When I was a kid, I had a number of chores my mother expected me to do every day. One of them was making up my bed, and I really came to hate that particular chore.

With apologies to Rodgers and Hammerstein, these are a few of my favorite things.

I go to the gym about five times a week, and the same thing happens every time I go. I walk in the front door and go over to the desk to check in. I hand the employee my membership card, which she scans. And when she hands it back to me, she always says the same thing.

It’s hot outside. I know this to be a fact for a couple of reasons. First, I’ve been outside. You can’t walk from your house to the mailbox without sweating like you’ve just run the Peachtree Road Race.

I’ve made no secret of the fact that I don’t like thunderstorms, so when one rolled through Gainesville on Friday night, I made a point to keep an eye on the sky.

Hardly a month goes by that I don’t hear or read something that make fun of the Southern accent. I never have understood this. I’m a proud Southerner. Y’all know that.

George Washington stopped by my office last week on his way to spend the 4th of July at the beach. Yes, that George Washington. The father of our country. Scoff if you want, but I talk to the Founding Fathers all the time. What of it? Some people claim to see UFOs. Others hold séances to talk the ghost of their great Aunt Gertrude. I talk to the Founding Fathers.

Ready to feel old today? The ATM machine, a device nearly all of us use in our daily lives, just turned 50 years old. That doesn’t seem possible.