It’s the “PRICE you have to pay” when your district’s “can of worms” just can’t “git-r-done.”

A Young Ostrich came to its Mother, groaning with pain and with its wings tightly crossed upon its stomach.

"What have you been eating?" the Mother asked, with solicitude.

"Nothing but a keg of Nails," was the reply.

"What!" exclaimed the Mother; "a whole keg of Nails, at your age! Why, you will kill yourself that way. Go quickly, my child, and swallow a claw-hammer."

Come to think of it, I enjoyed an excellent ostrich summer sausage while vacationing in Wisconsin, and spit nary a single nail in the process.

Anyway, back home again in the legislative epicenter of the open air museum, nickels and dimes are back on the agenda of Thursday’s city council meeting:

New Albany City Council to consider exceeding 3 percent benchmark for office workers, by Eric Scott Campbell (News and Tribune):

Last year, council members made four exceptions to the blanket 3 percent raise. Sewer Billing Director Kelly Welsh got an 18 percent raise, while three bookkeepers were granted 5.5 percent raises.

Councilman Steve Price said he is ambivalent about the exceptions.

“I kind of feel, sometimes you do that, you open a keg of nails,” said Price, though, he added, “I do realize there’s some people down there underpaid. I’m open to it.”

NAC received this comment from a frequent reader:

We need to invent a random expression generator so we don't have to wait for Steve Price to be interviewed by the press or appear in public. But then, we don't want to throw the baby out with the spoiled milk.

Speaking of steadily souring lactose, Thursday’s council agenda offers the intriguing possibility that lame duck Mayor James Garner’s most strident and verbose critic may soon be commuting by golf cart to sit alongside him at stormwater board meetings.

APPOINTMENTS:
Nathan Grimes – Stormwater Board member
Valla Ann Bolovschak – Stormwater Board member

According to cue, the cuddly faux professor (and the pants-wearin’ half of the Vaudeville team of Vicki Ann Denschak and Their Trognomic Tub Thumping Team) has issued a timely press release to extol the virtues of her benefactress:

Thank you Valla Ann Bolovschak for your tireless efforts have lead to a great deal of the saving of the federal funding. And for your major role in our local greenway project and your many hours of hard work. We can safely say that because of your involvement in this planning with the City of New Albany's Greenway Project will reflect the values important to our community.

You have left an indelible mark on this project.

Something just left an indelible mark on my office rug, and I think it was one of our cats.

At least it wasn’t an ostrich, because nails have a way of scratching the porcelain on grandma’s piggy bank, but one thing’s for sure.

While the category of “wannabe” may or may not include those securing appointments after demonstrating the consistent inability to win elections, the underachieving and obfuscatory city council president Larry Kochert will forever be remembered chiefly as a “wannabeen.”

After all, a few fine tooth combs are good for the dog.

(Thanks J)