Septuagenarians rule

It's Wednesday. Before tennis I went into the back yard to see if any flowers were ready for prime time. I found this one in a pot of flowers that NCW planted for me about six weeks or more ago. It may be a petunia. It is certainly purple. I have some other flowers and a patch of garden that used to be, years ago,  for vegetables that now is the unruly home for the Prairie Princess' native plants - grasses, wild flowers and, I think, a family of rabbits. A single milkweed grows there, too. PP will be back from Norway to tend her native patch on August 15 - in about three weeks. There are also three tomato plants in the back yard. All three are growing rapidly and green fruit is starting to set. The plants were a gift from Unky Herb's friend, Drew, and thus I'm not sure what style of tomatoes I'll be harvesting in a month or less, but I do know that they'll be organic and fresh from the garden when I eat them.  Unky Herb says he thinks they're heirloom tomatoes.  I'll eat them with respect.

It was a really nice day for tennis outside.  The temperature was mid 70's and dew point in the fifties.  The tennis playing geezer group has expanded for the summer and now we're playing three times a week at Sibley High School in Mendota Heights.  Today we had ten competitors, most in their sixties, but one, at least, at 58 and two septuagenarians (you know, guys in their seventies). We draw cards for partners and then play mini sets to start so that we get some variety of competition. A mini set allows everyone to serve once and if the set gets to 2-2, we have a seven point tie breaker. It's all pretty low key, but silently competitive. No one wants to lose to an old guy, even other old guys. After three mini sets against a variety of opponents, the survivors and the hard core play a set of doubles against whoever is still willing to play.

As one of the septuagenarians, I got to play the last set with the 58 year old guy against two guys who are cousins and pretty good players. It was a fun day and we all managed to get out alive and well. It was good tennis, good for geezers and competitive enough to make the afternoon feel like two hours well spent.  I love those guys and I love that game.

Twin Cities Marathon

It was a beautiful, albeit chilly morning in the saintly city. In fact it was the first hard freeze of the new season. The GFTNC and I walked the three or so blocks to Summit Avenue where the Twin Cities marathon was to pass, actually pretty early in the day. Most of the auto traffic in the city was squelched because Summit Avenue was closed for a significant part of the day. I calculated from knowledge gleaned from the newspaper that the lead runners would get to the Governor's Mansion, also the location of mile post 24, at about ten a.m.  We found a vantage point near the mansion and near the cheering section there and waited for the action to begin.

At precisely 10:07, a bank of motorcycle policemen escorted the lead runner past mile post 24. The parade of runners, that was to last at least until we left the parade route at 12:30, began. The guy that was in the lead was the eventual winner, Christopher Kipyego of Kenya, with a time of 2:14:55.  For 26 cold miles.  For those who like math, that's about five minutes and 12 seconds a mile for 26 consecutive miles. That's flying. More about the race can be found in this link.

The first runner past the 24 mile marker and the ultimate winner of the marathon came by us pursued by a group of four runners about fifteen seconds behind him.  He finished nine seconds ahead of the fastest of the four followers.  And won first prize of $15,000.

The first wheelchair racer, Saul Mendoza of Wimberley, Texas, crossed the 24 mile marker far ahead of his competition.  It was his ninth win in the Twin Cities Marathon.

We stayed and watched for another two hours plus as a stream of humanity of all ages, but mostly with pretty thin bodies, ran by us. There were young runners and tall runners, some in costume, all with varied running apparel. It was 28 degrees at about the time the race started, but most of the runners were lightly dressed. Some of the women were what I'd consider scantily attired. A few men were shirtless. One woman went by in a dress and bare feet. I wished them all god speed. These people had all finished 12/13 of a very long race and some were guaranteeing themselves a few days of considerable pain and stiffness.

The GFTNC and I did a lot of cheering and encouraging of the runners.  She channeled her cheerleading days, and I kept reminding the runners that there were only two more miles and they could finish and have bragging rights to having completed a real marathon.  A lot of them were pretty grateful for the cheers and a few mouthed thank you's as they passed.

I don't really understand long distance running, but I'm pretty sure not everyone understands my need to play tennis four or five times a week.  Even not understanding the need to run, I sure respect the effort necessary to run 26 miles in near freezing weather.

