It’s Your Paper…
“I started reading the Northern Sentry as soon as we knew we were coming to the Minot Air Force Base.” We hear that statement so many times over and over again when we introduce ourselves to new faces at a Military Affairs Committee meeting. Having good connections with folks on base is certainly vital to the success of the Northern Sentry, but our connection with base personnel goes a lot further.

The whole purpose of the Northern Sentry is to support the mission of the Minot AFB, whether it be maintaining our calendar of events on northernsentry.com, or sending out our Weekly Post Brief on Fridays to give people a chance to catch the highlights of activity on base.

Unlike other newspapers, the Northern Sentry is 100% online on northernsentry.com at no cost. Our web presence is probably most people’s first contact, and people can certainly continue to read every weekly edition online, but many folks still like the traditional printed paper, and we hand deliver the Northern Sentry to every home and every shop on base, along with making copies available in most popular locations. I bet the Northern Sentry is probably one of the last newspapers in the nation to still have traditional paper delivery (boys & girls).
OK, you have lived on base for a while and you know most of this information, but we all know PCS season is right around the corner, and now is when the phone calls, text messages and emails start to various agencies on base about how to get information about Minot and Minot Air Force Base. Of course, person to person is always good, but if you are someone who is receiving those phone calls:
1) Encourage people to check out northernsentry.com weekly for the latest news and happenings on Minot AFB.
2) Have people sign up for our Weekly Post Brief email newsletter that is sent out every Friday. Our editor, Erin Beene, does an excellent job of creating a synopsis and links to our top stories. You’ll find the sign up application here: https://northernsentry.com/subscribe/

Something else we hear all the time…no other base has a newspaper like the Northern Sentry. We are certainly proud of every weekly edition we print; but it really goes back to what I was taught in Journalism 101 at the University of North Dakota, you have to make your newspaper, their newspaper, and I can say we do everything we can to follow through with that challenge every week.

But You Didn’t Say Anything
I have a friend who reads my columns faithfully…except a couple of weeks last month when he had trouble getting to the grocery store to get a copy of the Northern Sentry.

As fate would have it, he was complaining at our weekly coffee group about not being able to get a copy of the Northern Sentry last week. However, he was in luck. I happened to have extra copies in my car so I ran out to get him a copy and delivered it to him in person.

He opened the paper and went directly to my column and dismissed himself mentally from the conversation taking place at the table about potential city council candidates. When he reached the end of my column he closed the paper without saying a word.

Curiosity got the best of me and I finally had to ask, “so what did you think of my column?” Without hesitation he looked at me and said “you’ve done better. I guess my complaint is that you didn’t say anything.”
I have another friend who will often use the quote “don’t ask if you don’t want to know.” That really fits this situation so well. I probably didn’t really want to hear Jim’s (name changed to protect the innocent) opinion of my article, but I asked, and he felt obliged to not only give me an opinion, but an honest opinion. So, what is the lesson here? Going forward don’t give Jim any more papers with a copy of your article? Well probably not. The lesson is to make sure when you are writing your articles, Rod, you need to say something. So, for this week my “anything” is that I really don’t understand putting up stoplights at an intersection and then shutting them off a few years later. Anyone else agree?

Travelin’ Around
This might not be so much about traveling and more about last week’s windy weather. I honestly was stopped dead in my tracks by one gust of wind. It’s March that is supposed to “Come in like a lion and go out like a lamb.” After last week we could use a little more lamb.

Today’s Chuckle
Only some of us can learn from other people’s mistakes. The rest of us have to be the other people.