Does this man scare you?

Well, I know that’s not the way most people, even those who like his writing, would describe him.

But Stephen King recently did something pretty cool. He and his wife, Tabitha, donated $13,000 so that 150 Maine Army National Guardsmen training in Indiana can come home for Christmas.

The troops, from the 3rd Battalion, 172nd Infantry Unit, are training at Camp Atterbury and are scheduled to depart for Afghanistan in January.

It’s a kind gesture that many of those soldiers and their families may never forget. Who knows how long it will be before they can return to their loved ones for the holidays … if at all. Those men and women shouldn’t have to spend their last holidays stateside a third of the country away from home.

The Kings actually gave $12,999 — because 13 is an unlucky number … who’d have though King was superstitious? — and a personal assistant chipped in $1.

If you’re a King fan, here are some other recent developments you may or may not be aware of:

Speculation that if King broke into the business today, he’d be less successful

A review of “Under The Dome”

SyFy turning King’s “The Colorado Kid” into a series titles ‘Haven”

King is considering a sequel to ‘The Shining”

King possibly teaming with Spielberg to bring “Under the Dome” to TV as miniseries

And my favorite … King trashes “Twilight” author Meyer, praises Harry Potter author Rowling

Because I can.

The Cowboy Junkies.

I heart Margo Timmons.

Nick Jonas told his brothers in a Radio Disney interview that his new band — Nick Jonas & the Administration — will take after Bruce Springsteen.

“I’m kind of modeling it after Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band,” he said. “It’s kind of the look we were going for stylistically on the album cover and just the project in general… [Springsteen] pours so much passion and emotion into all of his songs every night and I hope I can capture that too.”

Read the rest of the story here.

I’ll reserve judgment on whether or not he succeeds.

I just decided to post this because it’s a pretty sweet cover of The Band’s ‘The Weight” by Gillian Welch and David Rawlings with The Old Crow Medicine Show, one of my favorite bands, from a BBC broadcast from a couple years ago.

I hope you enjoy.

This is ironic because, somehow, we managed to discuss this particular scene from the greatest Christmas movie ever — A Christmas Story — in Sunday school class this past weekend.

And now, once again this year, someone has put the tongue-to-flagpole theory to the test, only to find themselves stuck.

Read here.

If you watch ESPN at all, you would have had to have been under a rock the past week and a half to miss the replay of this speech. Every year at this time, it becomes a nightly ritual on the network during the Jimmy V Classic.

On March 3, 1993, former N.C. State basketball coach and ESPN basketball analyst Jim Valvano gave this speech at the ESPYs after receiving the Arthur Ashe Courage and Humanitarian Award. His body was riddled with cancer and he knew his time was short.

And his speech was magnificent. It’s one of those television moments I never grow tired of seeing. I’m sure the people I work with don’t feel the same way.  I’m sure they get tired of me turning the TV up every night to hear the speech when ESPN plays it. I don’t care.

In the speech, Valvano said he hoped to survive long enough to present the Ashe award the next year, but it didn’t happen. He fell victim to his cancer April 28, 1993.

Though he didn’t live much longer, there are two themes in his speech that have endured.

First, he very poignantly suggested how one could ensure they live each day to the fullest:

“To me, there are three things we all should do every day. We should do this every day of our lives. Number one is laugh. You should laugh every day. Number two is think. You should spend some time in thought. And number three is, you should have your emotions moved to tears, could be happiness or joy. But think about it. If you laugh, you think, and you cry, that’s a full day. That’s a heck of a day. You do that seven days a week, you’re going to have something special.”

Then he closed the speech with this:

“Cancer can take away all of my physical abilities. It cannot touch my mind, it cannot touch my heart, and it cannot touch my soul. And those three things are going to carry on forever. I thank you and God bless you all.”

(Many mistakenly believe that his famous quote, “Don’t give up, don’t ever give up,” came in this speech. It did not. It came two weeks earlier, February 21, 1993, at N.C. State’s celebration of the 10th anniversary of Valvano’s 1983 NCAA Championship squad.)

Valvano’s entire speech can be found in a text version here.

I hope that should I ever be unfortunate enough to face an unforgiving disease like cancer, that I might have the grace and class that Valvano did.

I took Dylan on a long-promised bowling trip tonight with Grandpa Bill at the Oasis of Loganville, Ga.

He had a blast, bowling three games and even breaking the century mark (102) in the third game.

Of course, he had rails, but he’s 6 and he gets it. After an 80 and a 75 in the first two games, I told him his goal was an 80 in the third game.

He was easily on pace, with a 69 through eight frames, when he hit a strike — with no help from the rails, I might add — in the ninth frame, which brought cheers from the bowlers three lanes down.

Then he opened the 10th with a nine, and I knew if he got a spare, he would break 100. When he picked up the 10 pin, he got high fives from one of the girls from three lanes down.

Of course, after the strike and the awesome spare, he closed with an anti-climactic 3 in his final roll.

(Not that it matters, but I bowled a 117, cursed my shoes, removed the left one and finished with a 203 and a 188 wearing only one shoe.)

Dylan spent $1 on some ski-mobile spy-action video game, which was quite entertaining to watch, especially when he repeatedly ran into gates, trees, walls, buildings, etc. Then I took him to Sonic for an orange slush and popcorn chicken.

A great night.

Quick quiz: Who's the turkey in this picture?

The Clemson Poultry Science Club is offering 50 organic turkeys for sale this Thanksgiving.

Want to know more? Read here.

This was too good to pass up.

A man groped the nurse helping to deliver his baby. He was arrested and missed the birth altogether.

Story here.

I am all to aware about the myriad of reasons why newspapers are failing and journalism, in general, is in decline.

And journalists — newspaper journalists specifically — who blame the reader (the consumer, essentially) should usually be admonished, and rightly so.  The consumer (reader) simply wants the product (information) faster and in a way traditional newspapers can’t (or won’t) provide it (via TV, the Web, handheld or social media, etc.).

But where the reader can be held accountable is in WHAT information they want. Not enough people seem to care about the things that really matter anymore. Maybe that’s a problem with America, in general.

Here’s a prime example I find humorous.

The city of Atlanta is in the midst of its most important mayoral election in decades. The health care reform being debated in Congress, as well as in the court of public opinion, will affect virtually every Amercian in some way. We’re fighting a war in Afghanistan. And the H1N1 strain of the flu — swine flu, if you will — is spreading faster than expected and is killing our young people.

Yet, these were the three most popular stories on the Atlanta Journal-Constitution for last week:

1. UGA football player arrested, suspended

2. Winder man dies from rattlesnake bite

… and my favorite …

3. Man gropes nurse who was helping deliver his baby

The last one is so good, I might just have to post it myself.