We came back to my place in time to talk to the Prairie Princess on the telephone.  She's off in a corner of Africa beyond my experience, but appears to be doing well in her effort to finish her graduate study research.  She'll be home in about two months for the holidays and she'll have lots of tales to tell.  For now, all is well.

The falls at nineteen degrees

I took an afternoon walk by Minnehaha Falls. As I left my car I noted the temperature was 19 degrees, a sign that winter is setting in earnestly. The water over the fall is just a dribble, a sign that we are experiencing a kind of cold weather drought. The icicles are forming and the water in the creek is firming up, but the dramatic ice dams of previous years have yet to form. The stairs down to the creek level are closed, but still passable, so I went down for the photo and for a walk along the creek.

There were very few people out today, just the guys from Prairie Restoration who are burning brush and cleaning up the areas that they are turning into areas with more native plants. I stopped and talked to a couple of the guys who were tending a fire down towards the big river. I asked if they knew the Prairie Princess, who had worked there about a year and a half ago, and they said they did. The guys, Nathan and John, wondered what PP was up to, and I explained her decision to go to grad school and her current location. I walked to the Mississippi and back without encountering any other "tourists." I guess it's too cold for December meandering. The sun is low in the sky and there wasn't a lot of sun in the creek valley to photograph. We are only two weeks from the winter solstice.

The leaves are gone and the form of the hill can be seen from the bottom. This is the way I chose to go back up to the top of the hill.

The sign at the top of the steps indicates premature closing of the stairs.

Winter is here.

Thanksgiving Thursday

It was a successful day of cooking and overeating. I roasted the turkey with wild rice stuffing and I got a lot of help from Unky Herb, in fact all of the guests joined in to get the food on the table at about 2:10 pm. Barb and Emmy brought cranberry bread, Gino made a pie and the gravy, and Ying brought two Chinese delicacies - an egg plant dish and a corn and pine nut creation. Very tasty.  The buns (rye, I think) came curtesy of Sharon, the Girl from the North Country (GFTNC). The folk at the feast table with me are pictured below, and we were joined a bit later for pie and coffee by the GFTNC. It was a lot of good natured conversation and as promised, everyone was on their best behavior.

What the table looked like before the feasting began.

I wasn't able to send home anywhere near all the leftovers either. As is expected for Thanksgiving, we all over produced vittles, but I was able to send off only a bit of some of the choicer tidbits. I'll be having turkey sandwiches for a couple of weeks or until I sicken of them and toss out the remains or use them in soup. And I have some stuffing and gravy leftover, too. An almost unheard of situation in past festivities.  Cleanup is done and I'm starting to hanker for a turkey sandwich.

Photos of the bird can be found elsewhere on the inner tubes.

We missed having the Daughter of Norway (aka Prairie Princess) here to participate in the cooking and subsequent tomfoolery, but she seems to be well and contented, but a little turkey deprived somewhere south of Oslo.

Old Tennis Players

One of my team mates, Bruce McK. from the 1964 Hamline tennis team is trying to get our old coach into Hamline's athletic hall of fame. As a result of his activities rounding up the old players and getting the necessary documentation, I had the occasion to go look at the yearbook from 1964 and a chance to remember some times nearly forgotten. The coach was Doc Lewis, the Hamline librarian, and an all around good guy. He was instrumental in getting me to attend Hamline, and helped get me some financial aid, without which I couldn't have attended a private college, even in the cheap old days. As I recall, a year's tuition and books, plus a room in the dorm, was $700 for my freshman year. Times have changed a lot. Doc Lewis' teams won conference championships for three of the four years that I was at Hamline. Since those years, nearly every subsequent tennis championship has been taken by Gustavus. Doc Lewis died on April 1st of this year in Red Wing, Minnesota.

Doc is the guy in the suit.  I'm in the back row between Charlie Huss and Bruce McKinnon.  John Wirtanen is in the back row at the far left.  Rich Stebbins, my long time tennis playing doubles partner and singles competitor is in the front row on the right.   He carried me to some nice doubles wins that year (1964), for which I am grateful.

