Buffalo Gal

I "bit the bullet" again today and put on my most mosquito – proof clothes (including a special mosquito hood that covers my whole head and neck) and tackled some weeding in the hot and ever-drier garden plot.  After thinking that I would not ever have to water anything again a couple of weeks ago when our rain gauge filled up with 8 inches and overflowed after the week-long rain pattern that would not move out of here, I have now had to water several times…both flower gardens and vegetable patches.   The lucious spinach of a couple of weeks ago is responding to the heat and going to seed rapidly.  Phooey!   I am going to miss our spinach salad suppers a lot.  Nothing looks good this summer after the heavy rains.  Everything seems to have been set back during that time and now it all seems fragile and almost non-responsive to the high heat of late.

While I was weeding and digging up thistles and stray unwanted raspberry plants, I had a chance to think on things going on in our world.   If anyone doubts the hostility of Islamofacist thinkers, that ought to be once again put to rest with the discovery of car-bombs and flaming SUVs that have plagued both London and Glasgow yesterday and today.  I also thought about what seems to be a more and more futile "war on terror" which does not seem to improve the proliferation of terrorism.  It is the most unlikely enemy the western world has ever run up against…at least in the historical times we can remember.  Israel had been living with this sort of blind hatred for decades and seems to have figured a few things out that maybe we could learn from.  Israel built a protective wall between certain Palestinian areas and Israel and that has greatly reduced attacks on Israeli towns and cities.  By simply not allowing terrorists to get into Israel, the bombings and suicide bombers have dropped dramatically.   Now I think….what would happen to the US if the already- started wall on the Mexican-US border was completed totally?   Maybe we would feel less of a drain on our tax-supported medicare, welfare benefits and other governments programs that are being drained nearly dry by the constant influx of illegals crossing the Mexican border. There  have, no doubt, been devout terrorists who have also gotten across the border that is so open and loose.  They are here already living among us in relative obscurity until it is time to strike another blow against the U.S.  That is how 9-11 came about…it was perpetrated by Saudi Arabs living here in the US on student visas for several years without being checked up on. So easy—-so simple. 

     It is most interesting also that the "inclusive" and "sweeping" so-called "fix" to illegal immigration bill was killed for a second and final time in the Senate.  Apparently this was in response to Senators and Representatives receiving huge amounts of phone calls, letters, faxes, et.al. from American citizens who, in the majority, wanted nothing to do with this bill that was supposed to solve so many problems caused by the pouring across our borders of ever-increasing numbers of illegals who want to get into the US but do not want to do it like those who work so long and hard to do it legally.   It just did not seem right that those who are doing their immigration process according to our already- existing immigration laws should be given short shrift by putting 12 million ILLEGALS on the fast track to citizenship receiving all sorts of benefits in the process.

For the life of me, I cannot understand why our LAW-makers in Washington DC are so willing to ignore the established Laws already in place regarding immigration.  It seems to boil down to highly personal reasons, ie.  more voters who might just vote for them in the future elections!!!  Good Grief, what have our lawmakers sunk to????   The siren call of cheap labor for certain business interests also falls into the category of selfish personal interests.  Meanwhile who is interested in protecting the rights and laws of ALL the citizens of this nation?   I cannot see very many elected officials interested in that at all and that is so discouraging.   I have no solution to the problem but there must be many who have excellent ideas for solving it.  Would that our "representatives" (?) in Washington DC might take some of those ideas seriously instead of becoming so beltway-bound and hard-headed toward those they are supposed to represent.   I spite of the hand-picked polls politicians want to quote, perhaps they should look at the polls that say nearly 70% of the people are fed up with the politicians ideas for dealing with such a serious problem as immigration reform and illegal aliens.

I really did a lot of thinking out in the garden.  Maybe the hot sun on my head is a good thing after all.

