Buffalo Gal

Thursdays are the days the "Boys" are here.   That means the Middle Son and His Son (our youngest grandson).   Every Thursday afternoon means that the two of them will come to the Buffalo Bluff for most of the afternoon.

There are important things to do here on Thursday afternoons.  (1) Oil changes on car or cars. Sometimes the oldest grandson comes in his own car—-an aging one that needs oil changes just like the newer ones do.   (2)  Programs on ESPN to be watched and discussed, as in the NFL draft which was occurring about a week ago.  Since there is not any Cable or Direct TV at the home place in Fargo, "the Boys" arrive when Big Stuff is happening in the world of sports (we have ESPN stations on our direct TV package.)    (3) Direct TV cartoons must be watched also.  This is for the  11- year old grandson’s attention….much better cartoons on Direct TV according to him.   (3) Basement Basketball to be played.  Again for the 11- year old but occasionally he talks his Dad into playing a game with him.  The basket in the basement is a full -sized one but it is hung much lower than a regulation basket so it is a cinch for younger and smaller children to be able to "dunk" the ball.  The balls are also not regulation baske balls but varieties of Nerf balls, K-Mart balls, small beach balls, et. al.  The clang and twang of the basket rim is a familar sound around here because from 1976 until 1987 when the last son graduated from high school, that basketball hoop has seen much action over the years.  It has also seen and heard many loud arguments among 3 boys who are now grown up and have families of their own.  It has also seen some really bad crashes, like when one of the friends of the aforementioned sons made the wrong move while playing Basement Basketball and crashed headfirst into a cast iron supporting pole near the basket.  Thankfull yy did not knock himself silly and he has not suffered any permanent brain damage because he is working as a farm-loan banker in one of the local banks and still seems to make good decisions inspite of a near-severe head injury in our basement many years ago.   Another bad crash left a huge hole in the brand new sheet-rock in about 1977.  An over- charging Boy put his foot right  through the wall and it took many years before we had it repaired….it would probably happen again, so we waited til all 3 were "out of the nest" top finally have it fixed.        (4.)  Four Wheelers to be ridden:   This does not last long for the 11- year old boy but for the 45-year old boy, the rides are long and arduous.  He usually drives east, to the Becker County line to visit one of his favorite spots he has discovered while rambling around on the Four Wheeler. It is an old pioneer cemetery surrounded by huge old cottonwood trees.  All the gravestones are very old and some are not even able to be read anymore for all the lichens and moss that has covered them over many years.  But this son has decided that this will be his burial place whenever his time is up.  He loves that lonely pioneer cemetery as only a true country -bred boy can love lonely places in far-away spots in a county.  I have visited in once with him and I love it also….the peace and serenity there is unbelievable.  The only sound one hears is the soft sound of the wind blowing through the old cottonwoods….no other sounds at all.  Maybe a meadowlark in the warm season or other bird songs but nothing human to disturb that peaceful, solitary place.  It is a marvelous final resting place for one who appreciates the solitude of the country.    (5) Last but not least:  there are conversations to be had in "Grandpa’s Living Room" at the west end of the pole building.  There, on the dirt floor, in front of the opened doors (big garage door that is very high and very wide) is the "barn living room".  It has comfortable , slightly-used lawn chairs and other sundry chairs collected from various places, it has a radio plugged in somewhere in the barn set at a loud level so one can hear radio programs from anywhere in the barn or near- vicinity of the barn, and it has lots of fresh air due to the open doors when conversations are at their height.  All the participants have to do, is sit in a chair, lean back far enough so you can cross one leg on top of the other, put your arms and hands behind your neck and lean back and talk about many subjects for long periods of time while gazing out the open doors at the view to the West which is as spectacular as all the other views on the high up Buffalo Bluff.  Sometimes the sunset is observed from this "living room".

