Charmed by the snaggletooth grin of the beaming Girl Scout on Facebook, I ordered cookies again this year. There she was, in all of her prepubescent glory: my friend’s daughter, a proud Junior Girl Scout, hoping to sell hundreds of boxes in support of her troop. 

Just before the New Year, I read an interesting statistic: the New Year’s Eve holiday would mark the only time in 200 years when all of children in the world (at least as we in the U.S. define them) would have been born in the 21st century while all of the adults on the Earth were born in the 20th century.

It’s funny sometimes how life’s little coincidences come together. Not long ago, I traveled with friends to Lincoln, Neb., to see the Wisconsin Badgers play the Nebraska Cornhuskers. 

As I prepared this column, the 40th anniversary of the death of Elvis Presley was approaching. I’ve loved Elvis as long as I can remember, and his RCA 2-LP album from the early ’70s serves as the soundtrack for my childhood. (You can take the girl out of the Midwest, but you can’t take the Midwest out of the girl.)

This brief review of good practices can save thousands of dollars for processors looking to purchase a new shell-and-tube exchanger.