Today's column reflects its nature -- randomness.

Synonyms for "random" are haphazard, casual, desultory, lack of definite aim or fixed goal. (Actually, its goal is 625 to 675 words.)

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Trent Loos wrote this in his March 17 "Loos Tales" column for The High Plains Journal.

He is convinced that this is something this country can accomplish by being better than anybody else globally in the efficient conversion of natural resources to human consumable products.

"We must remind our leaders on a daily basis that the resources we have here on U.S. soil are to be utilized and not simply preserved."

Last year, North Dakota farmers led the nation in total wheat production for the first time since 1996, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture rankings released in early March.

"For North Dakota farmers, it's a source of pride to top rival Kansas," the HPJ commented.

The coverage area of Smoky Hills Public Television, with headquarters in Bunker Hill, includes 53 counties in the west and middle areas of Kansas and parts of three other counties.

Bunker Hill? It's just off U.S. Highway 70 in Russell County.

"The end of 2007 brought to a close another year marked by staggering levels of racist hate in America," according to the latest annual count by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC).

It reported that the number of hate groups operating in America rose to 888, up 5 percent from 844 groups in 2006, capping an increase of 48 percent since the year 2000.

FBI statistics suggested that there was a 35 percent rise in hate crimes against Latinos between 2003 and 2006.

"Experts believe that such crimes are typically carried out by people who think they are attacking immigrants," SPLC reported.

It continued: "Although there were some signs that nativist hatred may be starting to abate, you wouldn't know that by listening to the furious rants of many groups."

Happenings. The program for Buhler High School's "Spring Play Comedy Night" includes "The Devious Doings of Oozley Mudslime or Mother Knows Best," "The Kissing Bandit," "Going Down" and "The Audition."

A "Dessert Dinner with Table and Chairs" is billed by the Hutchinson

Theatre Guild.

Cruise Night at the Kansas Cosmosphere & Space Theatre in Hutchinson requires that "Dress is cruise wear casual with no jeans." Proceeds will go to the Sexual Assault Domestic Violence Center and the Environmental Protection Agency.

"Climate Connections" is the name of the program airing from 4 to 9 a.m. on weekdays on Radio Kansas.

NIMBY is an the acronym for Not in My Back Yard.

Michael Chertoff, Homeland Security Secretary, has one that is similar -- NIMTOF. In U.S. News & World Report magazine, he attacked the NIMTOF trend by administrations and politicians to reject big projects that won't be completed in time for them to get credit.

NIMTOF (Not in My Term of Office), he explained, is the tendency for the political process not to want to spend money unless the fruits and the benefits are harvested within an election cycle.

"If praise is your goal," Chertoff preaches, "go to the private sector."

At the Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library in Abilene on April 10, Mel Marmer discussed "Baseball and the Presidency."

And in late March, Catherine Lewis presented a program at the library. She's the author of "Don't Ask What I Shot." I don't know whether or not that was the topic of her presentation. Wish I knew who to ask.

E-mail Dolores Hope at dandchope@juno.com.