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After Santa has made his way back to the North Pole, after all the children have ripped open wrapping paper and torn apart boxes, and after parents have cleaned up the mess in their living rooms, someone has to deal with all the trash.

"Oh yeah, we've had lots of trash," said Cheryl Whatley, a dispatcher for BFI, Bibb County's refuse company.

And some of the biggest potential trash problems will come in the next few weeks when City Council resumes its meetings after a holiday lull. "When those meetings resume, we'll have some SERIOUS trash flying around here and a lot of manure, too," said Charlie Brigand, a custodian at Macon's City Hall. "The good thing is we have lots of manure to pile up with all those shredded Christmas trees. The manure really helps all the organic materials to compost much better and make better bedding for plantings," Brigand said. "In fact, we have so much manure, we even invite neighboring counties to send their trees here to be chipped and composted with our manure. It's a win-win situation as long as you're not the one cleaning up all the manure."

 Mayor: Maconites should reach out to Rocker and kick his backside

Atlanta Braves relief pitcher and Macon native John Rocker made some pretty outlandish comments to a Sports Illustrated reporter and grossed out thousands of passersby with a revolting hocker---prompting some New Yorkers to call him "Rocker the Hocker." Macon Mayor Jack Ellis is attempting to mop up the damage---so to speak.

In an interview with cable sports network ESPN, Ellis said Rocker, 25, is young and made a big mistake - but residents of his hometown cannot turn their backs on one of their own. "At least not until they're out of spitting range," Ellis said

"Of course he owes an apology to Macon," Ellis said. "He owes an apology to Major League Baseball. He owes an apology to people with weak stomachs. But mostly, he owes an apology to toll-booth operators."

But, Ellis added, though area residents should distance themselves from Rocker's hocker, they should not distance themselves from Rocker himself. Staying beyond spitting range is understandable but we shouldn't distance ourselves too much. Now more than ever, Rocker needs a hometown to stand behind him in position to boot his backside as he accepts the consequences of his hocker, Ellis said.

Shortly before Christmas, an issue of Sports Illustrated quoted Rocker in a verbal tirade against New York City residents, foreigners, various ethnic groups, people with AIDS, homosexuals and several other groups. And amazingly, he hocked up a big "lugie" and spit on a tollbooth with SI reporters in the vehicle.

Ellis said he hopes that Rocker will learn from his mistakes and, one day, be able to teach others about his problems with spitting. "At least it wasn't tobacco juice like so many major leaguers spit," Ellis said.

Some people in Macon won't be ushering in the year 2000 with champagne or good luck smooches. They have no choice. "You are the men and women who don't have the luxury of celebrating," Macon Mayor Jack Ellis told a group gathered at the Macon Police Training Academy on Jackson Street. "I, on the other hand, will be partying big time...er----but, never mind that. You must be ready to protect our citizens."

As the plan stood on Monday, the police department is ready for anything. And, the plan can change as needed. Major Gary Adams, head of the patrol division, called the plan a "fluid document" which has been changed numerous times. "I keep spilling my coffee on it. It has brown stains, but I can still read it," Adams said.

"The patrol division will begin double manpower at 8 a.m. on Dec. 31," Adams said. By 10 p.m., the department goes to "emergency crisis operation," which means that there will be even more officers working.

"We're pulling manpower from anywhere we can get it," he said. "We're renting bikes and cars from Florida. We're rounding up volunteers from Broadway, under Second Street bridge, where ever we can find them. If they can stand without swaying too much and speak without slurring too much, we'll swear them in and put them to patrolling."

More than 100 officers will be on the streets during the times of potential Y2K crisis and the police precincts will be manned 24 hours. Marked patrol cars will be everywhere.

The Macon-Bibb County Convention and Visitors Bureau has been working for months in an effort to develop a new advertising campaign slogan.

According to Janice Marshall, president and chief executive officer of the bureau, the slogan had to encompass everything the city had to offer, including the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame, the Tubman African American Museum, the Georgia Music Hall of Fame, historic architecture, the Macon Centreplex and, of course, a diverse history of music.

So what slogan could encompass all those aspects and then some? "The Song and Soul of the South," Marshall said. "It's our 'I love New York.'" Marshall said that, after months of contemplation, the CVB is ready to unveil the new slogan in a ceremony Jan. 5 at the Douglass Theatre.

"It was really a challenge to select a slogan," Marshall said. "We had to wade through a lot of entries. Here are a few of the many we had to reject.

1.Our city council is bigger than yours.

2. Cherry Trees, Cigarettes, Insurance & Zippers: A Great Combo.

3. Our mayor was a car salesman. Stop in and kick the tires!

4. If our lame parody writers were horses, we'd shoot 'em."

"'Soul' seemed to encompass what people look for in the South," Marshall said. "We're just having fun with the word 'soul.' It just lends itself to much of what our campaign is about. Of course, we rejected 'sole' because that would bring to mind shoes and yucky things people might step in. That's not the image we wanted," Marshall said.

Disclaimer: The accounts, quotes and stories on this page are wholly fictitious and intended as satire and humor. Although real names may be used and all good humor has an element of truth, this stuff ain't real. If you didn't already know these stories were bogus, then you're not too bright. --Steve Scroggins