It was the first day in the 70's of the year, and it was a surprise to me.  I was able to be outside and be comfortable without a jacket.  The prairie princess left today for her new job, halfway to Michigan.  She crammed her auto with the necessary items and drove.   It's going to be a lot quieter here without her.

There will be outside tennis soon for me.  I saw a family hitting balls back and forth at the Linwood courts this afternoon while I was out walking with PP's bro.  Spring has returned to the tundra.

Icicles on the Falls

The snow is over for a while and the cities are pretty well dug out from under the snow blanket. It was clear and reasonably pleasant (in the 20's) in these parts, so I went to Minnehaha Falls to see how the winter is going over there. The paths to the falls are plowed, but there were very few folks there to take in the view. It's pretty dramatic to see all those icicles hanging from where the falls should be. I've taken pictures of the falls in nearly every month of the year for this blog, and it is still an attraction - a place to walk and see some nature.



And tonight I went to tennis at Wooddale. It was a very entertaining evening. We, the hardcore girls (HG) and Jerry, managed most of two sets - 7-6, 5-5 - before we were forced to give up the court. Lots of good long points and running around retrieving lobs and angle shots. Good exercise and time well spent. Then I went to Yang's for mildly spicy singapore rice noodles to bring home. I shared the tasty meal with PP and UK. It was a pretty good day.

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.

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.

Princess Power

PP was here yesterday and was explaining how she has been working and working out and now has pretty scary "guns." [That means her biceps, apparently.] So she demonstrated by posing in the kitchen. As you can see, she's pretty scary.


It was a coldish cloudy June 8th. The temperature hovered in the mid 50's and it misted part of the day. But after sweeping off the courts we were able to play some geezer tennis at Marie Park. Three sets. 6-0, 6-4, 1-6. There were a lot of nice competitive points and, even on a court with a few slippery spots, no one got hurt.

I'm still beating the backyard rabbits. I'll be able to defeat their burrowing, but I'm not so sure I can keep them away from the lettuce. My secret weapon is marigolds.

Theme Day: Feet

Theme day again. This time it calls for a photo of feet. Not to be defeated, my feat was to fete my feet. As I have done. See below.



We played tennis this afternoon at Marie Park. We scheduled the playing time to be 4 p.m., but when we arrived both courts were in use. Two guys on the first court said that there was just one game left in their contest. We waited. It turned out that they meant a set and it took them about 25 minutes to finish. On the other court two young girls, about ten, were hitting the ball around. As it turned out they lasted longer than the guys, so we didn't get on the courts on time and didn't begin play until nearly five. But for all of that, the tennis was good and we finished two sets 1-6, 6-2, sets more competitive than the scores would seem to indicate. But it was a beautiful afternoon and no one got hurt. And Curt is back from Arkansas for the summer.

PP had a day off from MCC, so she was around most of the day, puttering in the dirt of the native plant garden, and trying to transplant some of the Big Blue Stem into a pot to move to another garden. The day goes better and faster when the princess is on the prowl.

And then we had Thai food from The Taste of Thailand. Topped off with mango sweet sticky rice.

Another great day in southeast Minnesota.

A Familiar Face

It was a nice day in May. The temperature topped out in the mid-70's. It was take a 53 year-old to lunch day. I found this guy over by Metropolitan State University, a place founded by an old, sometime teacher of mine, G. Theodore Mitau. It's also a place known reasonably well by Mr. Moohoo. I've known the guy in the photo all his life. The statue of Snoopy is a trade mark of St Paul, and there are dozens scattered throughout the city. This one is just outside the Metro State office where Andy works. We went for a sandwich and a walk through Bruce Vento Nature Sanctuary, not far from where he works. I was able to point out some of the prairie restoration and plantings done there by PP at her job with Americorps. Burr oaks and hackberry trees. The sanctuary is greening up nicely and seems to be becoming a more popular place to walk in nature.



I managed to avoid much physical exercise today, other than the nature trek and a little lawn mowing. The lawn is dry and we need some rain, but the warm weather the last few days seems to doing my two tomato plants a world of good. I like to mow almost as much as BB, but my lawnmowing didn't cost nearly as much as her last outing. Mine was just $40. It's a different story line however.

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.

