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Rainy Day Writers, Cambridge, OH (2025)

11/19/2025

Claire Cameron loves to cook. She shares a recipe that your family might enjoy the next time they come to visit.

Trying Something Different by Claire Cameron

When I was a little girl, my grandmother would set me on a stool in the kitchen to keep her company while she cooked. She was particular as to who she allowed in her cooking space, so that one person ended up being me.

Learning at an early age the joy of cooking and spending time with her, left a lasting impression on my heart.

Now I love to cook for family and friends and usually make meals like Grandma used to make.

But, one day when my granddaughter wanted to bring her fiancé to dinner, I thought I should try something new.

Pasta is always a favorite so, this time I let my imagination go wild and decided to pair kielbasa with pasta and veggies and make a creamy sauce to enhance the flavor. The result produced a tasty new skillet supper everyone loved. I hope you love it too!

Skillet Penne and Kielbasa Dinner

1 box of penne pasta cooked 9 minutes or until tender. Set aside in boiled water.

In an extra-large skillet, add 3 Tablespoons olive oil and heat on low.

To skillet add:

⅔ cup chopped onion, ½ cup chopped green pepper, 3 Tbsp. minced garlic,

½ head of broccoli cut in bite sized pieces.

Cut kielbasa into coin sizes and add to skillet.

Cook covered for 15 minutes stirring occasionally.

Dip out pasta with a slotted spoon from the reserved pan of cooked pasta and add 2 cups of broth from pasta water. Add pasta to oil mixture.

Add ½ block of cream cheese, ⅔ cup of heavy cream, 2 Tbsp. of butter and ½ cup Parmesan/Romano cheese. Stir until the cheeses and cream are incorporated.

Lastly add two teaspoons salt, 1 teaspoon pepper, ½ cup white wine, and ½ teaspoon of red pepper flakes.

Serve with a leafy green salad and toasted garlic bread. Enjoy!

11/18/2025

Rick Booth wrote an excellent article about a letter he found while visiting the Isle of Guernsey. It's from an early settler in Cambridge to his family back on the Isle of Guernsey. Very interesting. Read the entire article in November's Crossroads magazine.

11/06/2025

Betsy Taylor thinks back to an old favorite car. Do you have a car that brings back special memories? Read more Rainy Day Writers stories on Your Radio Place and in Guernsey News.

A Great Little Run-around Car by Betsy Taylor

It was one of those gorgeous late-summer mornings made brilliant with a drench of golden sunshine. The humidity was low, so the sky was that cloudless sapphire blue we usually only see in October. My husband and I were on our way to church and, as we drove, we admired the scenery – or, at least, what we could see of it around the windshield’s bug splatter.

Since my husband was recovering from a spinal fusion surgery, he hadn’t been driving, so his car had been on vacation. Untended, the bug gunk had fossilized. A quick sq**rt of washer fluid only smeared the mess. On the way home fresh carcasses added to the gauzy layer.

“Leave your car in the driveway,” I said when we reached our garage. “Go take a nap and I’ll wash your windows.”

I assembled my gear. I don’t care how glowing the sales pitches are for Windex and other factory-made glass cleaners; nothing can beat good old vinegar and water for cutting road grime and bug smear. While I worked, I extended the job by cleaning the glass in my 2023 CRV as well. As I did, an odd feeling of nostalgia settled over me.

My old car was out there somewhere. A friend, the mechanic who cared for her, told me she was a great little run-around car. That I’d never have to worry about a break-down. She’d never leave me stranded on the road. Was someone cleaning her windows? Were they taking better care of her than I did? At this point she was 24 years old. How old is that in people years? I had inherited her from my husband who had bought her in 2001then decided he need something larger than a Camry.

It’s true that I had taken her for granted and figured she was so reliable that she could take care of herself. Oh, I had seen to her needs such as batteries, tires, oil changes, and check-ups. But she wasn’t bathed or vacuumed as often as she should have been. Now that I consider the way she seemed to cheer up when I used a special cleaning agent on her headlight covers, I’m embarrassed. It was as if she had suddenly been given a pair of glasses and could see the road with bright new eyes.

The day I left her at the car dealership as a trade-in, I wasn’t thinking about the loss of my old friend. The pressure of selecting a new ride from what was available toward the end of the COVID supply-chain shortages weighed on me heavily. I needed something larger and taller to transport family members who could no longer settle down into the low-slung seats of a little sedan.

Choosing a new car and signing the purchase documents had made my head spin. As I took possession of my Honda, I asked the salesman, “What will happen to my Camry?”

