The Tennessean from Nashville, Tennessee • Page 59

1 MUM TO SUBSCRIBE: 242-NEWS Got a news tip? Call 771-5411 or fax 771-5409 WIL AM WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 12, 1997 'ordan to seek state jed County Lines Ml IAMSON gestae Jordan, 46, a Nashville attorney What? Christmas time again? Nashville attorney aims to succeed Bell on circuit court bench. By JIM EAST Staff Writer FRANKLIN State Sen. Keith Jordan, who two months ago took himself out of contention for another term, yesterday announced he run for the 21st District Circuit Court judgeship from which Henry Bell will retire. ing my public service and am excited by the opportunity this judicial race provides me," Jordan, a Franklin Republican, said in a prepared statement "Judge Bell has established an enviable record as a legal scholar and a fair-mined jurist I appreciate the challenge to continue the high standard of excellence which has been set in Division 1 of the circuit court by Judge Bell." The 21st Judicial District includes the counties of Hickman, Lewis, Perry and Williamson. Bell, father of noted author Madison Smartt Bell, has held the judgeship for the past 22 years.

Bell, of Franklin, served as Williamson County Attorney before he was first appointed to the bench in 1975. He made his retirement announcement at an August meeting of the Williamson County Bar Association. Two weeks ago, Jordan got a taste of the circuit court when he spent a day in Franklin seated beside Circuit Judge Don Harris. Jordan said he was there as part of the General Assembly's "day in court" program. "When a lawyer is before the judge, he has a little time to think about what he is going to say before it's his turn at bat" Jordan said of the experience.

"But a judge is always at bat and has to stay on his toes all the time." During Jordan's senate tenure, he has served as vice chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee and on that body's government operations, environment and conservation and transportation committees. Please see JORDAN on 2W Taillos- df dkfe mmm feud first elected to the State Senate almost eight years ago on a platform supporting term limits, imposed them on himself Sept 16. He will complete the 1998 session a JORDAN enainS in APru or May. "I am looking forward to continu- f- t1 jfi mm La q-k 'VW -33 11 papa bL fl te- Iff 1. vrJi'.

i 9 njF i i 1 I 1 Harris, Jackson team up to recount Dates from Hell. Py LAURA mu. Staff Writer FRANKLIN Everybody's had at least one of those romantic low points, those evenings when Prince Charming turns out to be a frog with an attitude, or the girl of your dreams takes off with the guy at the next table. They're the dates that begin with the promise of heaven and end as bona fide dates from hell. Hopefully, you're laughing at the memory by now or at least not wincing in pain.

And if that's the case, Mike Harris and Victoria Jackson want to hear from you for their new book, Dotes From Hell Got a story you think belongs in Dates From Hell? You can submit stories directly on the Internet at www. or send it to the authors via e-mail at dfhinfobt1.com. You may also fax stories to (615) 269-9765 or mail them to victoria Jackson and Mike Harris, P.O. Box 60393, Nashville, TN-37206-0393. You must send your correct name and address, although you may ask that it not be used In the book.

The Dates From Hell Internet web page can be accessed at www. (And a Few Moments Made in, Heaven). The title says it all. Both happily married (to other people), Jackson and Harris knew from their own experiences that bad dates can make for hilarious storytelling. If they'd survived to laugh about it Taking Flight table.

ymmm 1 over the place," says Harris, a native of Rochester, England, and now a Franklin-based artist and writer whose credits include America's Dumbest Criminals. "The stories people tell us are wonderful. It seems to be kind of therapeutic, I think, for people to share their nightmares." He and Jackson hit on the idea JOHN PARTIPILO STAFF Victoria Jackson and Mike Harris sort through nightmarish, but funny, tales of dating horror for their new book, Dates From Hell (And a Few Momenta Made In Heaven). It's an odd time of year, this post-Halloween lull, when you find yourself simultaneously digging petrified pumpkin seeds out of the living room rug, clipping turkey recipes from magazines and making lists of Christmas chores. The media, the stores, even some actual people I know have been fa-la-la-la-la-ing for weeks now.

Me I'm still sluggishly resisting the prompting of retailers to get on with it ignoring countdowns of shopping days and making lame speeches in the "doesnt anyone care about Thanksgiving any more" mode. Fact is, I'm hopelessly far behind on Christmas preparations, unless I get to count the three lonely presents on the top shelf of the closet as a good start I didnt mean for this to happen again. Every Christmas Eve, as I'm crawling around under the bed trying to find the elusive scotch tape at 2 a.m., I renew an ancient vow. I'll nev-. er go shopping at the last minute again, I swear, with the fervor of Scarlett in the ruins of Tara.

I promise, I say to myself, to start shopping the day after Christmas. We'l, maybe the week after. Having gotten myself off my back with that promise, of course, I'm free to backslide for another year, blithely bypassing January white sales and midsummer clearances. Fortunately, people who sell things at Christmas understand my problem and are more than willing to help. They publish volumes and volumes of brightly colored advertising pages which they stuff into newspapers and deliver right to my door so I can do most of my shopping at the kitchen table.

