Second 96th Birthday

I'm up for some more old photos. It's going to snow a whole lot here in the next few days, at least according to the weather creatures. My archives are up to the task of redirecting my attention away from the unpleasantness.

This is an 80 year old (or so) photo taken on the old bridge on county road U (near the junction with FF) over the Yellow River in Wisconsin. The teen ager posing on the bridge is Lillie Anderson, whose 96th birthday is today. This was about 1929, before even I was born. I don't know the occasion for the photo, or really what year it was, but I've been to this location many times.



And this photo was taken in 1947, I'm pretty sure, because I know the people pictured. Along with Lillie are people who fairly regularly read this blog. For the benefit of others, the baby is Mr Moohoo, the tow headed girl is Santini, seated beside her is the blogger who likes to be known as GPT. I am standing behind the other four on the steps of the house at Dick's Ranch, the farm of Richard and Hansine Anderson, our grandpa and grandma. World War II was over and life was good again.


Happy birthday, Lillie.

The Christmas tree is up and decorated. Unky Herb, the Prairie Princess and I put up the environmentally sensitive lights, some ancient and well loved ornaments, including one containing a photo of our long gone dog, Tag. The decorating party was last night, and now we are ready to face the holidays. I even brought out the clapper from last year and it now can be used to turn on the lights with three sharp claps. Technology is amazing.

Dragon Boat Races

Unky Herb was part of the dragon boat races at Lake Phalen today and so PP and I went over to see how he would do. It was part of Asian American Day celebration and festival. He was part of a 20 person team (the Flying Dragons) that paddled and otherwise inspired paddling in a contest that included about 20 teams from various organizations and companies in the Twin Cities. UH has practiced some over the last few weeks and today was the test. The first shot is the finish of their second heat of the day. UH is in the green boat in the foreground, paddling as fast and powerfully as he can. They were touched out by about a second in the race. But the day was pretty successful. They finished fourth and received a trophy and medals went to all the members. Plus they had a bunch of good Asian eats all day from the Flying Dragons support team.



This is UH's team, or at least the male members of the squad. The women were in a later photo which I missed out on. But these guys were an important part of the race engine and appear to be having a good time. And they were. PP and I were there for moral support, but also were able to track down some Mung egg rolls, Nepalese momo, Thai veggie pad thai and California roll sushi. Good eats all around.



After the races, PP wanted to go to Norway Day at Minnehaha Park to see if they had any rummagrot (or however you spell that rich Norski pudding). They were out of it. But the falls are there and I thought to have a look. The creek was basically dry, and no water was falling over the edge. It's a rare day when the creek is dry, but part of the low water effect is deliberate. They are still working on shoring up the creek bed to lessen the chance of wall collapse.


The Norway Day crowd was sparser and more subdued than the Dragon Boats, but they are more familiar ethnically and there was music and art displays from Nordic organizations in the area.

Ash Tree Blues, or Purples

The ash tree blight scrutiny has spread to my neighborhood, too. Mr Moohoo has reported these purple insect traps in ash trees in various parts of the city. This one is on Grotto, near Osceola. I, too, am obsessed with the purple traps - there is a row of ash trees lining both sides of the street on the block that I live. There are a bunch of trees on Grotto that don't look very healthy, not unlike a bunch on the Mississippi River Road, which are well along in the process of dying off. There are traps in Como Park, too, near the Conservatory. Ah. rotten luck.



The temperature in St Paul set a record for the date yesterday - 97. Unky Herb and I finally uncovered the AC and turned it on for the season.

I played two sets of tennis this afternoon with the GTA. It was about 80 degrees and my stamina was good enough to last through both sets. Curt and I played together, won some games, but managed to come out behind in both sets.

Wimby is well into the first week. Both Venus and Serena are playing well and may again meet in the finals. The Screaming Maria lost today and is no longer a factor. I'm predicting Serena to beat Venus in the finals. Roger Federer is the favorite in the men's draw, except for the Brits, who are hoping that Andy Murray (a Scotsman) will win before the blanc mange aliens do. He means to win Wimbledon. I hope he does. They haven't won their own tournament in over 70 years.

A Day for Tousan

It was Father's Day and the weather creatures were predicting rain. As was our usual custom on the day reserved for patriarchs, PP, Unky Herb and I went to the Sculpture Garden in Minneapolis. The Spoonbridge with the bright red cherry was refurbished this year - removed, repainted and reinstalled. It looked pretty good and it looked familiar. There are few changes to the park this year. There are now a boatload of wind chimes in a grove of trees near the spoonbridge and they make a wonderful musical addition to the area on a windy day like today.