Menwhile, back at the ranch (house),  Grandma and Grandson are discussing a "little lunch" . This tradition started many years ago when the pre-school grandson would say "Grandma, do you think we should have a snack?"  Then it was crackers or cookies and juice.  Now sometimes it is a vanilla malt or a big dish of ice cream with toppings on it.  It can still be cheese and crackers and juice also.  Sometimes Grandma warms up the breakfast coffee for her drink.  The last time "he Boys"were out for the NFL draft days, they brought pizzas and Mountain Dew and stayed for supper and a long time after supper….so as not to miss who the Vikings would pick up for next seasons play actiion.

Thursdays are welcome days for the "Old Folks At Home".  I do not know who enjoys it more—"the Boys" or the "Old Folks" !!!!!

We are currently being bombarded on the 24/7 news networks (and elsewhere) with the Swine Flu outbreak that started in Mexico.  It has now spread into areas of the U.S. and some other countries.  It takes little time for such a phenomena as the spread of a bad viral illness with world travel via airplanes….people who have been in Mexico recently have innocently spread the Swine Flu virus to their home areas as in the case of the New York students in one particular school.

Having experienced personally, the Asian Flu Pandemic of 1957-58 and the Hong Kong Flu of 1968, and having heard the stories of the "Spanish Flu" pandemic of 1918-19 from my mother who lived through that era, I know first hand what a bad flu virus can do to one’s body.  I caught the Asian Flu when our college campus was hit hard in October of 1957.  School was shut down for at least two weeks with a huge percentage of students and teachers sickened by the Asian strain of flu.  I was close enough to home that my parents came and got me on the first day I was sick; but I was delerious with high fever and can barely remember them coming to my dormitory room and leading me out to the family car; we came home and I collapsed on the living room sofa under as many blankets as I could cover up with and remained there for the next two days.  When we all got back to the campus a couple of weeks later, the classrooms, music rooms, labs, the gymnasium abounded with the sound of racking deep coughs from recovering students who were so weak many had to stop to get their breath when they were walking to classes and other places on the campus for well into November.

The 1918-19 "Spanish Flu" was the largest flu pandemic (world-wide) in recorded history.  It began in Europe among the masses of WW1 soldiers and spread rapidly around the world as troop ships and other transportation of the time carried the terrible virus from one place to another.  World-wide, it is estimated that between 20-40 million people died from the 1918 flu pandemic.  My paternal grandmother was a victim of that flu…she lived through the initial attack but suffered from kidney failure for the rest of her life which only lasted another 2 years after she had the flu in 1918.  My mother recalled watching a barn being built in her rural neighborhood and one of the young men was up on the roof working one day and the very next day they heard he was dead of the flu.   The H1N1 virus of the 1918 flu often led to instant pneumonia or the development of bloody froth in the respiratory passages which literally suffocated its victims.  People died a few hours after getting sick.

Now the Swine Flu alarms are spreading faster than the disease itself and nations are taking measures to either contain it (nearly impossible at this point) or to provide treatment for the ones who get the virus…which is the same one as the "Spanish Flu"…both Swine and Spanish flus are the results of the H1N1 virus and it is particularly dangerous and virulent.

An AP report out of LaGloria, Mexico today reports that residents of that small town are certain that their community is the place where this epidemic, possible pandemic, began. They blame their illnesses on the huge pig farms that surround their town, reporting that when pig waste was spread on fields recently, the winds blew the noxious fumes into a closed valley formation at LaGloria and people in the town began to get sick immediately after that episode of the pig manure being spread on fields in the area.  Mexican health authorities have been denying this claim by the people of LaGloria , going so far as to say that the Swine flu virus has not even begun anywhere in Mexico and denying that tests on the pigs in that area yielded any proof of the Swine flu virus.    Townspeople of La Gloria report that Mexican doctors visited the first confirmed victim of the H1N1 virus, a curious mix of the Swine flu, Avian flu and human flu, but left after a cursory examination of Edgar Hernandez, the five- year old boy who was the first confirmed case of the H1N1 virus. It almost sounds like Mexican health officials are in deep denial and are not taking the proper measures to deal with the outbreak of Swine Flu there.  Sick people have been denied entrance to clinics and hospitals and one man was put off a bus when the driver realized he was sick….the man was trying to get to a medical facility for help but never got what he needed badly.   When sick Mexicans are turned away from their own medical facilties, many of them have died as a result of the terrible disconnect between what Mexican health officials are saying and what they are actually doing—-or worse yet, NOT doing. It seems that the whole national health system in that nation is unable to cope with the crisis.