When my sister and I were young girls, our Dad would take us camping in the woods east of Waubun, MN at what was known as "The Best Shack In The World" to Dad and his hunting partners.  They had leased a small patch of land from the White Earth reservation where they built a tarpaper "shack" for hunting and fishing quarters.  It was actually quite a nice shack, for a shack….it was rectangular and big enough for double bunk beds at one end and a pretty generous living area in the rest of it.  They had a gas cooking stove, a home-made barrel wood-burning stove for heating, shelves for their dishes and groceries, an old table and enough chairs and benches to accomodate those who lived in the shack at the height of deer hunting season.  The day the hunting gang left for the woods and the Best Shack was a long one that featured all kinds of vehicles making their way slowly up north Hiway 31, back roads across to highway 59 which had to be crossed (it must have taken hours to get all the pickups, the home-made tractor and several other odd and assorted home-made vehicles designed for putsy-ing through the heavy woods across the highway.)    When they got to Highway 113 they were getting close to their turn into the deep woods.  Then they had to traverse the winding, dirt and rocky road, up what was named "Horseface Hill"…a problem in wet weather and often requiring the homemade tractor to pull all the other tin lizzies up the hill.   Finally they arrived at the "Best Turn In The World" which is what they called the "driveway" into the shack.  It was nothing but a grass trail hacked out of the woods but it led them to their idea of paradise on Earth.

My sister and I were allowed to go to the shack in the summertime for fishing on a very small secluded lake that was loaded with walleyes.  We would usually sleep over at least one or two nights in the shack with Dad and his best friend Jack.  My Sis and I got the top bunk and the two guys got the bottom bunk.   In the summer there was a major problem in the shack—-the woods mice…very large mice with even larger ears—were living in the shack before we got there and they scurried all over the beams and shelves, squeaking loudly and stopping to stare at us with their bright beady eyes.  My sister was freaked out by these huge mice.  At night the mouse activity level increased til it seemed we were outnumbered by 10-1 for each of the 4 of us.  My sister began to cry and beg Jack to "do something" about the multitudes of woods mice.  Jack picked up his .22 pistol and took aim at one of the beams that was crowded with a large mouse contingent who were staring at us in the firelight from the barrel stove.   "NO!  NO!" shouted little sister, "don’t SHOOT them!"  Jack, puzzled, laid his pistol down and Sister continued to fuss and whine until Dad told us to get up in our bunk and get in our sleeping bags.  Suddenly we thought of the same thing at the same time;  our sleeping bags were probably FULL of mice!   We had to finally put our feet down into the bags and thankfully, no mice erupted from the dark depths.   My sister cried herself to sleep and was finally sleeping with soft  sobby intakes of breath from having cried so much over the mice.  I lay awake for a long time listening to the mouse menagerie  racing  each other all over the shack beams. 

The fishing was great, however.  After eating a wonderful breakfast prepared by our Dad who never cooked anything at home, we set out in the homemade boat for a day of walleye fishing.  I think we all caught our limit but that night the mouse parade was repeated and so was the crying, whining, and pleading followed by fitful sleep among the hordes of woods mice.  Our visits to the extremely primitive "outhouse", which had been chewed nearly to pieces by porcupines was another harrowing experience for us "town girls."   We were absolutely sure a porcupine was lurking in there waiting to bite us where we sat down.

Later when we were grown up, we spent several wonderful days on snowmobile trails in the same woods near the shack.  Dad would build a roaring fire in the barrel stove and we would heat up chili or soup,  make "camp-coffee", eat our sandwiches and cookies and other good lunch items while warming up in the shack til we were ready to hit the snowy trails again. I think we even used the "porcupine outhouse" again at that time!!!  Dad and his buddies had to rebuild it each fall due to the porkys’ appetites for the wood in the outhouse.

Now the Best Shack in the World is long gone.   There is nothing there any more and the driveway is overgrown once again with trees and brush.   We took a ride up that old road a couple of years back when the leaves were in full fall color and a lot of memories of days spent at the shack came rushing back to me.  Of such days and nights are good childhood memories made, and my sister and I have plenty of them.

It is amazing what memory triggers can get fired when blogging about certain subjects. I have one more to share from a long-ago campout on an island in Blossom lake…or maybe it was Trowbridge Lake….it was that long ago that my usually sharp memory has forgotten exactly which one it was.  But it was a night of trauma so that is why most of the details are still sharp.

I was a Campfire Girl—-I think I passed all the ranks but did not make "Firemaker" the highest one. I remember passing  "Trail Seeker" and "Wood Gatherer".    After I went to camp twice, my enthusiasm for Camp Fire Girls waned considerably.  This was mainly because I discovered I was prone to terminal homesickness at camp— plus I had a few other experiences that did not boost my desire to be a Campfire Girl summer camper.  The first year I went there were 3 of us together in a cabin with other girls from Minot.  All of the  three were homesick.  "Miss Nancy" our fireball counselor did not manage to cheer us up either.  She was a great counselor but could not deal with 3 hang-dog 10 and 11 year olds who wanted to be anywhere but at the camp.  Then she made a bad mistake at the dining hall when we were served home-made tapioca pudding with the large round transparent tapioca balls in the pudding….Miss Nancy called them "fish-eyes" and one of our girls at the table had to make a fast exit while she was struggling to eat the pudding; she relieved herself of her entire supper!

