Text The Times.

Here’s what everyone is talking about this week:

I called the circulation department this afternoon before 5:00 to tell them we did not receive a paper today and I was told there would be one delivered.

I made it clear I didn’t want it delivered with my Wednesday paper. However, it wasn’t delivered today. It’s bad enough that this paper has gone to 3-day deliveries, but to not get your paper delivered on the day it is supposed to and you know that your neighbors all got theirs is a crying shame. Please see that this situation gets remedied in a timely fashion.

[Editor’s Note: I’ll do what I can]

*** I just wanted to say there are nice honest people in our area. This week I went to the Marion Post Office to mail a package and on the way back to my car, I dropped my credit card on the sidewalk. I got half way to work before I realized I didn’t have it.

When I went back, a very nice lady had picked it up just before I returned, and when I asked if anyone had seen it she said she had it. I thanked her profusely. Just wanted to thank her again, publicly because I forgot to ask her name. [Editor’s Note: That’s a pretty uplifting story, so thanks for sending it in. While we’re handing out props, I’d like to offer a big shout out to the West Memphis Wendy’s crew. Monday night, while in between being at the East-Earle basketball game and picking my daughter up from volleyball practice, I stopped at Wendy’s to enjoy a delicious 4-for-$4 meal. I also added a small Frosty, because I have no will power. Anyway, I sit down, eat my food, and then throw my trash in the bin…

along with my completely uneaten Frosty (sad face).

I confessed my stupidity to the cashier and ordered another one… which she did not charge me for, so thanks for helping a little fat guy get a little fatter without paying another two bucks!]

*** Do you realize that next year will mark the 30th anniversary since the grand opening of Blockbuster Video on Missouri Street and Dover Road?

Also 2020 will mark the 30th anniversary since the demolition of our one and only movie theater, which was located behind the Holiday Plaza Mall not far from where Kroger was once located? West Memphis has changed a lot over the last 30 years, but not always for the better.

[Editor’s Note: If you think I’m not going to jump headlong into a nostalgia- based question, you’ve got another think coming…

While I was not aware of the actual date Blockbuster opened, I remember it well. I actually worked there in 1992-1993, and it was a lot of fun. As a movie and video game nerd, it was something of a dream job for 20-year-old me. In fact, I always had it in the back of my head that my ideal “retirement” job would be to open up a video rental store. Of course, this was 20 years ago, back when those were things that actually existed. Funny side note: Netflix tried to get Blockbuster to buy them out several years ago, but Blockbuster didn’t see the value of DVD’s by mail and streaming services.

Oops, huh? And I also well remember the Holiday Twin Cinema. I watched many a movie there back in the day. Here’s another bit of trivia: While I don’t remember the other movie, the last movie on the right side of the twin bill before the theater closed was “Friday the 13th, Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan.” I probably wouldn’t remember, except that I’m a huge Jason Voorhees fan, and I distinctly remember driving past it and noticing the letters disappearing a few at a time as the wind and the passage of time took its toll. It was down to something like “Fr–d-y t-e 1–h P–t V— J-s– Ta-s Ma—tt-n” by the time they tore it down. Don’t even get me started on all the stuff from my childhood that’s no longer a thing…

I’m looking at you, Skate World!]

*** Please people please! Stop dropping off your dogs in the country, saw 3 in 1 day last week soon as it gets cold! The dogs are scared, cold & hungry! People in the country got dogs or don’t want any dogs!

Also please stop dumping trash and throwing trash out your car window! Take the dogs to the shelter, it’s called surrender, the shelter won’t kill the dogs!

It doesn’t cost you nothing but time & caring after you choose to get a animal.

Please put your trash in your trash can at home & take your home trash to the dump & stop littering! God cares! Won’t you care too please? [Editor’s Note: Oh man, where to even start with this one? Let me say, I’m fully aware that years ago, it was pretty common if you had an unwanted animal at the house it was time to “take them for a ride in the country,” so it looks like the tradition is alive and well for some folks, but yes, it is cruel. Those dogs don’t understand what’s happening, why they’ve been abandoned, or that their owner isn’t coming back for them. It happens with cats, too. And yes, cats are more inclined to be able to adapt to living out in the wild, there’s still a big moral lapse for someone who just abandons a pet like that, especially if it is sick or injured. And as for the trash… that really just makes me super angry.

I have no tolerance for people who have it in their head that their garbage is someone else’s problem.

It’s not as common as it used to be, but I still will see someone at a red light in the middle of town every now and then, just dump a sack full of fast-food trash and their empty drink right on the road. It’s infuriating. The worst one is when you see a used diaper, because that means that person will likely pass those bad habits down to a new generation of litter bugs…]