Firefighter's memorial

Sunday was a really nice day. PW and I went to the State Capitol grounds to witness the dedication of the newest memorial on the lawn - a statue to the 207 Minnesota firefighters who have died in the line of duty in Minnesota's history. PW's son, Steve, who is the fire chief in Grand Rapids was there with his wife, too, so we sat near them.

 The firefighters from across Minnesota came to the dedication and creatively hoisted a very large U.S. flag near the Capitol building.  Fire trucks for scale.

This is the new memorial on the Capitol lawn.  It may look familiar to some.  It was for a time displayed in the Lindbergh air terminal at the Twin Cities Airport.  It depicts a fireman rescuing a child from a fire.

It was a nice ceremony, but pretty lengthy, because they read the names of all fallen firefighters and presented the family of each a rose and an opportunity to shake the hand of the guv (Mark Dayton), the St Paul mayor (Chris Coleman) and Minnesota's senior senator, Amy Klobuchar, plus other local dignitaries.  Somehow Al Franken missed the event.

Today was another really nice day.  The main photographic highlight was a tour of Lake Como to see how the leaves were turning.  Some are still green, some are very red and yellow, and some of the ash trees have given up completely.  It's been dry and the ash trees are notorious quitters.

I'll probably revive the concept of Kelsey trees.  Those are the ones that refuse to give up and keep their leaves long after the pikers have packed it in.  It's a little early yet to begin judging the tree's vigor, but it will become clear later in the month who they are.

This is a partially obstructed view of the lake from the south side of Como.

Quite a lovely red maple stands near Lake Como, on the east side near the parking lot.  It was the best of the lot today, IMHO.

I chatted some this morning with PP. She got an email, purportedly from Winona Laduke, saying that Winona had been mugged in Madrid and needed 1450 euros to pay her bills and get home. The email asked PP to send it if she could. PP has had some contact with Ms. Laduke on a volunteer basis at the White Earth Indian Reservation, so she thought it might be a valid situation, but after talking it over with Unky Herb and me, it was clear that there had been a hacking of Ms. Laduke's email account and someone was trolling for dollars. PP sent an email to Winona advising her to change her password, preferably to something more complicated than the usual run of passwords. I think PP changed her own password, too, to be on the safe side. I guess that Tanzania is the wild, wild west of the internet.