Some mornings, it’s part of my job to scan The Associated Press wire service feed and select stories to appear on news section pages. Those are mornings when the task of designing pages falls into my set of responsibilities..

It’s distressing, of course, that so much of what’s available from state, national and international news sources can be depressing or horrifying or mind-blowing. Then there are some days when the set of stories are quite a mix of the terrible, the amusing, the amazing and the mundane.

Two stories from Thursday afternoon’s wire feed, well, I could not help comparing and contrastring them. The first is an item detailing that Khloe Kardashian has a talk show on television’s FYI channel that’s debuting in January, and the second reports the passing of Melissa Mathison. What makes me sad is my best guess is the percentage of people who know who Miss Kardashian is far outstrips the number who recognize the latter. Miss Karadashian, of course, is one of the seemingly endless number of Kardashian-Jenner family members who are famous for being famous.

If I quizzed people prior to the last few days when her name has been in the news about who Melissa Mathison was, my estimate is maybe 5 percent would have been able to say. For those who don’t know, Ms. Mathison wrote the screenplays to beautiful, wonderful films like “E.T. the Extra Terrestrial,” “The Indian in the Cupboard” and “The Black Stallion.” She was 65 when cancer claimed her life.

Of course, I doubt Ms. Mathison would have wanted to be in a Kardashian-type media circus. She probably got at least a taste of that paparazzi-infused life when she was married to Harrison Ford from 1983-2004. But she was a woman of substance whose contributions to the world have brought joy to moviegoers and will continue to be rediscovered and loved by families looking for something to watch together. Those are the names I like to see on the news wire for things other than they passed away.

Another story that same day was slugged “Oprah’s Favorite Things” and discussed the media mogul’s list, released just hours before, of fabulous items in myriad categories. Those items, the AP story indicated, are expected to become best-sellers during the holiday gift buying season.

Which is all well and good, I suppose. Except another story that afternoon was titled “Not So Happy” and related how people over the age of 30 are not as happy as past generations in that age bracket were … and that made me think of the Oprah list.

While I wasn’t a regular watcher when Ms. Winfrey had her long-running syndicated talk show, there were many times when the topics shared were thought-provoking, fascinating and profound. The “Oprah’s Favorite Things” episodes were not. While I realize many people looked forward to that annual hour, for me, it was a gigantic turnoff as the frenzy it created was too much for me to watch.

The frenzy was parodied on “Saturday Night Live” and included people ripping their arms off in the over zealous excitement. That’s how all that noise and confusion felt to me.

Ellen DeGeneres, whose talk show I have praised in the space before, has something similar in her holiday “12 Days of Christmas” giveaway. People about lose their minds when they find out they, for whatever reason, will be in the audience of one of the “12 Days” shows. That’s even before they are sitting in the audience for the actual giveaway.

Once I tried to watch one of these giveaway shows last year and couldn’t sit through it..

Which brings me to the fourth story, “Not So Happy.” Maybe the frenzy over these extravagant Christmas gifts is an indicator of why so many people report they are not happy. Because not everyone gets to have “Oprah’s Favorite Things” or Ellen’s 12 days of gift splendor.

If any of us are looking for these items to boost our joyfulness factor, then we are in trouble. There is nothing wrong with wanting and enjoying nice things, but the lack of those items should not be a happiness wrecker. That envy for those who do “have” can be a roadblock to contentment.

Of course, there are many other factors that lead to being “not so happy” and the story also noted that one in three American adults surveyed indicated they were “very happy.”

Which group are you in?

Editor’s note: Renee Prusi can be contacted at 906-228-2500, ext. 240.