An animal health expert, Peter Roeder, who is with the United Nations Food and Agriculture division, said that the jump from swine to humans could have happened as long as a year ago in that area.  But it is just a theory;  no one really knows how LaGloria became the first town that suffered the outbreak of the current flu virus.

All we can do is wait and watch what happens to see if this is truly going to become a pandemic.  Everyone of us can take precautions by careful washing of hands with soap and water, especially after touching surfaces that others touch…door handles, public phones, library books….anything that is in constant contact with other people.  Getting lots of sleep, taking certain vitamins and nutritional supplements that boost one’s immunity are all wise measures to take.  We plan to do all of these. Avoiding big public gatherings if this flu begans to break out in our area is also a wise measure for individuals to take.

  Only time will tell if it is a Big Scare or a Big Dangerous Pandemic of yet another dangerous virus of the influenza types.

That is how my dictionary defines the word "potpourri".   Recently I read something involving Chicago politics in April of 1987—-old history, yep, but a very amusing incident in a mayoral debate between Harold Washington and his opponent that year.  In an
April 1s dispatch in a Chicago paper, the debate the night before had stunned the audience and all the assembled reporters when candidate Washington stated that he had "a poopery of tax proposals."   Nobody had heard such a word as "poopery" prior to that debate and reporters from every Chicago paper, radio and TV outlets scrambled for their dictionaries to look up the meaning of this new word they heard Harold Washington use.  None of them could find "poopery" in their dictionaries.  A few phone calls were made to some possible sources who could identify what the mayoral candidate meant when he said he had "a poopery of tax proposals" ready for city government, should he be elected.   Someone among the reporters suggested that a "poopery" could be the name of a fancy outhouse and that someone should call a person who had been raised on a farm to ask if that was it.   Another reporter speculated at the possibility of outhouses being brought up in a mayoral debate but others said that in Chicago elections, anything could be brought up by the candidates.  When one reporter did call a friend who had grown up on a farm, the man replied a bit testily that THEIR farm had NOT had an outhouse and he thought "poopery" sounded like the fancy name for a restroom in a bar somewhere in Chicago.  The mysterious word meaning was finally discovered when one of the  Harold Washington staffers told the reporters that Mr. Washington was talking about a "potpourri" of tax plans.  Mystery word solved— but it surely made for a good story even if it happened in 1987.
 

My own Poe-Pur-ee includes the MISSING FREEZER LIGHT.   I opened up the upright freezer a few says ago and the little tubular light fell out on the floor, leaving the interior of the freezer in darkness.  So far the light is still missing although a new bulb has been purchased; it is just not installed yet….it is not high enough up yet on the HoneyDew List here at the Bluff.  So I have resorted to using a flashlight when I got to retrieve something from that freezer and that takes me right back to the middle 1960s when my father in law visited a hardware store in his small city/hometown and found a chest freezer that was unbelievably cheap—-on sale, and the price was so low he could scarcely believe his luck.  He bought the freezer and had it delivered to his home.  When the freezer was installed and ready to be loaded with frozen food, my father- in- law opened it up and noticed immediately that the freezer had no light in it.  He went back to the hardware store where he had bought it and asked why there was no light— to which the salesman replied that it was the reason it was so cheap and on sale.  When my father in law tried to protest his missing freezer light, the salesman gave him a free flashlight!   It was a done deal and the flashlight was used for the many years of the freezer’s long life

