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Here I am, back in spite of popular demand! The Fall 2010 issue of the Texas Hill Country magazine is now at the printers, and copies should be available sometime next week. I think everyone in Llano County should enjoy reading it; it has at least passing mentions of Llano County on 28 of the 96 pages, and quite a few more stories from neighboring counties like San Saba, Burnet, Blanco, Gillespie and Mason. I hope you’ll all pick up a copy at the office of The Llano News, starting sometime around next Friday.

In the meantime, I’ve lost touch with a lot of what’s happening here in Llano. I did manage to attend part of the Fifth Sunday Singing on East Main Street, but most of my time for the last two weeks was spent right here in front of my computer. I’ll try to play catch-up this week.

That may be a challenge! So far, I’ve heard about several things that I need to cover, starting with the Marksmen concert at the Cross and Spurs Cowboy Church at 7 p.m. on Wednesday (today, September 1). Then there’s the Comprehensive Plan meeting at City Hall on Thursday night (5:30 p.m.) and the Tea Party meeting at Inman’s (6:30, I believe); I hope to see a lot of you at all those events. I don’t plan to attend the "Study of David" myself (it’s intended for the women of Llano), but I’ve been asked to announce it. It’s a Bible study (no Michelangelo statues, I’m told) prepared by Priscilla Shirer, Beth Moore and Kay Arthur, starting at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, September 21 at the Fuel Coffee House. Arrive early to order blended coffee drinks or smoothies; study guides are available at www.lifeway.com or by calling Cindy Campbell at 719-337-0098.

We had a little foretaste of fall last week, when temperatures dipped to around 60 degrees Thursday morning. I’m ready for fall, but I really don’t think summer was as bad as usual this year. Almost all the really hot weather (at least so far; I shouldn’t count summer out yet) was in August.

I think that you’ll be able to read about the big news elsewhere in the paper: the shocking church drive-through, the tragic death of Dale Freeman and the opening-game victory for the Yellow Jackets. I didn’t have much to do with covering those events (and I barely knew Mr. Freeman, though I had certainly heard a lot of good things about him) so I won’t comment too much. I’m starting to feel a sense of belonging here, but events often remind me that I’m still "new" in Llano.

One such event is the LHS Hall of Fame induction later this month. I do know at least one of the honorees: my friend and colleague, Art Dlugach. As for the others, I’ll be learning more than any of my readers when I put together a little article for next week’s paper.

I was startled to see that several of the names of military personnel mentioned in the 1944 papers are not on the World War II monument in front of the courthouse (see History, page 7). Is it possible that there were more from Llano County than the nearly 1,200 named on the monument? Or were those named in the paper residents of other counties who just had a Llano connection? My daughter, Abby, has a Llano connection because I’m here, but she joined the Air Force when we still lived in Burnet. I’m guessing that her name wouldn’t be put on a Llano County monument, but I’ve already had her picture in the paper here at least once. The same would be true of Jason Holbrook, whose death made the front page here a couple of weeks ago, but would not be listed on a memorial in Llano. I may have answered my own question, but maybe not.

Before I bore you all too much with my philosophizing, I think I’ll quit writing. I hope I didn’t forget too many things that I was going to tell you, and I hope you all have a very good week!