We walked around, taking in the sights while it misted - from the spoonbridge and from the clouds in the sky. My kids posed for this photo in the greenhouse on the site, where the huge plexiglass carp is housed. We managed to stay dry enough and had a good time identifying plants, most of which were non-native, a fact that PP mildly disapproved of. They have some pretty and also unusual flora. Herb has perhaps more photos than I do of the day's activities.



The photo below is repeated almost every year. We stand in front of the outdoor mirror sculpture and I take our photo with the backs of the younger set in the forground. The display always amuses us as we look for ways to make it new.


The rest of the day went well, too. There wasn't much more rain until about five, after PP had done some more planting in the backyard, and I'd weeded some of my own, but mostly non-native, food and flower plantings. Herb laid out in the yard under the maple tree, resting his weary muscles.

Then we went to a movie in Eagan, the Pixar animated film "Up" about Carl, who gets his house to float away using helium balloons, and has a long cast of characters, including a dog named Doug, who talks, often about squirrels. We pronounced it a good movie and quite amusing. I laughed out loud several times at well placed witticisms.

We ate dinner at Sambols in Eagan, an Indian and Sri Lankan restaurant. The food was spicy, but good and I was treated to the meal by my employed children. Life is indeed good.

Another Heron

I guess that this is a heron. It was standing around in Lake Como eating a fish when I walked by with my camera. It was having a tough time getting the fish down its throat, but by the time I took this shot the digestion process was beginning. The wildlife around Como continues to amaze me. The birds and muskrats have settled in and it makes the walk around the lake somewhat more enjoyable. I spent a couple of hours at Como walking and enjoying a pretty nice day - not perfect perhaps, but nice. I had lots of company in the park today - people enjoying June.



This is shot of a funny little gray cloud against other gray clouds over Como. The peninsula sticking out into the lake was popular today, as were the paths around the lake.



PP was home for the morning and then was off on a camping trip with her female coworkers. They cal themselves BOWs, beginning outdoor women I think it means. (Or maybe beautiful outdoor woman.) They are off tonight at a Minnesota State Park making smores and talking trash about their bosses, I suspect.

Here's another snapshot of my tomatoes. PP and Unky Herb have been using the output of their compost experiment to fertilize the earth and the plants are appreciating the extra attention. Those little red worms in the compost heap are doing their thing.

Rafa Bows

After 31 straight wins at Roland Garros, Rafa Nadal lost today to Robin Soderling, a 24 year-old Swede in four sets. A huge upset. The four time French Open champ will have to wait until next year for his fifth title. The way is somewhat clearer now for Roger Federer to win his first French Open.

It was another of those great days in May that are not nearly common enough. The lilacs continue to bloom. This is another variety of lilac that always blooms about ten days after the common variety. The blooms and scent are somewhat alike, but recognizably different. The back yard smells mah-velous.



St Paul has a poetry project as part of the maintenance of the sidewalks in my part of the city, at least. They have a cache of poems that they imprint in new slabs of sidewalk when they are put in. Public Art St Paul had a contest to get people to send in short poems suitable for public display. They had an entry fee and a first place prize of $150. Their site has an explanation and the poems themselves. I discovered this example on Goodrich Avenue, I think, several blocks east of here.


Herb is back from another trip to Chicago and he brought back some of that Japanese candy Pocky. He says that he drove the rain on the road between here and Hudson. The sidewalks here remain dry.

Twenty Stars

After my usual Saturday tennis competition at Wooddale, I came home to find the youngsters here and looking for an adventure in nature. We decided that Pike Island offered a nice walk in the woods with a relatively high chance of sighting a deer or maybe an eagle. And it's only ten minutes from my door.

On the way we walked by old Fort Snelling. The flag flying against the cool, blue sky has only twenty stars. I know that Fort Snelling is a historic site, so flying an old flag is probably okay, but I am hard pressed to know when the USA had a flag with only twenty stars, maybe sometime near the Civil War. I'm sure there is an internet site that will tell me. [The twenty star flag was the official flag for only one year, 1818.]



The three mile walk around Pike Island took a while, and on the journey we discovered several hollow trees. They reminded me of Winnie the Pooh and his honey tree. PP said she could live in this particular tree, so we asked her to get inside and see how it fit her domestic requirements. The place did not have indoor bathroom plumbing.



Herb was taken by the multitude of dead limbs lying about. They look like ninja hitting sticks. We had a good time trying to knock hanging dead branches out of trees above the path. PP called them widow makers. It was a nearly perfect day for woods walking, fifty-five-ish and sunny. Unfortunately, we saw neither deer nor eagle on our rounds, but there were wood ducks, geese, poison ivy, and some wild turkeys at a distance, a distance beyond the photo taking range of my camera.