Casually he said, “Oh it will go to auction.”

I hope auction is a place where someone bought a really great car that could haul a bike rack and play tunes and books in a CD port and cassette slot. I hope auction delivered my old buddy to a terrific new owner who takes care of her and appreciates her loyalty.

11/01/2025

Martha Jamail will make you smile with her embarrassing moment. Read more Rainy Day Writers stories at Your Radio Place or in Guernsey News.

An Embarrassing Moment by Martha Jamail

It was just an ordinary Saturday when our air conditioning stopped working. My husband made a call and, before leaving to run errands, told me the repairman would come in the afternoon around one o’clock.

At 10 am, I decided I’d have enough time to color my hair, so I applied the solution. Knowing I had a 10-minute wait time before rinsing, I also applied Nair hair removal cream on my face. After about 5 minutes had passed, the doorbell rang. I panicked, knowing it wouldn’t be my husband. Looking in the mirror, I saw the reflection of a woman with her entire head plastered with black goo, and a mustache of white cream!

There was nothing I could do. I thought quickly about wrapping a towel turban-like around my head, but that would certainly ruin a good towel. The cream on my face was just beginning to work and would take too much time to adequately remove before I needed to answer the door.

I approached the door slowly hoping it was my neighbor, Patty. But, NO! It was the air conditioning repairman, and he was quite young. I just knew the poor guy would be scared out of his wits.

So, . . . I took a deep breath, opened the door slightly, and said, “I’m going to open the door, but I don’t want to startle you. I’m coloring my hair, and I have cream on my face, so be prepared.”

As I opened the door all the way, the young man looked at me and laughed saying, “You don’t have to worry, Ma’am. You look just like my mother.”

10/24/2025

Life is like a book. Some chapters are sad,, some are happy , and some are exciting, but if you never turn the page, you will never know what the next chapter has in store for you.

(This describes our new Rainy Day Writers book, "Patchwork Tales." Pictured is the recent book signing.)

10/24/2025

Betsy Taylor reminds us of the times when the Cuyahoga River caught fire. Read her description and what it did for our environmental conscience. Find more Rainy Day Writers stories on Your Radio Place and in Guernsey News.

River Ablaze by Betsy Taylor

In 1969 I was a year away from graduating with a four-year university diploma bearing my name. I enjoyed being a student at a small school in Southwestern Kentucky where the landscape reminded me so much of Cambridge. Because I’m a homebody one of my friends sent me a subscription to the Daily Jeffersonian Newspaper and I can’t emphasize enough how much I looked forward to receiving each issue.

I looked for names of friends and neighbors in the paper’s articles and stories. State and national news accounts were also welcome. In June a small report of Ohio’s Cuyahoga River caught my eye. It seems the darn thing had caught fire – again.

It’s not that a river ablaze isn’t a big deal, but the Cuyahoga had caught fire before with more serious consequences. In fact, there had been 12 Cuyahoga River fires in Ohio’s history (since 1869). This time though the event was a big deal in terms of environmental science. Even ordinary citizens along with scientists had become concerned about the health of their surroundings. We could thank public figures like Ralph Nader and Rachel Carson for expanding our collective environmental conscience.

This time the river burst into flames when oily bits of floating junk were hit by sparks from a nearby train. The short-lived fire produced no casualties.

Time Magazine picked up the story and ran with it turning a hum-drum event into a media sensation. Even though the river fire had occurred in Ohio, I didn’t pay much attention to the story until my ecology professor referenced it in class and treated it as a joke. Burning water – Ha Ha. Imagine water that was actually a fire hazard.

A murmur went through the room. I was embarrassed that my classmates imagined my home state to be a grungy place so dirty that one of its rivers could burst into flame. Of course, my professor saw the story as a teachable moment highlighting the negative effects heedless humans can have on the places they live.

A quote from the Federal Water Pollution Administration stated, “The lower Cuyahoga has no visible signs of life, not even low forms such as leeches and sludge worms that usually thrive in waste.”

Rivers in other states had met the same fate as the Cuyahoga. Those citizens had been guilty of the same environment abuses. Was Time Magazine picking on us? Probably not. But, as it turned out, they did us a huge favor in the form of a wake-up call galvanizing the country into action.

The first Earth Day was celebrated in 1970 and later the Environmental Protection Agency was established. Important “acts” were passed in short order. The Clean Air Act and the Clean Water Act along with several others resulted in major changes in the ways we protect ourselves.