DEEP THOUGHTS ON APRIL 26:  I listened to some of the best expository teaching I have ever heard on Sunday when we visited a  Christian church fellowship in Moorhead.  The young pastor is a gifted speaker and scholar of Biblical texts and his teaching that day was on Heaven and Hell…not a topic that many pastors are willing to tackle these days.  I learned that there are more references to Hell in the Judeo-Christian scriptures, including a number of them in the Old Testament.  Thre are more scriptural references in both testaments to Hell than there are to Heaven.    Jesus taught about the reality of Hell in the  gospel accounts recorded by four of His apostles. The four questions we were left with were provocative and I ask them here for anyone who wishes to ponder them also….or answer them according to their own light.   Question # 1:  Is this life all there is?    2. Should all people go to Heaven?     3. Should evil go unpunished?   4. How bad do you have to be to deserve Hell?

(This teaching was prefaced by the revelation that surveys reveal that many Americans believe in an afterlife. My google search yielded this:  an AARP survey of people over 50 years of age revealed that 73% agree with this statement: "there is life after death.")

At any rate… that is the close of a session of "poe-puh-ree" from Buffalogal.

The young girl learned early on how to go downtown by herself and do the shopping chores that her mother had little time for,  with a new baby who was fussy and colicky and the mother was worn out and tired every single day of the first few months of the new baby’s life.  She had trusted her "big girl" from the age of 4 when she had sent her small daughter downtown on a snowy January day to buy a bar of laundry soap when  the mother ran out on the day she was doing the family washing.  Mother knew her "big girl" could handle more than buying a bar of soap so now, when the girl was 9 years old, she could handle shopping for her own shoes for the new school year.

There was no risk in those days of young children "going downtown" in the small town where they lived.  No worry about abductions or child predators then.  Kids routinely did shopping chores for the mothers, including going to the grocery store with a list and the red wagon to haul the groceries back home.   This 9 year old girl had shopped for both groceries and other things, including a day she braved the women of the small town when she went to get 3 yards of cotton fabric which was on sale for her mother.  In spite of the crush of eager sale shoppers and  having a bolt of cotton cloth pulled from her hands by noted female town "bully"—rare among women then…the girl had pulled back and won the struggle with the big and initmidating Mrs. D  who tried to get the bolt of cloth for herself.  This little girl learned early how to stand up for herself on that strange day….those kind of shopping struggles were rarities…..except when something really precious went on sale, like sewing fabric, because nearly all the women sewed for their families then.

Today the girl was on a mission to buy her annual pair of school shoes—either plain brown oxfords or saddle shoes which were becoming increasingly popular among all the girls, big and small.  But there was one caveat she had to obey; her mother had told her not to get shoes unless Allan would wait on her.   "Always wait for Allan" was what the mother had told her girl and her girl was obedient.  The girl also knew why she was supposed to "wait for Allan".    Allan had worked at his job at the local clothing and shoe store all of his life as the breadwinner for his family.  The job was secure but the wages were not the sort that would cause Allan to get ahead and save big bucks.  None of the small town jobs were like that but almost all the men in town had jobs like this.  The downtown of the little village had everything its people needed:  6 grocery stores, 3 hardware stores, 3 stores where clothing, shoes, coats, hats…all of it…could be purchased.  There was a local drug store, there were at least 4 car dealerships and as many implement dealers.  Two banks served the community. Two lumber yards suppled wood and shingles and everything else needed for building or repairing.  Nobody had to drive to the big city to get what they needed….unless the family made a once- or twice- a – year trip for certain things.  Everyone shopped on the little main street that was a-bustle with business each day—-and especially on Saturdays and Saturday nights when EVERYONE came to town. On Saturday night there was even a popcorn stand open for business with the most delicious popcorn served up by the town’s Boy Scouts.

But back to waiting for Allan:   Allan was the girl’s neighbor.  He and his family lived in a modest small house just like the girl’s family did. There homes were back to back on the block.  Allan always had a huge garden full of all kinds of vegetables.  So did the girl’s family.  The neighbors had many good talks as they cultivated their gardens.  Allan also had potatoes in his garden and his small son earned a penny per potato bug that he picked off the potato plants and put in a jar of some sort of liquid…probably water.  The neighborhood kids thought this was a great game…they helped Allan’s small son pick potato bugs and did it for free….the little boy got the pennies and the other kids did not care. They just enjoyed picking potato bugs in the hot sun of summer mornings and afternoons.