Another beautiful day in east central Minnesota.

Blue Bells and a stump

It was a Saturday for indoor tennis at Wooddale, the next to last Saturday of the indoor season. It was good that we were indoors, because the weather has relapsed to middle April. The mercury stayed in the 50's for the day, and I was glad to be inside playing tennis.

Later in the day I donned warm clothes and ventured to Theodore Wirth Park in Minneapolis to check out the Eloise Butler Wildflower Garden. It's a long standing garden established in the 1930's by a Minneapolis teacher and botanist, a garden that tries to grow native wildflowers. This time of year the species include trillium, wild ginger, toad lilies, and blue bells. The blue flowers below are Virginia Blue Bells (so PP tells me) and they grow in profusion at the garden. There wasn't much sun today, but when this picture presented itself, there was a break in the clouds.

There were also a lot of down trees in the area. They leave the trees to rot in place to give a naturalness to the wooded slopes. The old stump with the new growth around it made a nice contrast, so I include the photo I took.


When I got home Herb was back from Afton State Park, where he was taking photos (50 or so, he said), and PP was home from her full day of hard labor at MCC. She was wearing her new steel toed boots that are required when wielding chain saws. We were hungry, so we went out for Tex-Mex food. Love that guacamale.

Incidentally, PP informs me that her new nickname at work is "Wild Card", because of her unexpected witticisms, so she may now bear the initials "WC" in future blogging opportunities.

Borrowed Prairie Chicken Images

The Prairie Princess borrowed Herb's fancy camera to take these fancy photos of her trip to view the Prairie chicken mating ritual up by Moorhead. She posted these on her Facebook account. I went to look at them but one must belong to Facebook to get to them. I borrowed copies from Herb's iPhoto files, edited a little and am posting these three photos. It seems all legal and proper. I'm not sure who has copyright to the photos, but I'm giving credit to the main photographer - the Prairie Princess. The first is of the self same PP, posed in front of the giant sculpture of a prairie chicken (in full throat) in Rothsay, Minnesota. Folk sculpture is one of my favorite subjects over my blogging days.



These are the real thing - two real male prairie chickens engaged in the territorial conflict prior to finding a female to engage in the mating dance on the prairie. The distinctive mating song is, of course, absent.



And flowers. The state flower of South Dakota is the Pasque flower. Photo by PP. Pasque refers to Passover and Easter, the time of year when the flower blooms. It's also known as the prairie crocus, wind flower and Easter Flower. It was used as a medicinal plant by the native Americans.



It rained today in Minnesota. It was a hard rain, and it came down even harder a couple of times while I was playing tennis at Fort Snelling. It was very loud in in the bubble, so loud that the sound of racket hitting ball was completely drowned out. It made the game change some. It is amazing how much one relies on sound to judge the velocity of a struck ball and thus its trajectory. We finished two sets that would have been impossible outside in the Minnesota monsoon.

And because of the rain, I borrowed these photos from the Princess.

Cardinal

There were two cardinals sitting in the tree outside my window this evening - male and a female. Cardinals are pretty birds and sort of bloggable. I thought I could sneak up on them and get a good photo. So I was wrong. This is the best one I got, but it has been massaged by iPhoto to concentrate on the male as he streaked away from the beast with the camera. Herb says it's kind of arty, so I'm going with it.



This is the original that I edited to get to the above photo. It is really hard to tell that the blur is indeed a cardinal, but I swear that it is.


The tennis part of the day was spent at Fort Snelling again. The crowd there is thinning out as the days get warmer and the sun stays out into late afternoon. We played a long first set, filled with long deuce, ad in, deuce, ad out sequences. It was a fun set and good exercise. We managed only four games the second set, after swapping partners, and quit, as time elapsed at 2-2, deuce. I came home and napped. I have two more dates with tennis madness the next two days before a day off. I love that game.

The Prairie Princess is home tonight. She's playing Final Fantasy 12 and waiting for Herb to come home from a concert. He rode his bike there, so it's not far off, but he'll be doing some night biking coming home.

Flood Plain

It's my first day off from my whirl of tennis playing. After four straight days, I deserved some R&R, I thought, so I decided to have a look at the big river to see if was comparable to the Red River in Fargo. I drove to the north entrance to Hidden Falls Park and found it blocked off from vehicle traffic by the city. Undaunted, I parked on a side street and burned some shoe leather. I was nearly alone in the park, but it didn't seem to be very dangerous. The Mississippi River is running high, not Red River high, but up on the banks and claiming some territory that is usually used for picnicking. [That is the correct spelling of picnicking.] St Paul's city fathers were smart enough to build the city on the bluffs above the flood plain and it seems impossible for the city to ever be inconvenienced by a spring flood. It would require a Lake Agassiz level disaster to even get close. I'm feeling pretty safe.


