One industry that has not slowed down during this major economic downturn is the solicitation of money for an amazing number of causes, most of them worthwhile.

    I expect that your mail is like ours, full of these pleas for funds. And once you start reading these expertly presented explanations of why the money should be sent you are likely to feel a need to steady yourself and consider whether sending a check is really something you want to do.

    The telephone solicitations for money also are well scripted. Again, if you listen you might well be drawn in. The callers are good at what they do.

    At our house we have gotten to the point where we try to keep in mind that the fund drives which make the most sense to support are those closest to home. That pleasing voice on the unexpected phone call may be coming from anywhere in the country and really all you know is what the caller is telling you. And you don’t know just how the money is being spent.

    One thing is sure, a person cannot possibly send money to everyone who asks for it.

    Americans are naturally generous and helpful but the constant requests for contributions may well be turning some people off and as a result legitimate fund drives could be losing support they deserve.

    *****

    Dover’s City Council had a tough choice to make in trimming its budget — set up a system of unpaid furlough days or actually fire some employees. The vote was for the former course and it strikes me as a good move. Better to make it possible for everyone to keep getting their paychecks than to drop people.

    It is worth noting that Dover is fortunate to have employees of high caliber. They are a credit to the capital city.

    *****

    The J.M. Smucker Co., maker of jams and jellies, uses a slogan that says “With a Name Like Smuckers, It Has To Be Good,” a humorous acknowledgement that “Smuckers” is not exactly a euphonic name. It tends to grate on the ear.

    But in this recession Smuckers somehow is one of the few companies doing better. It’s fiscal fourth-quarter earnings more than doubled, according to a Wall Street Journal news story. One of the reasons is that Smuckers last November bought Proctor & Gamble Company’s Folgers coffee business and the coffee segment’s side of the combined businesses is doing very well.

    Good products with good management in a free enterprise economy will survive and prosper, although in some cases it may take longer.

    *****

    At one time years ago I frequently used a pair of nippers, which is what small oyster tongs are called, and put out in a rowboat in a Chesapeake Bay cove and gathered in oysters. They don’t run, of course. They just lie there. “Catching” oysters gives a false impression of somehow nabbing them. Actually, in fairly shallow water, it’s not that hard to dredge up a batch of oysters, assuming they are down there in the first place.

    Because of this pastime, and because oysters are very good indeed to eat, I have accumulated a half dozen or so oyster knives. The requirement for an oyster knife is that it have a sharp point to wedge between the upper and lower shells of an oyster. The blade also has to be strong. A sharp edge isn’t necessary.

    In recent years I haven’t done any oyster shucking but the knives are useful as letter openers.

    It was while using an oyster knife in that fashion a few days ago that I opened a letter and for convenience, not a bright move, stuck the oyster knife in the side of my left shoe after crossing my left leg over my right.

    A few minutes later I got up suddenly and felt a sharp pain in my left foot. I had just been self-stabbed by an oyster knife!

    I didn’t take off my sock then to check the damage but it was evident enough when I got out of a shower the next morning. There was the oyster knife puncture point, now with a scab.

    It was some perverse comfort to know that I was probably a unique individual. Who else in the country that morning could say that he had a self-inflicted oyster knife wound in his left foot?

    *****

    Seeing some of the clips of Ed McMahon clowning around with Johnny Carson on Carson’s late night show of many years ago brought back how enjoyable that show was. The clips, of course, were being played because Ed McMahon had just died at the age of 86.

    I never met McMahon but did graduate from Catholic University in Washington, which also was his alma mater. At the time he was there, a year or two before I was, C.U. was well known for its drama program, which was associated with the late Helen Hayes, among other theater notables. I took one drama course from Walter Kerr, who went on to become the well-known drama critic for the New York Times.

    Johnny Carson was good but he was ever so much better with Ed McMahon as a foil. Perhaps a TV station some day will replay a series of the old shows. I’m sure they would still bring laughs.

    *****

    Two city slickers went duck hunting for the first time. They worked at it for a couple of hours and finally one of them said to the other, “I wonder why we aren’t getting any ducks?”

    And the other guy says, “I don’t know. I wonder if we’re throwing the dog high enough!”