There have been a lot of “celebrity deaths” lately (time catches up with everybody sooner or later), but I wasn’t paying them much attention until Harvey Korman died the other day.

Korman, for a certain generation, is mainly known for being Tim Conway’s foil on the Carol Burnett Show. And maybe for his role in the movie “Blazing Saddles,” but that’s almost certainly a guy thing.

I’m not a Korman expert by any means. I’m sure he had movie success in the ’40s and ’50s, but for whatever reason, the Carol Burnett show was a large part of my youth and I was sad to hear of Korman dying, even if he did live a very long, successful life of 81 years.

I was also mildly saddened to hear about Charleston Heston finally calling it a day last month. By the end, Heston had basically became a clichéd conservative for Republicans to haul out at election time, but I always remember him for over the top performances in science fiction movies that dominated my young years when I wasn’t watching the Carol Burnett Show.

Whether it was being stunned by the sight of the Statue of Liberty in “Planet of the Apes,” fighting off mutants in “The Omega Man,” or discovering what “Soylent Green” was really made of, Heston, who was a respected actor before he hit the science fiction circuit, never looked down on what could have been silly material.

Either way, they’re both gone now and the 1970s, amazingly, continue to recede further and further into the past.

High gas prices take their toll

In what may have been the first sign I’ve seen that high gas prices have finally knocked some sense into people, we were in Knoxville last Saturday and traffic, at times, was almost non-existent.

Now, this is a city we’re talking about, so there was still a bunch of cars around, but for anybody who goes to Knoxville on a Saturday, especially in the Turkey Creek area, what we saw (or didn’t see), was rather surprising.

Kingston Pike, in case you didn’t know, rises and falls as you drive it, and there were times when we topped a hill and there was absolutely nothing on the other side. No exaggeration here. There were literally no cars.

And when we drove into Turkey Creek we managed to sail in without having to ride the brakes, getting caught by 200 different red lights.

I figured there was some big event going on we didn’t know about that everybody was attending (and there may have been), but later I talked to somebody who drove to Chattanooga on Saturday and he said it was the lightest traffic he’d ever seen, especially on a weekend.

Have people finally been socked hard enough by high gas prices? Was getting so close to $4 a gallon the final breaking point? And considering I saw several other Monroe County license plates while in Knoxville (not to mention my friend driving to Chattanooga), has this lick of sense not hit Monroe County yet?

Who knows? Maybe everybody used their gas to drive to the lake where they filled boats up with $5 a gallon gas and spent the day on the water.

Whatever the case, at least they weren’t riding my bumper at 60 mph.

A tale of two cities

It was a tale of two cities, so to speak. In the same edition we ran stories about both Madisonville and Sweetwater passing (or attempting to pass) their budgets. That was where the similarities ended.

Sweetwater’s leaders made no bones that they wanted their money for their projects and if the lowered property reassessment tax rate had to be jacked back up to meet it, that was fine. Nothing is set in stone yet, but if past history is any indication, Sweetwater’s property tax rate will not remain at the $1.07 rate the reassessments brought it down to.

On the other side of the ridge, Madisonville’s leaders were sweating over the idea they might have to hike their 52-cent tax rate, less than half of what Sweetwater residents pay. They cut everything they could and pretty much mortgaged the town’s future in an election year.

I’m not really a fan of the way either town handled the situation. I sometimes get the feeling Sweetwater’s commissioners forget they’re handling taxpayer money (the tax rate keeps increasing above and beyond the cost of doing business and I don’t see anything new in town).

Madisonville, on the other hand, never seems lose sight of the fact it is taxpayer money. Madisonville is growing quicker than most people seem to realize and one day they’ll have to raise that tax rate, probably much higher than 10 cents here and there. The cost of growing can really hurt if it hits all at once.

Somewhere in between is probably the perfect place for these towns to be. Always remember it’s taxpayer money, but realize the towns need to grow at a healthy pace.

But if I really knew what I was talking about, I’d run for office.

michael.thomason@advocate anddemocrat.com | 442-4575.