In the second year of CFGirls camp, we took an overnight excursion to test our true camping skills.  It was primitive to be sure.  We were taught to make bedrolls out of our bedding from our cots;  we learned how to make several camp foods, including "squaw corn" (no political correctness in the late 1940′s)    bread-on-a-stick and some kind of creamy looking cheese-flavored gravy that we put on soda crackers plus "angels on horseback" (that era’s appellation for "s’mors".)   On the chosen night,  several boatloads of girls and counselors set off for the island….there was not a life jacket in sight in those days!!!  But we did not capsize, thankfully.  We made landfall at a sheep pasture where the sheep stood around and looked at us as only sheep can do. (there is a reason for the term "sheep-eyes")   We made our way into the pasture with the sheep following us.   In a sort-of "clearing" we made camp.  There was a lot of brush everywhere as I recall and a lot of stones and a LOT of piles of sheep manure "pellets" around the entire campsite so it was hard to find a place for your bedroll.  We had no mattresses or comfy foam pads to sleep on— such things did not exist at that time.  We had to find the best ground on which to rest ourselves.  Before it got dark, we had to cook our camp  meal and I remember eating semi-warm squaw corn (which was actually pretty good with bacon, onions and tomatoes added to the corn);  our bread sticks were charred on the outside and raw on the inside but we were hungry and ate them anyway.  The crackers and the strange camp gravy were also eaten and then came the angels on horseback which really were the best course we ate that night.  Everything was semi-cooked over our campfires.    As we settled ourselves into our bedrolls, the stars came out in the clear nightsky but so did the mosquitos and we were feasted upon by the bloodthirsy pests the rest of the night during which none of us slept a wink.  The sheep were still with us, around us, and their curiosity, as well as their constant "baaaa-ing" was not conducive to sleep.  All of us were miserable on the pasture’s rough ground and sleeping atop small stones and piles of sheep pellets did not add to any comfort.  The rest of the night is a bad dream….we rose up at dawn and ate something that was only partially cooked again—over the campfires, naturally.  Nearly raw pancakes I think.  We also drank milk that was warm–it had been "refrigerated" in the lake water overnight and the lake was not cold at all in July.   By that time, all we wanted to do was get back to the relative comforts of our primitive cabins, our outhouses, our swimming beach and our dining hall where the food suddenly seemed pretty inviting. I did learn to swim and dive better at Campfire Camp.  The swimming was the part of the day I really liked but then in the second year there, I got some sort of itchy outbreak on my skin and couldn’t go swimming again.  That was the most "revoltin’ development" of my time as a Campfire girl….no swimming ended my only real pleasure of the long long homesick days spent at that camp.

I must have learned some valuable lessons at Campfire camp.   I learned to make a bed really well….we were taught to make "sqaure corners" and when I got back home I declared myself to be the official bed-maker at home.  I learned to fear "streak lightning" and thunderstorms from another very nervous camper;   I did learn to dive off the dock;   I appreciated the comforts of home greatly after spending a week at camp.   I learned how to braid a "lanyard" rope;  I learned a lot of good camp songs that still rattle around in my brain occasionally.  "Waltzing Matilda" was the favorite.   One of the college age young women  counselors   stepped in a mousetrap one night and that news spread like wildfire throughout the cabins.  I learned how to do a great  ape imitation from "Miss Nancy" who amused us with her version, complete with grunts and the picking of lice off the rest of us!!!   I can still get a laugh out of one of my "campmates" by doing the "ape"  to her even though both of us are now  well into our "sixties".  

I have never enjoyed any other primitive camping experiences in my adult existence so the pattern was either set at Campfire camp or I was just not cut out for that sort of camping. Probably a little of both!!!

Having blogged about the Friday night sleepover in the little cabin in the woods on the Buffalo Bluff, I remembered another camp-out…one that took place a long time ago in another setting.  That long ago camp-out was brought to an unceremonious halt soon after setting up the campsite.  Without naming names, due to sensitivity on the part of some of the long-ago campers, I can relate the story of what happened on that summer night. 

