Thanks for the extra break

2023 has been a rough year for many in our community. Several of our favorite people did not survive the year, including my own mother. Her recent death is part of the reason the Tri-County News took a full week off from publication. (Another reason is that Christmas and New Year fell on Monday which reeks havoc on everyone’s print schedules.)

Putting together a new paper each week is a labor of love – but it is labor nonetheless. And we appreciated the break, truly.

The week off was a good time to rest, get caught up on some projects put off for a long time, rest, start some of the end-of-year projects, and rest some more. As can be expected, a single week was insufficient to accomplish all of this, but it was a great start.

Taking a week off from publication is a first for the Tri-County News, although it is standard practice for a few newspapers (some even take two weeks off for a real vacation). A few other newspapers joined the ranks taking a week off this year. The decision was not made lightly.

The news doesn’t take a break, though, and we were able to run the breaking news of two serious news stories that just couldn’t wait until this week. That’s where having a news website and active Facebook page (with more than 4,300 followers). Our news posts this week reached far more than that. So no one missed a thing during that usually very slow final week of the year.

(I made the decision 24 years ago, before I even owned the Tri-County News to put it online – fully archived and searchable by story. It has required investment of time and money, and it is well worth it to us and to our readers!)

It took us a few hours, but we caught up on all our mail, email, and phone messages as well, without any problems (touch wood), in time for this week’s issue.

We appreciate each of you, our readers, and we hope you also had some time to both rest and catch up on a few things. Happy 2024!