After about an hour in the flood plain, I climbed the hill by Hidden Falls and headed to Lund's to buy the raw materials for lunch. Incidentally, it is possible to see Hidden Falls this time of year from the entrance road. The tree foliage has yet to close off the view and thus return its status to "hidden."

A photo from yesterday when the Prairie Princess was getting ready for a bike ride. It wasn't purely recreational - she had an errand to run - and she had to borrow Herb's bike helmet, because hers is somewhere near Lake Harriet where she's currently residing. She and Herb congregated near the confluence of the back door and the kitchen bathroom and willingly posed for their tousan. As you can tell from their attire, spring has not permanently sprung here in this part of the tundra.



We are expecting snow again tonight. There are often April snow storms here, notably in early 1980 and 1983 to announce the arrival of Herb and PP to Minnesota. It's still March.

Swede Hollow Revisited

It's been sort of a tennis marathon this week again. After our last and finest curling win on Wednesday, I've managed to play three tennis matches in three days. I'm in a minor slump, losing more games and sets than I'd like, but, at least, I haven't fallen down in a while. So after a Saturday morning session at Wooddale, Herb and I took a hike through Swede Hollow and the nature sanctuary, the same one that PP and I had visited earlier in the week. The entrance to the park, at least the one we used, has this sign announcing its presence.



There is still a lot of dry, dead plants in the Bruce Vento nature sanctuary, but some green - mostly microscopic - is beginning to emerge. I brought my camera, as did Herb, and we have a record of the early spring grayness. The park has been improved in the last three years, with the planting of new trees and some work on hiking bridges. They have also chainsawed away a great deal of buckthorn, our local invasive species champion. The blue sky behind Herb was noticeably a richer blue than the washed out blue over the city. But it was a spring day in the 50's and we were happy to have the snow begin to drain away toward the river.



More tennis tomorrow. This time at Fort Snelling, a better surface to my taste.

Mixed Doubles

It's the end of the USTA tennis season. Hence tournaments. My 8.0 mixed doubles team played in the sectional tournament at Reed-Sweatt (R-S) Tennis Center today. I played a match at 2 pm with my partner - one of the hard core girls. I usually don't play very well at R-S, but we were already out of contention for the trip to the nationals, so most of the pressure was off. I have been having some knee problems and tried to baby the joint as best I could, yet trying to be competitive. We scraped out the first set 6-4, but lost the second 6-2. The match is then decided by a 10 point tie-breaker (first one to ten and ahead by 2). At 8-5 against us, my sore knee acted up and I was temporarily unable to put weight on it. I think I have a bone chip or calcium deposit that moves around, because after walking around for a few minutes the knee reurned to near normal. We played on, but lost 10-7. Another fine example of GOINFS, but I was glad that I played - there were a lot of very competitive, if not artistic points and I enjoyed the chance to beat some other pretty good players much my junior.

The Prairie Princess is home for the weekend. She's been off visiting friends and socializing. We have had several opportunities to chat and catch up on her Glyndon orchid activities. It's nice to have her around.

Unky Herb has a new toy. He bought a new bike - I think at Erik's. It's a Specialized and seems pretty nice. He went for a ride on it today and pronounced it better than the previous one, which had been stolen out of the garage a couple of weeks ago.

Today's picture is a soccer practice I encountered at Linwood Park. The season of kids kicking the round ball is upon us. It reminds me of the years I spent coaching and following Herb's teams to various soccer fields in the area.

Scouring Rush

Unky Herb and I took a road trip to Glyndon to visit with the Prairie Princess somewhere just east of Fargo. Part of the fun was venturing to Buffalo River State Park to check out the prairie there and the adjacent Nature Conservancy prairie. It was a raw, windy morning and we were all alone on the park fields. The plants that PP knows are legion - (many). The clump in front of the two plant lovers below is Scouring Rush, a kind of dry land, simple reed. I remembered its name with a simple memory device - attach the name to a ridiculous image and then remember the image. My image was of someone thoroughly scouring the posterior of one Rush Limbaugh with a wire brush. Quite hilarious.


We made it home after a nearly four hour drive, just a few minutes ago. I'm going to bed, but may update the trip report on the morrow. I have more photos.