Although the Cuyahoga River still drains runoff from major cities along its banks, the improvement in its health has been dramatic. A dozen species of fish, even those sensitive to pollution, now inhabit its water, and birds such as the great blue heron have returned. Sounds good. But we can’t breathe easily if we remember the carelessness that, 12 times, turned the waterway into an inferno.

10/21/2025

Claire Cameron takes a trip back in time to visit "The Little Rascals." Perhaps you enjoyed their humor also years ago. Read all about her thoughts in October's Crossroads magazine.

10/20/2025

Mark Cooper thinks about writers' block. It happens! Read more Rainy Day Writers' stories on Your Radio Place and in Guernsey News.
Blocked, Unblocked by Mark Cooper
Pen in hand. Blank page, crisp and clean, ready and waiting. But I’m blocked. Time to shift tactics.
Start my computer. Open a blank page. An impatiently blinking mouse awaits my touch, tormenting me.
Still blocked.
Try typing random words and phrases. Is inspiration stirring? No, the block remains firmly in place.
A deadline looms. Will a good night’s sleep help? Will words flow in my dream world, freeing my creativity? Maybe, but come morning’s light and they erase, forgotten before they can be transcribed onto the blank pages.
Memories of an ancient manual typewriter I once used ni**le in my mind. Tiny round keys. Ribbon easily sticking and smearing ink. Maybe if it were on my desk for me to peck at, ideas would unlock. But probably not.
Typewriters remind me of Jake, a young blogger I once followed. He printed aphorisms on random scraps of paper, using his old manual typewriter. I won a contest he held for his readers. The prize was some of his own work. He sent me these words typed on a Manila label,
“Far too many blessed with sight travel life blind.” -Jake Lira (not Jake the MMA fighter).
“…travel life blind.” Or in my case, at this very moment, traveling through this day blocked.
Blocked. Perhaps I need to learn more about this condition afflicting me. Time to google.
“Writer’s Block, an inability to produce new work or a significant slowdown in [a writer’s] creative output.” Dr. Edmund Burgler coined the phrase. He was a psychiatrist. He said writer’s block was a physiological condition “rooted in neurotic inhibition and inter conflict.” From there he went down a Freudian rabbit hole that ultimately blamed moms. Poor women, as if their lives aren’t tough enough, why not pile on more guilt for them to bear.
Do Dr. Burgler’s thoughts on the matter mean I’m mentally ill?
Other thinkers, those blessed with common sense, say that a block is simply a necessary part of the creative process, a foundation, if you will, that leads to a breakthrough producing new and fresh ideas. It happens to everyone. Nothing to stress about. Perfectly normal. Please don’t blame mom.
I find those thinkers more trustworthy than Dr. Burgler.
Feeling better now. Maybe I can break through my block. Perhaps I can write and meet my deadline.
Wait a minute. I just did.
I’m unblocked!

10/16/2025

The game is afoot! Beverly Kerr recently talked to the ladies involved with Sherlock Holmes Mystery Weekend. Join in the fun of solving the mystery or the following week, watch the entire production at Pritchard-Laughlin. It's a great show anyway you look at it. Read the entire article in October's Crossroads magazine.

10/07/2025

Rick Booth discusses the popularity of fall out shelters in the 1960s. Is there a chance we might need them today? Read the entire article in October's Crossroads magazine.

09/26/2025

John Anderson tells why people love their dogs. Can you add any to his list? Read more articles by Rainy Day Writers on Your Radio Place or in Guernsey News.

Why We Love Our Dogs by John Anderson

Every so often a car displays a bumper sticker that acknowledges the adoption of a dog.

There is a picture of a dog above a question- “Who saved Who?”

There are at least four reasons that are evidence showing why we love our dogs.

There are no walls or conditions for a dog’s love.

Dogs always offer an enthusiastic welcome even if you have been gone a few seconds, a few hours, or a few days.

A special needs child finds complete acceptance from a dog and therefore those special needs peel away… for instance, if a child stutters, the stutters disappear when he is talking to his dog.

A pet owner doesn’t own a dog for all of the owner’s life. But the owner does have the dog for all its life. Owners commonly have a succession of dogs with the same name. There may be a Scottie 1, a Scottie 2 and a Scottie 3. Owners hope to be reunited with all three of them at the end of their lives.

As a dog owner, what reason would you add to this list?

09/16/2025

Betsy Taylor tells about an aunt's questionable gifts with connections to the past. Read more Rainy Day Writers stories on Your Radio Place and in Guernsey News.

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