Allan was to be waited for because he knew the little girl’s mother  was concerned with getting  the shoes fitted carefully so they would last throughout the school year.  Money was not easy to come by and the girl needed to wear her school shoes til the next summer came ’round.  So Allan was the one who always made sure there was room to grow in those shoes. He was a kind and gentle man and all the kids who got their shoes fitted by the careful Allan loved him like he was their own dad.  The little 9 year old girl loved Allan like another dad, and also his wife and children with whom she played.  Allan’s wife came over to the girl’s house almost every morning to visit with the girl’s mother for a short while….both of them took a break from their heavy load of housework to chat and share a cup of coffee and a cookie.  "Yoo-Hoo!" Allan’s wife would call at the screen door to the kitchen and the morning visits would begin.

Sometimes the girl had to resort to trickery to "wait for Allan".  There were two other salesmen in the clothing and shoe store and they were fine gentlemen in the eyes of the girl’s mother; but they did not take as much time or were not as careful in the fitting of the shoes.  Sometimes one of the others might sell a pair of shoes that fit perfectly but there was not room to grow into them!  That violated the girl’s mother’s rules for shoe-buying. So there were times when the little girl had to say she was just looking at the shoes or make an escape to the "other side" of the store—the womens’ side.  Sometimes she went into the little sewing room to talk to her good friend’s Grandma who was the alterations lady at the store.  She had to wait for Allan—til he was not busy with other customers.  So sometimes it became a game of hide..but not seek …for the girl.  But it paid off, because in waiting for Allan, she always got the right shoes that would meet her mother’s approval and she was set for the school year.

Many years after the "waiting for Allan" days had passed, the little girl was grown up and she was a wife and mother herself.  Her own little boys grew to love Allan as much as their mother did.  They, too, visited Allan, when he was out working in his still plentiful vegetable garden.  They even picked off the potato bugs for Allan because Allan’s own little son had grown up and gotten married and lived far away now.   

One day in a lovely summer, the year the little town was celebrating its 100th year, Allan’s brother came to his house to cut Allan’s hair.  It was a long-time tradition…the two brothers had become skillful home-barbers and always cut each others’ hair regularly.  This summer evening was no different than all the other evenings the two brothers had cut each others’ hair.  But halfway through the haircut for Allan, something happened that would change everyone’s life—everyone who knew and loved Allan.  Allan suffered a fatal heart attack and died in his brother’s arms. 

The little grown-up girl, the next door neighbor for so long, was stunned and grief stricken. None of the tears she shed could be numbered….there were too may.  But when Allan’s family asked her to sing for Allan’s funeral, she somehow summoned up the strength it took to do what the family had asked.  She got through the requested songs without breaking down but when it was over, she shook with sobs again, weeping into a handkerchief that became wet and soggy.

She still thinks of Allan and his wife and their sons when she drives by their old home, now occupied by another young couple.  Allan’s trees and plants are still there…..the garden is uncultivated and grown to grass…but that home will always be special in the girl’s memories.   She can still "wait for Allan" because she knows she will meet him in Heaven when her time comes to go home like Allan did , so many years ago.

