FARMVILLE, Va. — On the basketball court, Tyler Strange is always on the move. A starting junior point guard for Division 1 Gardner-Webb in North Carolina, the Leominster resident is constantly shouting out defensive instructions to his teammates or calling for the ball on offense.

A Notre Dame Prep product who is generously listed at 5-foot-10, Strange sported a goatee and an intense demeanor when Gardner-Webb posted a Big South Conference victory over Longwood here on Wednesday night.

Told in high school he would never play Division 1 basketball, Strange is now a crowd favorite at Gardner-Webb, located in the small North Carolina town of Boiling Springs. Strange is toiling for a mid-major far from home.

“Growing up, everyone always told me I wouldn’t even play Division 3 basketball,” Strange said after scoring 10 points with four assists in an 82-62 win over Longwood. “I have always had that on my back. ‘You are not going to be able to do that. You are not going to be do this.’ That is my fuel. I have to prove myself every night.”

So does Strange play with a chip on his shoulder? After all, Gardner-Webb was the only Division 1 school to

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The restauranthas a home-style approach to its plating. A thick slab of meatloaf came dressed with gravy, an adequate serving of mac and cheese, and two measly stalks of asparagus. And, while the three large tables may have gobbled up all the asparagus, our meal arrived much quicker then I expected.

Aside from the proportions being a bit off, the meatloaf was good, moist on the inside with a bit of a crust. The addition of bacon gave it good texture. The gravy was well done, yielding an earthy flavor that was not too acidic. But, there was not enough rosemary in the sauce to warrant a mention in the title. The mac and cheese was what you’d expect in a home-style mac and cheese, a little crispy on top from being baked, but completely engulfed in creamy cheese sauce. In a word, it was delightful.

My wife ordered the “Sassy” garlic-crusted char-grilled chicken. Again, the portions were a little off. The chicken — thin, boneless skinless cutlets dredged in a garlic crust — was served in abundance. It too was served with the same mac and cheese as my dish, but the vegetable

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“I slept for an hour and it was not comfortable,” Troy said. “Most people sat the entire night with no food, no water, no bathroom. We saw people who had children. It was a dire situation.”

After daybreak, a few good Samaritans appeared, going car-to-car with bottles of water and cookies. Traffic started moving again about 8:30.

At Atlanta’s Deerwood Elementary School, librarian Brian Ashley spent Tuesday night with a dozen of his colleagues and 35 children on cots in the gym.

The teachers and other staff members opened up the pantry in the cafeteria, making pizza and chicken nuggets with carrots and apples for dinner. Later, some police officers dropped off sandwiches, and parents living nearby brought food.

“The kids slept peacefully through the night,” Ashley said. “They knew that there were people around them that cared about them.”

However, Ashley said officials never should have allowed the schools to open Tuesday.

“They were forewarned about the weather, and they were ill-prepared,” he said. “If schools were canceled yesterday, we would not have had the catastrophe we did last night and today.”

About 1,000 arrivals and departures were

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Buncombe County TDA board members include Bob Patel, chair, and Stephanie Brown, executive director of Asheville Convention and Visitors Bureau (center). (Carrie Eidson/ Mountain Xpress)

The Buncombe County Tourism Development Authority held its monthly board meeting on Wednesday, Jan. 29. Items on the agenda included a first look at the new Foodtopia marketing campaign and a study recommending changes to the Tourism Product Development Fund.

Board members Marla Tambellini and Anne Elwell presented a new initiative for Foodtopia, the Asheville Area Chamber of Commerce’s food-centric marketing campaign, built around the key message, “Asheville is where free-spirited food-enthusiasts come to play.”

The presentation included plans for further development of a logo and tagline, new advertisements with digital components including profiles of area foodies and food institutions, a tablet-based E-book and public and private events. The campaign’s suggested budget — $82,500 — did not include proposed media outreach costs, such as purchased slots on broadcast programming. Response to the proposal, which will be discussed further at the TDA’s next meeting, Feb. 26, was mixed — with one board member calling mock-ups of the new

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The Blue Ridge Parkway is closed today through the Asheville corridor, as swell as most of the rest of the parkway in North Carolina for snow, ice, winter, cold, all of those end-of-January conditions.

Got snowshoes? Head to the Blue Ridge Parkway.

However, the parkway is open at Mileposts 384.5-384.7 at U.S. 74 to access the Blue Ridge Parkway Visitor Center, and from 382-382.5 at U.S. 70/Tunnel Road to access the Folk Art Center, which are both open today.

It is 8 degrees in Asheville, -8 with the wind chill, and the roads are heavily snow and ice-covered and treacherous, which is translated to mean – don’t go out driving if you don’t have to!

You can access the parkway in most places by foot if you have really good, waterproof boots.  You can hike, snowshoe, cross-country ski and walk the dog. But remember, unless you have an Alaskan Husky, dogs are not typically snow and ice creatures and should be properly protected, just like you’d protect a child in the cold. They have warm vests and booties for dogs at any pet shop or outdoor gear store

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