Land hurricane disrobes my maple tree

This week we had a large wind storm that some of the more grandiosely inclined weather creatures have named a land hurricane. I guess there was record low barometric pressure for Minnesota and it was low enough that, had we been at sea, it would have been a level 3 hurricane. We had some big winds blow through and about seven inches of snow fell to earth near Duluth. Here we just had strong gusts of wind. In my backyard there used to be a maple tree with a lot of beautiful orange leaves. Now it looks like this. I guess summer is over.

I did get outside some today. It was cold enough for gloves, the first necessary use of gloves for the season. I guess the first hard frost is arriving over night tonight. October 29 is a latish date for the first frost. There will, of course be many more.

The project to scan old slides continues. Most of the slides are mostly interesting to me and so I'm not likely to put them all up on the blog, but some are of more general interest. Tonight, a pair of photos of infants who have appeared as adults on this blog. The first is Unky Herb from April of 1980, in the Minneapolis hospital where he was born.

The second is the Prairie Princess in the same Minneapolis hospital where Herb was born and where she also made her arrival. This was April, 1983. A long time ago.

The tennis wars continue. I seem to be in a slump. Maybe it's age related, but I'm blaming the new Adidas tennis shoes that I've been wearing the last week or so. They are fancy shoes with a six month guarantee on the soles. But because the soles have to last that long without being worn through on the toes or heels, they seem to have an unusual thickness of rubber - and thus they are a tad heavier than my old Nikes. And for some reason, I'm feeling a little out of balance when I hit some shots, and my usual fancy footwork is leaden. Tonight at Wooddale with Jerry and the hardcore girls, my side went down 1-6, 6-2, 6-2. Then I went to Yang's for Singapore Rice Noodles to share with the Prairie Princess.

I'm buying some cheap Nikes tomorrow and hoping that that fixes the shoe problem Otherwise it's age related and I'm not ready to admit that yet (a la Brett Favre)