The FORUM today had an editorial singing the praises of the newly built and now-open Fargo Public Library.  Personally, I can barely wait to see it…..I am a resident of Minnesota but the two library systems (Fargo and Lake Agassiz Regional ) have had a long standing agreement that allows patrons of both systems to use each other’s libraries.  I have cards for both Fargo and LARL and I have made huge use of both library systems.   When I was a school librarian, I had a collection of metal buttons I used to put on each day that had library themes imprinted on them.  One of my favorites was a green one designed for March 17…it had a nice big green clover leaf and the logo on that button said "I Am Library Lucky".  I would say that logo applies to Fargoans and others who use that brand new library on the Civic Plaza.   I feel lucky (and blessed) to live in an area where the people have given their permission to build such wonderful places for resources…all the many resources that are now available to library users.  Not that many years ago, I remember going into the old Moorhead Public Library when I was a college student and you could not even browse the shelves…you had to make a request at the desk and a librarian went and found it for you.  How times have changed!   Now when you enter a library there are often huge numbers of users around in the many spaces devoted to special interests.  People are browsing the shelves for fiction and non -fiction; special shelves hold "talking books" and DVDs and Videos.   A magazine and newspaper section is always in heavy use.  A childrens’ section is populated by pre schoolers, and elementary age children who have access to so many books for their own reading levels. The computer areas are nearly always filled with those who may not have computers in their own homes but are able to use those in the public library for both research and word processing.   Patrons may request materials from an Interlibrary loan system and recieve books and other things from many other libraries around the state(s).  The services are marvelous in a modern public library.

I am always amazed at the use I see in the Fargo Public Libraries….I have been at the Carlson and the downtown temporary site on Roberts St. most recently and whenever I am at either place, I take note of the many people using the library.  Many young students are there to study and to use the library computers.  Many of these young people are obviously new immigrants who are thrilled to have such access to information and learning in their now homeland.  Older people and middle aged people are also there—many of them reading newspapers and periodicals..a wonderful library service for those who love to keep up on current affairs but cannot afford to subscribe to the many magazines a library has on file.

I have seen armloads of books and films checked out at the libraries by people of all ages. Even at the temporary small location on Roberts Street, there was small separate room for childrens’ books and in that room had the most inviting rocking chair for Moms and their toddlers to sit and browse or read books together.

There were a few negative comments on the FORUM’s editorial piece and that made me sad. To read that some people are still blaming Linda Coates for raising their taxes to build the new building and then to suggest that the new library is a hangout for Coates’s "pets"…homeless people….seems cruel and ludicrous.    There is no mistake that public libraries are a magnet for people how have no permanent homes.  Many of these folks love to read also and love to learn and keep up on the news and the library is their only place to do so.  Why shouldn’t everyone in a community have access to such marvelous places as public libraries are???

I spent two years working in a public library and I learned more about librarianship at that position than anything I learned in any of the classes  I took  in library "science" and media education.  I learned the meaning of "service" in helping library patrons—either on the phone or in person… helped them find things they wanted to read or view.  The library I worked at was packed with people that some would call "homeless" every morning.  They were the quietest, most considerate folks I have met.    They truly enjoyed the comfort of the library and the materials available to them.  Most of them did not check anything out but they would sit for long hours reading things…learning and gleaning information that was important to them.

One commenter on the FORUM (surely a young computer "geek") opined that public libraries were obsolete.   I do not use the term "geek" derogatively…it is just a way of saying that computer "geeks/nerds" do not understand the power of the public libraries which will NEVER be obsolete!!!!     To young people who have been taught to love reading..mostly by example in their homes and some in their schools …..a book in the hand can never replace an internet screen.  A book is a personal thing—-you handle it, you smell it, you almost caress it… and if it is one you enjoy..you can go back many times and enjoy it over and over. 

 One of my favorite cartoons. which is magnetically held on my refrigerator door, shows a young boy sitting at a desk in front of an empty computer screen.  Behind the screen and open on the table, keeping the boy fascinated, is a book!   It is the best commentary on reading that I have ever seen.   Computers will never replace a public library’s enchantment and pure joy.

A history of public libraries began early in the history of our nation.    Andrew Carnegie, a wealthy industrialist, gave many millions of his dollars earned, to build public libraries in cities all over the country.  There are still Carnegie Libraries in existence, preserved as they were when they became a centerpiece of many towns and cities.  Detroit Lakes has preserved their early – 1900′s Carnegie library as a space in the construction of their newer facilties.  It is worth seeing …the old Carnegie building had a fireplace in the reading area and that is still there.  The old library is used as a reading room for periodicals and newspapers and the tables, comfortable chairs and sofas are nearly always occupied by readers. And the fires continue to burn brightly in the old fireplace now converted to  natural gas but still just as inviting as the old fashioned fireplace.

