So, there is once again a weekly topic this week; it's Small Town Festivals and not specifically Sauerkraut Days, though much of my personal information and images will be Sauerkraut-related. First, though, this weekend I saw a story which occurred on Friday that is somehow related to reader Andrea B.'s Apprentice field report from that same day: "In New York's first stagecoach accident of the century, two horses led authorities on a wild and woolly chase yesterday, as they broke loose and charged pell-mell along 14th Street. Hero and Princess sent pedestrians scurrying for their lives as the half-ton Percheron ponies bolted with nostrils flaring for several blocks. The wild incident unfolded around 10 a.m. when the stagecoach the horses were pulling — in a publicity stunt for country singer Shania Twain's new perfume — was rear-ended by a van between Eighth and Ninth avenues." As I see it, there are two possibilities: 1) our reader's TwainMobile sighting had no connection to The Apprentice 4, or 2) the other Apprentice 4 team caused New York's first stagecoach accident of the 21st century. Naturally, I am hopeful that it is the latter, and have found this selection from Survival With Style: The Women of the Santa Cruz Mountains by Joan Barriga (1989) that seems to back up this reading of events: "...it soon became apparent that the new apprentice had a special way with horses. Before long Charlie was handling teams, and from there it was a natural progression to becoming a stagecoach driver." Now we just have to wait until the new cast is announced to see if it includes a Charlie. At this point all that we can say with certainty is that Bill Rancic was in the vicinity of an Eau d'Twain promotion in midtown on Friday and that he is overall very good looking.