Sunday, after I'd parked the fork lift I used to get the paper from the driveway to the den, I was amazed to see what was still there to be bought I flipped through ads for appliances (who really wants an electric can opener for CJiristaias?) and jewelry (or a cubic zirconia bracelet for that matter) and then found myself irresistibly drawn to the mini-magazine from Toys Know Who. You'd think when your children get older the promise of savings on Baby Pick Me Up and Hot Wheels Volcano Blowout would lose their appeal. But once a Fisher Price junkie, always a Fisher Price junkie I Ve found even if your precious babies are more into Jane's Addiction. Some things never change, Christmas to Qirisbnas. I was delighted to see that among the state-of-the-art toys for the approaching millenium are a number of classics.

Barbie is still valiantly trying to be all things to all little girls, skateboarding with her dog Ginger, applying cosmetics at her vanity table, driving her hot pink roadster, performing root canal procedures on children. Gloworm, as-toundingly, is still lighting kids' way to bed, though he's no longer a bilious shade of green. The Little Tykes coupe has undergone a re-design and now looks positively sleek. And Barnie? Well, Barnie is forever, although the big purple guy with the goofy half smile has taken on a couple of new affectations. For $1155 you can hug your basic fuzzy 12-inch Barney, unadorned.

Add another eight bucks and Barney will say seven or more phrases (battery included). And for the best of Barney, just cough up $99.99 and Interactive Barney can be yours. He sings. He dances. He's got a vocabulary.

And with his special TV or PC pack and transmitter Barney will interact with your children, which you, on the other hand, will be entirely too fatigued to do Christmas Day. Now, if we could just teach him to shop. Reporter Laura Hill lives in Franklin. Her column runs Mondays and Wednesdays. Write to her at the address below or by e-mail to Monday-Friday in The Tennessean Tennessean Publisher Craig Moon General Manager and Editor Ted Power Advertising Manager Sara McKissick Write: Williamson AM, 320 Premier Court, Suite 202, FrankSn, Tennessee 37067 E-mail: wiBamtennessean.com For advertising IrrformatJon: 771-5430.

i during what could have been a meeting, if not a date, from hell. He had drawn a caricature of the prominent Nashville businesswoman a not very flattering one, I'm he says) for a Nashville magazine. She saw it called the editor and wanted to buy the original art work loved it thought it was hilarious," she tatives. Ward 2 serves as home to Spring Hill's newest residents in subdivisions like Crown Pointe, Maplelawn, Buckner Place and Cameron Farms. But redrawing lines to contain roughly the same number of people in each ward can be likened to drawing squiggly, squiggly lines on a map of the town.

It can also be a never-ending process, because at any given moment a moving truck is delivering a new family to a new home. "We'd be redrawing lines every month," Hankins said. To add to the confusion, an act enacted by the Tennessee legislature in 1987 mandates that money collected within a ward be spent on im 7 Ac i'U 5' Ward 2 growth sparks calls for redrawn Spring Hill lines says). The two met at her office to review his portfolio and "two minutes later I was on the floor laughing," Jackson recalls. "Somehow we ended up talking about less-than-perfect dates and swapping our own dates-from-hell stories and suddenly realized there was a book in it" I Please see TALES on 2W provements or maintenance in that ward, with certain exceptions.

"Anything out of the ordinary that might be put on a town, like emergency police or fire," explained June Quirk, town recorder. And with a new sewage treatment plant penciled on the town's wish list the Ward 2 share of the town's budget would be greater than the other three wards. Former mayor and current alderman Pete Boyd is also against redrawing the lines, and definitely isn't interested in eliminating wards altogether. "We'd end up with five people on I Please see GROWTH on 3W ARSONIST HITS POLICE BUILDING An arsonist who set fires on three floors of the Fraternal Order of Police building appears to have had the law enforcement organization as a target This was an attack on the lodge," said Detective Tommy Heithcock. Three floors of the building on West Main Street were destroyed.

On 10W. they figured other people had some whoppers to share. Armed with a web page and a bunch of business cards, the pair has set about collecting tales of "awful evening, noxious nights, woeful weekends" which Cumberland House Press in Nashville will publish next year. "We're getting stories from all JOHN PARTIPILO STAFF AFTER 50 YEARS IN NASHVILLE, LEE CO. MOVES TO FRANKLIN One of Nashville's best-known family-operated heating and air-conditioning businesses has relocated to Williamson County.

Lee Co. has moved operations, with 350 employees, to a 44,1 36-square-foot building on Mal-lory Station Road. On 5W. Second-grader Grady Mathls, 7, a student at Crockett Elementary School, releases his butterfly during an STC science class. The students in Nancy Sevier's class raised caterpillars until they became butterflies and then released them.

Bv 1ANET LETHCO Staff Writer SPRING HILL As Spring Hill grows, so does Ward 2. But not Ward 1,3 or 4." And that's a problem that keeps popping up at every meeting as the town's eight aldermen try to figure out how to keep town residents fairly represented. "We had some people in Ward 2 complain that they are not fairly represented because of they have more people in their ward," Mayor Ron Hankins said. "They want the lines redrawn so they can have more of an alderman's ear." Each Spring Hill citizen gets to bend four ears, because each ward has two represen HARPETH CENTER OPENS SOON Rekfetone Farms residents will be able to mail a package, deposit a check, rent a video, pick up a gallon of milk, and take the family to dinner an without ever leaving their de-wtopment Harpeth Village Center at Hillsboro Road and Fieldstone Parkway is nearly complete. On 4W.

IfiH Community News 3, 7, 10 Growth and Development 4-6 Things to Do A Schools 9 LEVI WORKERS NEEDED Hickman County workers who wi lose their jobs when a Levi plant in Centerville closes are being courted by local employers. On 1E.