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I don't know about you, but Christmas seems to take forever to get here and is over in a blink of an eye. Maybe it's just me, but I was so looking forward to a long drawn-out Christmas with ample time to visit with all of the relatives. What I got was, hurry up we have to go here and hurry up we have to go there. If I could wish for just one thing next Christmas, it would definitely have to be more time. We were lucky enough to have my grandmother join us again this year. Although it took a lot of prodding and convincing her that she was not putting any of us out by traveling to get her, it was worth it seeing the great-grandchildren at her side every waking minute.

Some people have asked us why the Chisago County Press is so slim the last few weeks. Here is my 50 cent explanation. The holidays have really put a strain on the paper with the days that Christmas and New Year's landed on this year. I apologize if you feel that you are getting shorted of any local news, but I assure you, if it is important, we will do anything in our power to make sure it is in the paper. We, here at the Press, like you, can't wait for regular work weeks to resume so we can bring you as much local news as possible.

I was watching the news this morning, and they were breaking down the $555 billion spending bill that President Bush passed. Luckily, Minnesota was included in the bill. The state received $195 million towards the rebuilding of Interstate 35 bridge which collapsed this summer. The other mention the state of Minnesota received in the bill was for the GOP convention. The President allotted $50 million for the state of Minnesota for the upcoming Republican Convention in St. Paul. $50 million? You have got to be kidding me. Couldn't both parties find their own money to hold their own conventions? In a day when all we here about is under-funding, over-taxing, and cuts, cuts, cuts, $50 million is a little hard to swallow.

My New Year's resolution is not to lose weight, (I know it should be tops on my list), but this year I am vowing to recycle as much as I possibly can. We already recycle, but we could always do more. I came across some interesting facts I thought I would share with you.

•Recycling one aluminum can saves enough energy to run a TV for three hours -- or the equivalent of a half a gallon of gasoline.

•A 60-watt light bulb can be run for over a day on the amount of energy saved by recycling one pound of steel. In one year in the United States, the recycling of steel saves enough energy to heat and light 18,000,000 homes.

•Recycling a single run of the Sunday New York Times would save 75,000 trees.

•If all our newspaper was recycled, we could save about 250,000,000 trees each year.

•The energy saved from recycling one glass bottle can run a 100-watt light bulb for four hours. It also causes 20 percent less air pollution and 50 percent less water pollution than when a new bottle is made from raw materials.

•A typical family consumes 182 gallons of pop, 29 gallons of juice, 104 gallons of milk, and 26 gallons of bottled water a year. That's a lot of containers -- make sure they're recycled.

These are just a drip in the bucket as far as things we can do to improve the Earth by recycling. Make recycling high on your priority list this year.

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