments. How did this day come into existence you ask? The LC has just demurred, commenting: “No. They didn’t ask.” I heard ya loud and clear so here’s a bit of the history on who were the Valentines and how did the day come about! Let’s start with two Romans preaching the good book, one of whom was martyred on February 14, 269. Add to that perhaps as many as 12-14 Saint Valentines, a Spanish Hermit, a woman named Valencia and the English poet Chaucer. I bet you didn’t see that coming! The preacher who was martyred was allegedly named Valentine, which was a very popular name at that time. So popular in fact that his preaching partner was likely also named Valentine. What does any of that have to do with our celebrated Valentine’s Day? Nothing. Zip. Nada. You’ll recall I mentioned Chaucer earlier. He wrote a romantic poem in the 14th Century, Parlement of Foules. He needed a word that rhymed with whatever he had penned and Valentine fit the bill. That’s it, a rhyme. The poem struck a chord with the English and they began the annual celebration on February 14 of writing poems and giving gifts to those they loved.
• 2
  The show starred Lucille Ball as the wife of the Cuban band leader Ricky Ricardo, her real life husband. She and her neighbor Ethel find hilarious predicaments at every turn. https://bit.ly/42ktltF For those of you who aren’t familiar with the show, I suggest two episodes that will undoubtedly tickle your funny bone. They are: “Job Switching” and “Lucy Does a TV Commercial.” You won’t be disappointed. https://bit.ly/3Okhnug
• 3
  Karma originated in the ancient Hindu text Rig Veda written during the Bronze Age around 1500 BC. I haven’t read it. https://bit.ly/42gcKaA
• 4
  Originally known as Eros and traced back to 700 BC, Cupid was more of a heartthrob than cherub. Fast forward a few hundred years, the Greeks and then the Romans decided the cuter cherub version better fit society at that time. https://bit.ly/3Ujce9C
• 5
  A staple of slapstick comedy involves the pratfall, otherwise known as an overly dramatic (read funny) fall on one’s posterior and other such crazy stunts. https://bit.ly/49djzvH
• 6
  Bubble Wrap was invented, accidentally, in 1957 by Alfred Fielding and his partner a Swiss chemist named Marc Chavannes. Oddly they were trying to invent textured wallpaper that would appeal to the Beat generation. You can’t make this stuff up! https://bit.ly/3SjHJOd
• 7
  Another partnership! Travis Kalanick and Garrett Camp were attending a tech conference in Paris. The one across the ocean not the one in Logan County. I digress. Oh boy, LC is getting fired up now. “You’re making these poor people read about Bubble Wrap and Uber! What does that have to do with cities and towns?!” Oh ye of little faith. Where was I? Oh yeah, Uber. The two dudes, already independently wealthy, couldn’t get a cab one night. From that the generation of summoning rides from your phone was born! https://bit.ly/47UJV4s
• 8
  I’m pushing my luck, so I’ll make this quick. Go visit. It’s spectacular. https://www.biltmore.com/ Oh, and I wrote about it in an issue or two ago if you’d like some additional details. LC’s arms are crossed and the toe is tapping. Moving on….
• 9
  She was raised in Mammoth Spring and went to my alma mater, Arkansas State University. She was in the marching band which likely means I saw her before she was famous! https://bit.ly/42gdP28 Also of note, she’s related to family of a certain mayor in our fair state. I’m keeping that on the down low unless I get permission to share!
• 10
  Corn was likely cultivated around 9,000 years ago. In 2012 however archaeologists discovered evidence of popcorn in Peru. They found 6,700-year-old corn cobs with puffed kernels! I’ll go ahead and beat everyone to age jokes. Yes, that’s about the time I graduated from high school! I’ll be here all week. Tip your servers. https://bit.ly/42eAb49
• 11
  Connect Four was created in 1974, Jenga in 1983, Tic-Tac-Toe in ancient Egypt and Baggo in the 14th Century. Who knew?! Google, that’s who!