 The campers were all boys and most of them Boy Scouts, but they organized their own foray into the woods along a river near their homes in a town where all of them lived.   There were no fancy displays of camping equipment….no real sleeping bags, no tents…they had made blanket bedrolls and were minimally equipped for their night in the woods.  They had matches, jack-knives, a small bit of camping paraphernalia and all had a can of Van Camps pork and beans which they intended to cook in the campfire they would make.   They hiked to their chosen spot and set up for the night…built a campfire, put their bedrolls around it, got pieces of wood to sit on around the fire while the cans of beans were readied to be put into the fire embers to heat up for a simple supper.  Unfortunately , one of the older campers forgot to puncture a hole in his can of beans.  All the cans were put into the hot campfire embers but as the un-punctured can heated up with the others, it suddenly exploded sending showers of hot bean missiles along with the entire campfire flying apart from the bean can explosion.  All the campers were knocked off their perches, somersaulting backwards from the exploding fire which burned holes in blankets and other pieces of clothing.  They were also covered with hot beans.  Nobody was injured–once again proving the existence of Guardian Angels….but the camper who forgot to punch the hold in the can was furious…with himself and with what happened.  He picked up what was left of his bedroll and also his dignity and went stomping back to town in a furious fit of pique.  He arrived at his parents home, still steaming and still covered with brown pork and beans which enhanced his already-freckled countenance.  After relating the story of the  sudden end to the camp-out, his parents could not help exploding themselves—into helpless laughter.  The remaining campers bravely tried to go to sleep at the campsite, but it was useless. 

They followed the path back to town also and all of them spent the rest of the night in their own beds—probably after being forced by several mothers to "wash up" and clean off the beans and ashes before getting into their sheets at home.  Whether they attempted another similar camp-out is unknown to me.  The story remains as a legend and a hilarious trip back into a time long gone but much remembered.

I have previously blogged about getting a little "hytte" (cabin) in place of the much-wished for gazebo.  We made the right decision!    In spite of the current heat wave, we have enjoyed the breezes blowing through the several screened windows;  on this past Friday night the little hytte was duly christened when 5 grandkids "slept over" in it…..or at least tried to do it.  You know how kids can be when they sleep somewhere else than inside a house.  I remember being determined to "sleep out" in a home-made "tent" which was put together over clotheslines…blankets with lots of clothespins and no provision whatsoever for the hordes of mosquitos that descend on hot summer nights.  My attempts at sleeping out were usually a failure by the time I had been chewed up by the pesky biting insects and I was back in the house before midnight, complaining of the itching and misery.  I woke my sleeping parents more than once on these futile outings.

On Friday night, the 5 (2 girls and 3 boys ranging in ages from 9 thru 15) got the sleeping arrangements settled:  the boys were going to sleep in the loft and the girls were going to sleep in the tiny bedroom.   Grampa and Gramma had previously carried out sleeping mattresses, cut them to size for the bed and for two comfortable lounge chairs that make into beds.  Pillows and sheets and covers were in place.  Grandpa and Gramma sat down for a few minutes to wipe sweat off their brows and catch their collective breath.  It was an impossibly hot and humid Friday and we had our doubts about this sleeping out in the hytte but the grandkids were determined.   The loft was the real broiler but the 3 boys insisted that they would be "just fine".  By 9 p.m. we, and one of the parents had gotten them convinced that they should "stay put" and not get mosquito-bitten by going in and out.  A card game was in progress.   Just as the adults in the house were ready to go to bed, the two girls came inside with the news that they "were hungry" and so were the boys.  They convinced Gramma that they would take a loaf of bread, a jar of jelly, a sack of potato chips and a huge jar of peanuts plus some bottled water to the hytte and they would make lunch for the hungry boys.  With a warning not to get jelly all over the place, they departed once again for the cabin.  The adults went to bed—finally—in the cool AC comfort of our house.  I had decided I was sleeping in the "grandkids" room in a twin bed due to other beds being occupied plus a TV set was blaring in "my room" so I opted to sleep in a quieter place.  Just as I was getting sleepy,(about 1 a.m.) the two youngest boys, ages 9 and 10 appeared in my quiet haven with their pillows in hand.  "We can’t sleep in the loft–it is too hot!" they informed me with the implication that they were taking over the twin beds.  They did just that, and I went to the TV blare in another bedroom where I tossed and turned and slept poorly.  Soon the 15 year old was inside also, having fled the loft for one of the sofas in the downstairs.  The girls persisted in the hytte and stayed all night.

