Harnett County Schools

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Harnett County Schools: Wake County Public Schools will dismiss two-and-half (2.5) hours early on Monday, Jan. 10, due to anticipated winter weather.

Wake County parents are encouraged to monitor http://www.wcpss.net/ and local newscasts on Monday to keep abreast of the situation.

Harnett County Schools are closed for students and an optional teacher workday.

Johnston County Schools Early Dismissal at 10:00 am today, Mon., Jan. 10

School systems that closed during Thursday's icy conditions have set make-up days. At least one will catch up the missed day before Christmas.

Harnett County schools will be open to students on Monday, with an early release.

Lee County Schools will make up the day Jan. 3.

Cumberland and Moore counties will be in school on Feb. 21.

A Moore County Schools spokesman said Monday "was on our calendar as a make-up day, but we made a decision because it was so close and people would already have plans for the holidays, that we would have it on (Feb.) 21st."

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Winter weather blocks view of meteors.

Today's storm also will serve as a celestial show-stopper, with clouds likely obscuring remnants of one of the year's larger meteor showers.

After unseasonably warm temperatures over the weekend and high temperatures in Reno on Monday exceeding 60 degrees, another storm is headed for the region today.

Rain and winds gusting up to 55 mph are expected in the Reno-Carson area today, while light snow in the mountains should intensify through the day into tonight.

It's really a "run of the mill" December storm, but it represents a change, said Alex Hoon, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Reno.

"It's definitely a return to a more winter pattern," Hoon said.

Along Sierra ridges, winds today could gust in excess of 100 mph. Snow levels are expected to start high but lower to Lake Tahoe or below later in the day.

Up to 18 inches of snow might fall along the Sierra crest, with 6 to 12 inches expected above 7,000 feet. Several inches of snow are possible around Lake Tahoe.

"The snow is going to accumulate pretty fast," Hoon said. "It's definitely going to cause some travel issues.

Pomplamoose helps local schools

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Pomplamoose helps local schools.

He online success of a Marin County musical duo on YouTube is translating into thousands of needed book donations for school students in Richmond.

Book donors, in turn, get to download the Christmas album by Jack Conte and Nataly Dawn, known to their fans as the act Pomplamoose.

Pomplamoose sold some 100,000 songs online last year, and the YouTube video channel PomplamooseMusic has almost 210,000 subscribers who track releases by the duo.

Tyler Hester, a ninth-grade English teacher at the Leadership Public Schools charter high school in Richmond, has been close friends since college with Conte and Dawn and suggested leveraging the group's online popularity to bring books to low-income students.the site's donation counter showed 3,708 donors sending 4,179 books.

The Richmond Book Drive site has full details about the donation/download offer and a link to amazon.com, which has a wish list of needed books. Donors make a purchase, put the Leadership School as the delivery address and then are directed to a "thank you" page where they can download the Christmas album in return.

WEST COUNTY NOTES: A new group dedicated to stemming the tide of violence among young men is holding a kickoff event at 4 p.m. today at Peter's Rock Deliverance Temple Church of God in Christ, 4739 Foothill Blvd. in Oakland. One of the founders of the Grieving Mothers Unite group is Peggy Walker, of Richmond, whose son, Carlnell Walker, was killed in 2006 as he prepared for his junior year at Morehouse College, a historically black college in Atlanta.

Organizers want to reach out to other mothers who have lost their children to violence and hope they will come to hear and further the group's goals, which include helping victims' families cope with the loss and providing assistance and guidance to young people trying to break out of the cycle of violence.

Crystal Bowersox: The Reality Rocks

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Crystal Bowersox: The Reality Rocks

Many past "American Idol" contestants have milked personal sob stories to increase their likability factor, but during Season 9, runner-up Crystal Bowersox only needed to rely on her immense talent to get all the way to the finale. She kept much of her personal life tightly under wraps during the show, but still, viewers couldn't help but detect a depth of pain and hard-won life experience behind her quiet, steely exterior.

When I recently got the chance to interview Crystal over at Sony Music headquarters in Los Angeles, talk about her goal to not make a typical "cheesy" Idol album and the possibility of her crossing over to the country market soon led (around the 4:30 mark in the video below) to a heartfelt discussion about her album's "here I am, this is my story, take it or leave it" statement song.

It's definitely autobiographical. I never want to talk about my mother poorly because she did the best she could...She was a single mom of three kids. That is not easy...We were poor and she would get frustrated and she didn't know how to deal with her emotions, and she'd turn to drinking and things would get physical a lot in our house growing up...There was constant chaos, cops on the lawn, physical fights and stuff. A lot of my youth was very dark and ugly. But I don't see 'Farmer's Daughter' as a dark song, because for me it was healing.

Crystal Bowersox

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Crystal Bowersox.

Crystal Bowersox captured our hearts on American Idol, and her career is definitely taking off thanks to the show. With her debut album, Farmers Daughter, finally being released, Crystal Bowersox is an all-American success story that everyone should feel inspired by.Here are five things you may not know about Crystal Bowersox’s untold story.

1. Crystal Bowersox didn’t tell American Idol producers her whole story, because she didn’t want America voting for her because they felt sorry for her.

2. Before American Idol, Crystal Bowersox dug through garbage cans for food and slept on park benches.

3. When her son was born, she couldn’t afford a crib, so he slept in a Moses basket on her nightstand. (Crystal did say that her son is getting a race car bed this Christmas.

4. Some of the lyrics on Farmers Daughter suggest that she was the child of an alcoholic, and was abused.

5. Crystal Bowersox admits that her upbringing was “dark and ugly.”

Be sure to get Crystal Bowersox’s new album, Farmer’s Daughter. It’s sure to be a hit!