The tradition of public libraries is too strong to ever "go obsolete".   Congatulations to the citizens of Fargo on thier fine new facility which will be dedicated on Saturday April 25.

I have not been out and about too much recently….I got in the habit of staying at home during the flood crisis when my Aunt stayed with us for 10 days.  But today, I could not put it off any longer…I had an eye appointment after tracking down my favorite optometrist, Dr. Mark Tufte….I got my eyes checked for this year and found out that for someone my age, I am really doing well….I can still boast of 20/20 vision with a slight correction prescription. Seeing small print?  That is another story…but thankfully there are ways to overcome that problem.  I shall continue to take my "eye vitamins…especially lutein.. since that substance alone can prohibit the development of macular degeneration, which my Mother had later in her life.  Not a good thing to have…..it brings on central vision blindness and it is a nasty way to spend your days as an older person.  If you want to get your lutien the natural way by eating foods rich in it, you better get going on eating about 10 pounds of Kale or Spinach every day…or go to Swanson’s and buy some good quality lutien capsules!!!!  Eating so much gas-producing vegetable matter on a daily basis can make you a social Leper…so take that into consideration before embarking on the Total Lutien Diet.

I got a few other things done that I have put off for many weeks…it feels good to have done them all….I spent a half hour at the food court in West Acres before going to see my eye professional…and I enjoyed a plate of food from the China Doll.  While eating my own food, I (as always) am a people-watcher.  I would guess that there were other people-watchers present, probably watching me as well.  Have you ever noticed how funny we humans looks when we are chewing and eating our food?   I nearly got the giggles and came close to  a dangerous inhalation of my rice and honey chicken down the "wrong tube" while watching human mastication all around me.  Some folks eat daintily, bringing the food up to their mouths cautiously and slowly and they also chew rather delicately, not making noise or other strange motions with their mouths.  Others handle their forks or spoons like coal shovels and really push it in as quickly as possible.  They are either very hungry or in a big hurry I suppose.  Others chatter away to their dining companions and eat rather cold food–something I can not tolerate.  When I was still an unretired school teacher, circumstances dictated that all of us in the faculty lounge were "coal shovelers" as we had little time to eat and relax before returning to our students….who were often knocking on the faculty room door asking for their teacher even when he/she was suposed to be having a 20- minute lunch break.   Can those of you who take hour- long lunch breaks imagine how fast you have to eat in only 20 minutes?  It is embarassing to remember how much like cows chewing our cuds we resembled….but we did.   A video taken in a teacher’s lounge, set to  appropriate music, would be absolutely hilarious.  Parts of the "William Tell Overture", like the one we all recognize as the Lone Ranger’s theme, would be very good for those scenes. Some of the eaters I watched today use their fingers to get food into their mouths—hey!  fingers were made before forks, "they" always say…the famous and incognito "they" of our conversations.    I saw a couple of people today who might, if the scientists in Britain are correct, be adding to global warming due to their..how does one say this delicately?  …… their "wide loads" on their posterior side????   I thought about John and Max, my landlord and landlady one blissful summer so long ago, when I went to summer school. John described those "wide loads" on certain ladies  as appearing to be like "two bulldogs fighting in a gunny sack" and I have never forgotten it…especially when I try on jeans or slacks and look at myself in those triple rear-view mirrors in ladies’ dressing rooms…the ones that always add at least 10 pounds to your body.  I was only in a dressing once today and I was in the department devoted to ladies’  "under-apparel" items.  I just had to get the right size for once…enough said about that subject.

