March 28, 2024

The town will be overfull in 11 days

Look for about 20,000 extra people in Creston on July 25 for the RAGBRAI overnight stop.

Most all the plans are in place and ready to go for the event. Now the countdown begins.

The committees have done a ton of work to make the event possible. It has taken many people to make this event come together. A big pre-RAGBRAI “thank you” goes out to everyone who has helped to make this a nice showcase event for Creston.

It was less than six months ago that we found out that RAGBRAI was coming our way. About 2,000 committee meetings later it looks like we are ready for the event. Now if only the weather will cooperate. If you could believe the long-range forecast, it should be around 94 degrees and sunny that Monday. Be sure to put on your smiley faces and welcome all our guests to town.

County fair

The Union County Fair will also be going on the same day as RAGBRAI. In fact, the celebrity beef show will be moved to Tuesday instead of its usual Monday night. The county fair is undergoing some new leadership changes and along with that several changes along the way. The free breakfast will remain each morning which is a good thing. There will still be plenty of 4-H’ers and the demo derby is still on tap. Our staff has been busy covering many of the area county fairs and a few cooler days would not hurt!

Chocolate

For those of you with a sweet tooth for chocolate you may want to keep stocking up on the wonderful dessert. The price of both cocoa beans and sugar keep going up. The cocoa butter is up 21 percent over last year and sugar is up almost 38 percent. Candy companies are starting to raise the prices of their bars and products to account for the move up. If you’re a chocolate lover now is a good time to hoard a fair amount of the products.

Golf

The Olympics added golf to its list of events and boy is that backfiring. You have a number of the world’s best golfers backing out of going to the Olympics. The Zika virus seems to have a lot to do with some people withdrawing. The general conditions in Brazil probably are not helping the situation.

Softball

The Creston Panthers made it back to the State Softball Tournament. It’s back-to-back tournament years for the team. Hopefully they can keep up the momentum and make it all the way to the finals.

Art

The building on the corner of West Adams and North Division streets has had a nice transformation as of late with the addition of a large mural on one side and several colorful inserts on the other side of the building. Kind of makes the place look like “fun!”

Stocks

The stock market hit an all-time high this week. I’m not sure that it helps a lot with the interest rates still being at all-time lows.

It just doesn’t feel like stocks have gone up that much as of late. But here we are at all-time highs! It looks like you need to be more of a stock picker in these times if you want to come out ahead with stock. I think the low gas prices keep as much money in anyone’s pocket as any investment right now. Cheap gas, low interest, high stock market, lots of debt and the dollar and gold going in the same direction. Makes for an interesting combination!

Thought for the week: “The reason grandparents and grandchildren get along so well is that they have a common enemy.” - Sam Levenson