The next morning I staggered to the hytte to inspect for damages.   I discovered several empty pepsi cans which explained the energy and sleeplessness of the grandkids.  They had discovered a large carton in the garage and had consumed some warm pepsi along with the bread, jelly, potato chips, and peanuts!  The water bottles were also empty which would account for the girls’ midnight story (when they came in for the lunch items) that the boys were all "outside pee-ing in the grass".

On Saturday the kids were all going strong all day…playing a baseball game called "autos" in the field down hill from our house; they were spraying each other with cold well water from the hose to keep cool and they also drank a cooler full of gatorade and water bottles. (more trips into the trees for the boys).  There were also many short trips around the immediate farm fields on two vehicles—a 4- wheeler and a scooter— usually with passengers, after all were cautioned about "being careful" and wearing helmets.   

 By Saturday night everyone was exhausted, slightly sun-burned or sun-tanned, and very ready to go to bed early.   I fell into a deep sleep—this time on a sofa having been turned out again from my usual sleeping places!!!   By Sunday we all felt like we were back to normal and the christening of the hytte was completed.   I look forward to sleeping out there myself—but it is going to be on a lot cooler day and night when I try it.  I am definitely not going to drink many bottles of water or any warm pepsis before I  "sleep over."   "Going" in the grass in the blackness of a summer night is NOT an option for Buffalogal.

I read the news each morning and sometimes it is not a good thing to do, in my case.  I can get easily discouraged by reading much of it.  The first thing that caught my eye this morning was the continuing story of the Ohio woman found dead, pregant with a baby girl, her "boyfriend" charged with her murder.  All the actors in this tragedy made decisions that ultimately led to the horror that is being lived out in both of their families.  The murdurer made a decision to kill a pregant woman; the woman made a decision to become the "girlfriend" of a married man and have two children by him.  Now a very young child has an indelible memory of his mother’s murder; the toddler, with his language limitiations, haltingly made statements about his mother…."mommy broke the table, mommy’s in the rug" and gave authorities their first clues about what happened.  The child was left alone amidst the carnage of his mother’s murder.  He is the only one who did not make decisions. He is truly an innocent victim of the decisions made by his mother and her "boyfriend".

I am constantly appalled by the decisions that are made by so many people.  Choosing to disobey the mores and laws of a society can only lead to grief, hardship, poverty, and in this case—-the end of a young life.  We have seen such decisions over and over again in the "liberated" and libertine way of life so many individuals choose to live…or should I say, "exist".  We all make decisions, however small, each day that affect the way we live. We hold the power to improve our life or to degrade it.

No….not William Faulkner’s "sound and fury"….the sound and fury in Fargo ND over the Ten Commandments monument.   Will it stay?  Will it go?   Will the city commission actually vote again?   Is the city commission in contempt of the court that previously ruled that the monument need not be removed?   Will we see Coates, Williams, and Mahoney hanging in effigies  on a light pole somewhere in downtown Fargo?  Will the REAL Coates, Williams, and Mahnoney be tarred and feathered and run out of town???    Will the petition that is circulating be filled up in a New York minute???   Of several New York minutes????   Days?  Weeks?   This scenario is almost as interesting as the Gothic southern novel written by William Faulkner and published in 1929.  It still sells well and is used heavily in college English classes as an American example of the "stream of consciousness" writing style.  I remember reading a James Joyce novel in this genre and having a hard time concentrating on it.  Oh well, the Fargo "sound and fury" is a lot more interesting than Faulkner, that sensitive southern soul who looked at the world darkly.

I predict that the momument fury will stay at the top of the news for some time to come. I remember a time past when another fury arose over the 10 commandents monument and someone suggested that citizens of Fargo who believed strongly in publicly displaying them should each put a 10 commandments monument on their lawns for everyone to see as they passed by.  That seems like it would be a lot more effective than having them in one place—on the city’s lawn by the Civic Center and the Library.  The constant reminder in many places might even have good results among those who see them every day.  It would be worthwhile trying it.

I found some good cynical quotes to satisfy my soul….they are about government and democracy of course!