August Flees

August is nearly half gone. Next week is the first week of the Minnesota State Fair. Soon thereafter a herd of Republicans come to town to choose a "white-haired old guy" as their presidential candidate. There will be a circus-like atmosphere in staid old St. Paul. Soon thereafter school starts.

This weekend the Prairie Princess was here to visit. We saw a Woody Allen movie, ate some Thai food, and went to the Greek Festival at the Greek Orthodox Church on Summit. She's gone now, back to the prairie restoration project in Glyndon. She and Herb were clowning around in the kitchen before she left and the result is below.



Quote of the day: Said by Walter Dix, the bronze medal winner in the 100 meter dash in Beijing. He said this of Usain "Lightning" Bolt, the gold medal winner in world record time. He said, "That man can run."

If you saw the race you probably know what he means, and how understated it is.

I played tennis three times last week after our return from the east shore of Lake Michigan. I'm in a slump. The zone is nowhere to be seen. I'll be searching for it all week.

Herb is off to Como Park to see the lantern floating ceremony that closes the Japanese Festival that has been going on today. He's riding his bike.

A Storm at Sunset

The sunsets have been thwarted. Tonight a big storm rolled in and snuffed the latent sunset. This was as close as we came to a sunset at about 8:30 as the clouds took control of the sky. A bad karma day all around.


Herb and I managed a march to the end of Big Red's pier this morning and some running on the beach. It was my third trek to the lighthouse this week. It's Wednesday and the mass of humanity that usually inhabits the beach down there on weekends was not in attendance.

The blueberries are holding out and still are tasty. Blue Crops, I think.

Yesterday's Post Today

Yesterday the blogger failed me. I would have posted this picture then, so I am doing it now. Herb and I took a long walk down to the Spy Glass dune in the afternoon and had a look at the big lake from there. In this photo, Herb is lounging on a bench in an area that appeared to be decorative rather than functional. He's pulling off the act with serious aplomb.


We have had a deficiency of sunsets of late. Both last night and tonight were bereft of colorful sky at the appointed hour. There are no guarantees of sunsets even on the big lake, but we always expect a couple of very good ones every year here.

Herb and I managed to get in about 45 minutes of tennis ball smacking at a local park just off James Street. It was muggy but it was nice to be able to hit some.

Where the Heck is the Prairie Princess?

Another death march with Herb, part of it on the run, and some bad badminton highlighted the first Sunday in Michigan. We finished off with a tunnel park trek to see how they fit 3.5 billion people on the beach there. They had gone. [To paraphrase my favorite George W. joke: He's told, "There were 4 Brazilian beach goers at Tunnel Park." Amazed, he asks, "How many are a brazillion???"]

Cousins talking and bonding near the summit of the dune at Tunnel Park - Herb and the newly anointed Domestic Goddess.


Another beautiful day in southwestern Michigan.

The Winds Came

It was a very windy day by the big lake. It seemed like a day to recover from bike trips and, perhaps, to take a march to Big Red at the state park. It's a long trek, but one that I've repeated many times in the past. The reward is a chance to see if the lighthouse has changed since my last visit and the challenge is to get a unique photo. This, at least, proves that I made the full distance to the pier.


On the way back from the Big Red visit, I ran into this gang of ruffians. They seemed friendly and, indeed, familiar. They were coming to meet me on the beach - Nikki, Totally Jammin', Unky Herb, and Nancy.



Later in the day, after a trip to the farmer's market for cherries, blueberries, tomatoes, cukes and zukes we trekked to Tunnel Park to run down the dune and get a picture of Herb jumping off the wall next to the downhill. We're trying to get him in midair with his arms flailing about. We'll be trying again tomorrow after something less than success today. The picture below is the walking group standing on top of the dune in the wind. I guess it was gusting to about 30 mph, at least according to some reliable sources.



Another fine day in southwestern Michigan.

A Day by the Big Lake

It's the first day of August. Herb and I are visiting at Santini's Bed and Breakfast, a fine establishment near a very large lake. The proprietor of the establishment is shown below at Tunnel Park with the lake in the background. The weather is very nice and we were able to get in a bike ride today - 13 miles with a stop at Bowerman's Blueberry Shop for a quart of blue joy.


This would be Herb himself, jumping off the start point for the fabled run down the dune at Tunnel Park. This is the best of several takes, but we may get a better one later in the visit. He did not hurt himself.


Herb again. He's lording it over mere mortals, standing atop a structure on the dune at Tunnel Park. It was a beautiful evening with a beautiful sunset.



We miss the Prairie Princess who is saving the prairie, one orchid plant at a time. She's hard at work in Glyndon, toiling for the Nature Conservancy.