Cheers & Jeers is a feature I remember from the days of reading TV Guide. TV Guide, for those born after the advent of cable TV and the internet, is a small, bi-weekly magazine which lists upcoming TV programs, contains features on shows, actors and actresses, a TV crossword puzzle and more. Now, you can get the week's channel listings through your cable provider, on the internet (TV Guide.com and other locations) and, if you still like magazine subscriptions, in the TV Guide magazine. We used to have a subscription but we found no use for it as the internet and cable provider gives us all we need. Plus, we don't watch a whole lot of TV anyway — unless it's news, sports or certain sitcoms.

I find that daily life is full of cheers and jeers — things we enjoy and things we don't. Some weeks are full of cheers and some weeks are full of jeers, while some weeks, there is somewhat of a balance of the two.

Looking over the local news from the past week, I offer here my cheers and jeers.

Cheers

• That my friend and our former co-worker, longtime Register photographer John Edwards, made it home safely after going missing for about 36 hours. I hope an incident like that doesn't happen again. Dementia is cruel -- a jeer to that disease.
• To Melissa Nein and Emily Mirabile for teaching dance to our young people. Yes, our granddaughter was in the Y-Arts Dance Recital this past Friday and Saturday, but I have been covering these recitals for many years and year after year, I find it entertaining. Our young people are talented thanks to these two ladies bringing out the best in them.
• To the people of Wiscasset who are fighting for their town to be the best it can be after months of meetings, protests and more regarding the traffic plan offered by MDOT. There are usually two sides to controversial issues and both sides seem to have been able to express their views without any major incidents. Let's hope there is a happy medium somewhere down the road.
• To our schools, police departments and fire departments for doing their jobs well. Good news on all fronts in this week's issue.
• To a couple of women I know named  Lisa. Lisa Orne Hallinan, for offering "cheers to family and friends" in her TV commercial for Mainely Spirits, and Lisa Arsenault, who will be the guest speaker at this year's BRHS Alumni Banquet. She will be moving to England next month and is getting married. Congratulations. P.S. Lisa Hallinan will also be catering the Alumni Banquet.
• To our part-time reporter Art Mayers for finding some interesting maritime stories of late. Art retired from full-time reporting and came to us a couple of years ago to pick up some "retirement" work during the spring, summer and fall. I asked him to feature some young people who are working at the local shipyards and other businesses. Our aim is to point out that young people are working and living here and that there are opportunities for those graduating high school.

Jeers

Being an optimist, I could fill this column with Cheers, but I feel I do have to look somewhat balanced. So here are a couple of Jeers:

• To Mother Nature, for not giving us a full week of great weather after putting up with this past winter of snow and cold. Yes, ground conditions are dry, but my lawn is still soggy in spots.
• To whomever is to blame for the rising gasoline prices. I don't know the exact stats, but it seems to me that in February, gas was 40 cents cheaper than it is today. What gives?

Hope you have a mostly cheerful week ahead. I sure plan to!