Horse Manure Park

A friend of mine posted this on her Facebook page and it is well worth sharing here. The small town of Bertha, MN, (the town from which I graduated high school) holds its own piece of baseball history.  I remember my dad talking about this man and how good he was (I don't know if my dad ever saw him play, though).  Almost 100 years after he left Bertha, they still talk about him. The Greatest Pitcher You've Never Heard Of:  John Donaldson

I seem to be on a blogging roll here.  I've nearly made as many entries this month as I've made in January and February combined.  That's okay, that's what a blog is for... blogging.  Right? Beth is feeling better.  Amazing what antibiotics can do for a person.  And she managed not to miss a single day of work. I've been working on a lot of Farm Fest stuff lately.  I'm not sure what I'll do with myself if we ever stop doing Farm Fest.  It occupies a lot of my time in late winter/early spring. Some of my recent projects include: Designing invitations and a t-shirt order form in a blog format, so that everything will be available in one place.   Finishing the "Prom" music for Thursday night (a mix of pretty much everything - 60's, disco, 80's, country... and more).  Fun party music! The biggest accomplishment is that I finished the 2011 t-shirt design already.  I think it turned out very nice (but what do you expect me to say...

Another day, another blog entry.  How about that? The dryer got fixed today.  The repairman said the blower belt was installed wrong at the factory - it was put on backwards or something - and slipped off, which in turn caused the thermostat to burn out.  Installed wrong at the factory!  I guess it is hard to find good help anywhere these days. Of course, it was totally covered by warranty, but if it wasn't the total damage would have been $177.  Dodged a bullet there. In other news, when I got home this morning, I found poor Beth in a bad way.  She has been battling a cold/upper respiratory infection for the last 10 days and she was miserable when I got home.  She hadn't slept and her head/jaw/eyes were killing her.  No doubt about it: this was sinusitis.  So I got her into Urgent Care at 9:10 AM and she finally got some antibiotics.  I hope she feels better soon.  I don't like to see her sick. Well, it is almost time for w...

Well the weatherman got it pretty close to right this time.  We didn't get 14 inches of snow like they were predicting, but we got enough to piss me off. It snowed hard all night with a 20 to 30 MPH wind so it is hard to tell how much we really got, but NOAA's preliminary measurement for this area is 8 inches and I think that sound about right, based on the crap I had to shovel this afternoon. You could say March is going out like a lion.  I'll say it again: boys basketball tournament = winter snow storm.  And how. The best part is the first day of spring was on the 20th.  Forty-eight hours later we get the biggest snowfall of the year (at least in this area). Oh, Irony, you cruel Mistress.

Geez, I think they might be getting serious about this.  The National Weather Service has cried "wolf" much of this winter season (at least in this area).  It is getting hard to take these guys seriously, but here is what they've got posted this evening: ...WINTER STORM WARNING IN EFFECT FROM 7 AM TUESDAY TO 7 PM CDT WEDNESDAY... THE WINTER STORM WATCH IS NO LONGER IN EFFECT. * TIMING AND LOCATION: AN INTENSE LATE WINTER STORM WILL AFFECT THE BRAINERD LAKES REGION...SAINT CROIX RIVER VALLEY...AND HAYWARD TO PHILLIPS AREA TUESDAY THROUGH WEDNESDAY. THE STORM WILL BRING A MIX OF HEAVY SNOW...FREEZING RAIN AND SLEET TO THESE AREAS. * SNOW AND ICE ACCUMULATION: 10 TO 14 INCHES OF SNOW IS EXPECTED BY WEDNESDAY LATE AFTERNOON...WITH ICE ACCUMULATIONS UP TO TENTH OF AN INCH.

Sunday night, the end of another week.  That means, of course, a new week starts tomorrow.  That's the way it works. So back on January 26th we had new appliances delivered, including a new dryer.  We managed to go a whole 52 days before running into our first glitch.  Yep, our dryer is on the fritz.  The good news is we purchased a "head to toe" service and repair plan from Sears.  The bad news is the broken-English, impossible-to-understand person who we called (probably outsourced to India) said that no one is available to repair the appliance until Thursday.  Funnier still, she actually asked, "When would you like the dryer repaired?"  The answer was "Today."  The reply was, "I'm sorry, no one is available in your area until Thursday." Then why the hell did you even ask?  I know I could have called a local repair service and they would have been here right away, but we bought this plan, so by golly we are going to use it. I...