"Politics is choosing between the disastrous and the unpalatable."  (John Galbraith)                       2.  "In democracy everyone has a right to be represented…. even the jerks."     (Chris Patten)                         3. " Corruption is nature’s way of restoring our faith in democracy."         (Peter Ustinov)                    4. "Democracy means, simply, the bludgeoning of the people, by the people, and for the people."    (Oscar Wilde)            5.     "Anybody who enjoys being in the {House of Commons} probably needs psychiatric help."    (Ken Livingstone)

Dare we apply  # 5 to the {Fargo City Commission}????

I just read the WDAY Information Teams’ blog.  I get teary-eyed just thinking about the great generation of WW2 veterans who literally did save the world from evil and ruthless dictators.  I was alive, but too young, to remember the details of those days but my curiosity about history has led me to learn about those times of great distress, sorrow, patriotism and noble efforts by the military men and women and the people on the homefront throughout the entire duration of the war that was truly world-wIde.   

Recently on the first flight that left Fargo to take WW2 veterans to Washington, one of the elderly veterans who was interviewed at the Fargo airport was Bernard Hilgers.  I was stunned to hear his name; he used to visit my parents when he was home on leave during WW2 and I remember that my parents talked about and prayed for their friend Bernard, who served in the Aleutian Islands front.  How many times was such a story played out?  The young men went all over the world to defend our democracy and the folks at home did their part by joining homefront war support efforts and praying constantly for those who were serving in so many places.  My mother worked every week in a Red Cross program to support the troops; our class of first graders collected milkweed "silk" to be used in making parachutes; everyone willingly conserved on the rationed items so that the troops could have more of what they needed.  Scrap iron drives brought in tons of the needed metals for the war effort.  Many "Rosies" (the Riveter) went to work in what were called by us at the time, "the war plants".  My aunt worked in one in New Brighton, MN.  Two of our uncles moved to the West Coast to work in factories that built things that were for the troops.  My father in law was drafted at an age beyond draftable men because he was a US postal employee and they needed postal employees to sort out the backlog of mail for the soldiers in a huge terminal in Seattle.  My husband’s family moved to the Seattle area for a year of uprooting to serve on the homefront, in a way.

The World War veterans are finally being honored as they should be….with their own memorial built among those already honoring Vietnam veterans and Korean War Veterans. It is a remarkable testimony to the WW2 vets, being of a generation that did not demand anything for themselves when they came home.  They did their best to "get back to business" and serve once again in the frontlines of civilians who built up our nation in the 1940′s. 50′s and 60′s.  Many of them suffered from their war experiences but they carried on in spite of the horrors they carried in their memories…and many in their bodies as scars, pieces of shrapnel, and the worst possible scenario–the loss of limbs or vision or other catastrophic injuries.  Every generation that goes to war suffers these things.   The WW 2 vets are elderly men and women now.  Their generation is dying at a high rate every day.

I am so proud of those I know who served in that war; I am so proud of our area for participating in this noble "Honor Flight" projects.  All of us can give more to these men and women who saved our nation from falling into a disastrous defeat that would have changed our lives forever, no doubt.

I need to immediately give another donation so that more of these "greatest" generation members can see their memorial in Washington DC.   I hope a lot of you will do the same as soon as it is possible!!

The recent heavy rains have created a jungle-like setting out on the BuffaloBluff.  Things are growing like crazy…especially the lawn grass and we can barely keep up with it as the warm sunny days encourage the growth even more.  The vegetable garden still resembles the bottom of a swamp that goes empty….the soil is slimy and wet and I have lost "crops" in that we will not be having any delicious home grown carrots this summer; they have drowned and disappeared.  I will miss them.  I am still unsure as to the tomatoes—-will the new ones we planted grow and produce after getting absolutely soaked several times. I have not dared look yet to see if they are full of fungi blight.  I "see by the paper"  (old phrase I remember from my childhood when adults talked about things)  that this spring has been the wettest since the early 1940′s.

OTHER STUFF:  Housecleaning turns up things you have not seen for years or thought you did not have any longer.  Today I found a bundt pan in a cupboard I took apart.  I thought I had turned that over to a charitable second-hand outlet but I did not and now I can try a recipe for a coconut cake that looks wonderful.  It is baked in a bundt pan so I can do this anytime now.  Baking things is not easy when the weather turns hot, however. (what happened?  the type changed suddenly and I must have hit a strange and unknown key on the keyboard with my arthritic "pinkie" finger"…oh well.)