Two Guvs

It was a kind of brisk day although it did rally to get into the 60's. The Prairie Princess had the day off from her government job, so she organized two of her co-workers to take a bike trip. She decided they would take the Cannon Falls trail from Cannon Falls to Red Wing and back. I suggested that it was way too long for this early in the season, and possibly too chilly. She reminded me that she is 26 and hardcore. So she borrowed my sun glasses and off she went.

I had lunch with some old Cray friends and then went to the state capitol to check out the work ethic of our state leaders, who are currently in session. I watched some debates and voting on amendments in the House chambers. There was a tie vote on one of the amendments having to do with state funding of abortions. That was exciting, but the Speaker broke the tie and and they went on to other details. I had seen enough and went looking for the portraits of my favorite governors. Every governor since statehood has had his portrait painted and hung in the capitol. I have heard that they are now out of room and don't have a place for T. Paw, our current head honcho. He's got another year and a half before this term ends, so they may figure out a place to hang him.

This is Jesse Ventura's portrait, filling the last available spot. He seems to have his hand on a statue of Rodin's Thinker. Jesse liked to think of himself as the thinker. I remember him as The Body.

And Rudy Perpich, the Iron Range guv. He's the only one the former guvs who insisted that his wife be included in the portrait. He maintained that Lola was a big part of his success as a politician and governor.


So the Princess came home tonight. She and the other two women did the 40 miles to Red Wing and back, stopping along the way to photograph wild flowers. She claimed that she did not feel tired and the weather was plenty warm enough along the way. I think she should take her chain saw along the next time she takes the Cannon Trail and wipe out some buck thorn on the way.

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.

Nature Sanctuary Very Much

It looks like spring may actually set in. My car thermometer read 69 degrees this afternoon. It was a good day to do some exploring. PP had the day off and she wanted to check out the restoration project at the Bruce Vento Nature Sanctuary. It's connected to Swede Hollow and lies below Mound's Park in the eastern part of the city. We drove there and walked through the hollow until we found the sanctuary. It's been in existence at least since 2005 and there has been quite a bit of restoration going on there in the years since. They have planted trees and irradicated a lot of the nastiest buckthorn. This tree was at the top of the bluff, its roots are exposed, and seems almost ready to fall down hill. It made a pretty picture with the blue sky behind it.



I learned some more about native plants from the princess as we walked. Here she's extolling the virtue of the native switch grass. Notice the curtain of luxurious hair (as she calls it) blowing in the wind. She's also modeling her "hardcore staff (bananas)" shirt from the TRAM adventure several years ago.


The grass hasn't begun to green up yet, and there is quite a bit of snow and ice in the hollow, but the sun was hot and a jacket was not necessary outside for the first time since October of last year. We walked to the end of the sanctuary where Carver's Cave used to be, before they destroyed it to put in the railroads in 1869. Nonetheless. It was a nice walk in nature and a good way to spend the day after the ides.

Dreaming of Summer

It's the middle of February and summer is still a long way away. My tennis activity requires a drive to an indoor tennis facility where there is no sun, no wind, and a marked lack of heat. I'm looking forward to summer and dreaming of outdoor clay courts in orange groves.

The climate in Minnesota retains a wintry look. We had some melting lately and a lot of the snow cover has scrammed, but the winter will replenish the white stuff in the next few weeks. The streets and icy sidewalks are currently pretty perilous for walking, but I had to go look at nature this afternoon. There is ice yet over Minnehaha Creek and warnings about the danger that lies there. It has a kind of bleak beauty.



The cold weather of January has curtailed some of my outdoor photo activity, but the winter has loosened up a bit. The outdoor ice rinks have mostly closed down, because the more direct sun in the latter half of February doesn't allow ice that is fit to skate on. Ice fish houses have to be off the lakes by March first in the southern half of the state, because they can fall through the ice any time after that - or freeze in place after a warmish day. Even today the creek has some open water. There is plenty of ice, but no one can say where it is safe when water is moving under it. This spot is a couple of hundred yards upstream from Minnehaha Falls.



The Prairie Princess started her new job today and seems happy to be once again gainfully employed full time. The whole economy seems sick at the moment, but I have some hope for the federal stimulus package. Spending 787 billion bucks should cause something to change.