You’d think I didn’t have novels to read and bon-bons to melt in my mouth

The flood of incoming emails, news tips and press releases never ceases. Some days it’s like we’re in the batting cage and somebody cranked the news-fastball-pitch machine speed up to “Lucy and Ethel.”

We find places for most of the incoming,…

Then there were 7

Seven contestants squeaked through “The Snake Pit” of Venture Island North State’s second round on Thursday night:

Gisele Maxwell, Shasta Crystals
Carl Hamon, Country Entrees
Bernadette Butz, Save our Skin SOS
Eric Mogensen, Elements
Kevin Risse, Risse Racing Technology
James Phillips, Inovius
Kimberly Mankins After Baby LLC

Venture…