I'm always excited to share new music with my friends, and if you are reading this, I must presume you are my friend! First, credit where it's due:  My nephew Ross sent me an e-mail not too long ago and asked me if I had ever heard of this group and he sent a link to their appearance on the Dave Letterman Show.  He said he thought I'd like them.  I guess Ross has got me pretty well pegged. If I had judged a book by its cover, I wouldn't have even watched the performance.  Here were four hairy, scruffy-looking guys just standing there - an acoustic guitar, banjo, keyboards and upright bass.  That's it.  Oh, and a bass drum played by the guitar player, who was dressed in a red and black Paul Bunyan-type flannel shirt. Put it this way, these blokes would not have survived on Sunset Strip circa 1987. And their name hardly aroused my curiosity:  Mumford & Sons... sounds like an upscale men's clothing shop. Then they started playing.  Wow!...

Wow, another post?  Can you tell I am trying to stay awake?  Is anybody out there? * silence * Oh well, I have a tendency to talk to myself quite often anyway.  I'm good company, just ask me. Daylight Savings Time was last night, which meant I only had to work seven hours.  That did not suck.  It still seemed like a long night, though.  Two more shifts to go, then an eight hour class on Thursday.  At least I get paid for it.  It's all good.  Or pretty good.  ...well, maybe it's all okay.  Yeah, it's okay. I'm still waiting for all this damn snow to melt.  The eaves drip and tease me -- sort of like waving a sirloin in front of a hungry coyote.  But there is a lot of that white crap out there.  This will take a while to go away. Meanwhile, the Vernal Equinox (as opposed to the Venereal Equinox) is next Sunday.  Aaaaah, spring is just a week away.  That's reassuring, but I don't see many flowers bloo...

Back home after spending last evening and part of today in Parkers Prairie.  It was a sad couple of days; at the same time it was nice to see my aunts, uncles and cousins again, and to get a chance to visit if only for a little while.  Call it bittersweet. It makes me even more determined to have Farm Fest every year.  Before we started organizing that annual get together, I'd only see my cousins for the occasional funeral and wedding, and maybe the odd anniversary here and there, but such gatherings were some times years apart.  I joked with some of my family today that it is a lot more fun to get together to play music and drink beer.  Everyone laughed.  (And agreed.) So now our schedules (sort of) go back to normal.  I work tonight through Monday night.  Beth has weekend duty through Sunday.  I have an all-day class next Thursday (which Beth took this Thursday).  My class is on St. Patrick's Day.  Beth told me it is a "brain...

Oh, the winter blues.  Anyone else absolutely sick of winter?  Around the third week of February I start getting sick, sick, SICK of winter, even though by that time April is just five or six weeks away (about the same amount of time between Thanksgiving and New Year's Day -- which seems to fly by).  Time just seems to c...r...a...w...l towards the end of winter. Worse yet, we are bound to get a big snowstorm before it is all said and done.  The basketball tournaments always guarantee a snowstorm.  That's what my dad always said, and he was invariably right. This is the beginning of a long week.  Working when I don't normally work.  Off when I'm normally on.  Funeral on Friday.  A long week. I've stumbled upon a new band which I really like a lot, thanks to my nephew Ross.  I will post more about them later, since I'm always eager to share new, great music. Time now to get ready for the whirlwind week.

Boy, it has been a rough couple of weeks.  Swede Stokes passed away on February 19th.  Swede was one of the "good ones."  He was an old family friend and a great friend of my dad's.  They spent many hours together solving the world's problems, playing cards, drinking Grain Belt... he was a man dear to my heart.  And his youngest son happens to be my son's godfather. Click here to view a five minute slideshow celebrating Swede's life .  It is very well done and well worth your time if you knew the man we all knew as "Swede." <<>> <<>> And more sad news.  Yesterday, my mom's sister, Glenice ("Tissy" as she will always be known to me), lost her long and fiercely fought battle with cancer.  She was the toughest woman I've ever known.  She was knocked down many times, and got up every time to fight some more.  She never complained.  She never felt sorry for herself.   Eventually, though, the f...