I also found a long-forgotten T-shirt that I used to wear to amuse my musical friends. It has the titles of "operas" that never made it and I laughed anew when I discovered the shirt in a closet.   The operas that never made it are…..1.  The Plumber of Seville by Rossini   2. Midsummer Nightmare, by Britten.   3. The Magic Tuba, by Mozart.   4. La Bamba  by Puccini    5.  Rigatoni  by Verdi.    That is the sort of stuff that is fun to find when you are dealing with household corners that have not been dealt with in awhile.

DECISION BY THE CLAY COUNTY PLANNING COMMISSION:  It took nearly 5 more hours of debate and testimony last night, but the Planning Commission denied the application for another large factory-confinement hog barn in SE Clay County in the Downer-Barnesville area.  There were many happy, relieved people at the hearing…people who had done a lot of research, contacted a lot of experts, and written a lot of letters to commissioners and other county officials requesting that the barn not be approved, mainly on the grounds of the very high possiblility of pollution of both surface and ground waters.   The best and probably the most convincing testimony came from a Geologist/Hydrologist with the Minnesota DNR who spoke passionately about the soil formations(sand and gravel principally)  and the underground water patterns in the area where the barn would have been constructed.  There could have been massive movement of polluted water downhill and into the Red River Valley, into underground aquifers, and other surface waters nearby including creeks that feed into the river systems in the valley.  The commission seemed to believe him rather than an engineer who thougth that polluted water could be contained with a tile drainage system.  That system did not eliminate the problem however; it sounded like it just moved it elsewhere in the field…not really what you would call a solution.  The vote did not come til nearly midnight after 5 hours of discussion and testimony.  There are , no doubt, a lot of tired people today, trying to do their jobs after being up so late and so filled with tension and anticipation.

My "break" is over; back to work, discovering other oddments and forgotten objects hiding in closets and cupboards.  I am beginning to think that I seriously deserve the title of "pack rat".

What a difference a day makes!   This morning all the news is about the Fargo City Commission, in a 3-2 vote, choosing to remove the Ten Commandments monument from city property.  It seems to have released a firestorm of protest and it seems highly likely that this decision will not go unanswered by those in Fargo who feel that they have been "high-jacked" by a small group of people who prevailed among the city commissioners.  I heard some of the testimony of those who wished the monument to remain where it is and it seems that nothing influenced the commissioners who voted to remove it.  It seems they were already committed to getting rid of it rather than face the boxed-in situation that they were put in by the wily "Freethinkers" (a real misnomer since their thinking does not seem to be free at all)   It will be extremely interesting to see what happens, especially if this issue gets put to a vote of the people.  That seems to be the most fair way to determine the fate of the monument.

Another "commission" meets tonight to make a decision that is also highly controversial.  The Clay County Planning Commission meets and will probably be taking a vote to see if a highly controversial "factory" hog barn is approved or rejected.  This proposal has been inscendiary in rural Clay County and much information has been presented , especially about the dangers of putting  2400 hogs in a confinement barn on this site which lies atop a gravel formation from ancient glacial Lake Agassiz.  It has formerly been a gravel pit and the water table is extremely high coupled with a mainly gravel underpinning, instead of the usual layer of thick clay.  Surface water moves very quickly to the underground water sources and the prospect of hog-manure laden water making its way into underground aquifers is pretty horrific for the entire county.  It should be a no-brainer decision to reject but even at the county and local level, political influence plays a big role.    It is not a very good thought to think that local and county politics is not pristine and honest but some citizens are wondering about this particular aspect after observing a lot of meetings and discussions on the subject.  I hope that none of the "wondering" is true….that would be a low point.

Once again we will be in attendance to hear the further discussion from the Planning Commission members and see "what comes down" after it is all said and done.  Who knows what further information may come forth tonight.  I won’t have a hard time staying awake as I listen to the testimony and the discussion. 

It really is a pleasant dry-air day and I must "make hay while the sun shines".  Yesterday I succeeded in getting some badly-needed weeding done in flower beds.  Today a food pantry awaits my housecleaning attention and if I can get it in, more weeding in the cool day we are enjoying………..before the next wave of warm fronts began to arrive.  For us, it is inevitable to have these changes back and forth, weatherwise.