FOR THE LOVE OF MIKE…..CONTINUED:  Last night I went to bed and read some more from the collection of Mike Royko’s best columns over a long period of time from the late 1960s up til the year he passed away…1997.  As usual I snickered, chortled, and outright hooted while reading.     One of the best I have read so far, concerns former Chicago Mayor Jane Byrne and her husband Jay McMullen.  At the time Byrne was the Mayor, her husband made a mis-step in letting himself be quoted by a tabloid type magazine (People)  when he evaluated his wife’s "appearance" in saying that she had great legs and a cute little_____ (commonly- used, slightly derogatory 3- letter  term for a woman’s back side)  Royko went on speculating about the interview which created a firestorm of comments from others who thought McMullen was being very disrespectful to his wife and other women by making such comments about his wife’s Derrierre.  But Royko explained that such comments about women are common among men who are "about average" and occupy the great bell part of the average curve…they speculate a lot, apparently, about womens’ physical assets …. especially their legs and their (ahem)  A — (you know).  Royko also wondered why these same men never talk about their own wives in these terms… but when referring to their  own wives, usually say something like… "I gotta go—or she’ll be all over my back!"    Why, Royko, asks… don’t men pay their wives the same compliment that McMullen paid Jane Byrne?  Royko then went on to list the things men DO say to their wives, instead of complimenting their "figures".   Among them, these infamous words spoken by men to their wives:    "What’s for supper?"….."Shhh, it’s third and one for the Bears on the five-yard line."……."Shhhh, its the half time highlights..we can talk after the game"…..Don’t forget to get the oil changed on the car"……While you’re up could you get me a beer?"  ….."While you’re up change the channel to 4…."While you’re up, adjust the color"….."Where’s my blue shirt?"……"Did the dry cleaners deliver my good suit?"….."Why don’t you call out for some pizza?"……"the dog’s whining..better take him out for a walk"     and so on and so on, for the next several decades that marriages can last….if the wife doesn’t pack her bags and go back to live with her sister or mother or girlfriend!!!!

And after that column was read by Mike’s readers, he got the usual complaints, great thoughts, and calls from readers.  One was furious with him for using the word a___   in a public newspaper and complained about her 10- year old son reading it and laughing at it. Another reader (Norma Smith) castigated Royko and said:  "Regarding your column on Jay McMullen’s remarks about Mayor Byrne’s legs and bottom: modern women crave comments on their intelligence and creative talents.  I know I do. I think anatomy comments are just a touch old-fashioned."    Royko replied to Ms. Smith with this observation:  "You are probably right.  So the next time I want to pay a compliment to a modern woman, I will say ‘Hi Doll…you got a nice set of frontal lobes.’  "

As always Royko gets the "last word in edgewise"  !!!

I have blogged before about my distress over the roofers’ big machine tearing up the "pea patch" in  late February and all of March.  I know it cannot be helped but I was still distressed every time I saw a fresh gouge in the lawn grass made by that piece of equipment.  I didn’t know it before but have realized since that I am a "nice grass-perfect-lawn" neat-freak in the summer time.  I wince when I see the deep scrapes that take off the top layer of lawn grass and lawn sod from the snow blower(s) of winter.  This early spring gouging of the lawn by the roofing machine nearly did me in, several times.  I almost went back to sucking my thumb some days. (that was truly a childhood comfort of mine especially when combined with stroking an eyebrow)

Now the snow is all melted.  The dirty, gritty drifts have melted leaving some strange looking spots of flattened dead looking grass….but the gouges are glaring at me every day…big or small black spots of grass-free sod….mocking all the efforts of past years…all the velvety green summer lawns I have loved so much and taken an inordinate amount of pride in….my heart is breaking as I look at the ugly black spots in both front and back sides of the lawn. 

Now is the time to strike!   Even after telling myself "I don’t care any more"… I find that I cared very much.  I approached My Best Friend cautiously yesterday when he was sitting at his desk studying something…this is not a good time but I did it anyway….  I gently asked: "Have you made any plans to repair the lawn gouges from the roofers???"    He conceded that he had thought of it but was still too busy picking up rocks which get hurled all over the lawn every winter by the snowblower, especially the BIG one that has to come out when the drifts resemble the Alps or the Andes.  About this time, I begin to have my recurring dream of moving into an apartment or a condo where all the lawn work and snow removal is done by someone else than US.  But I was jerked back to reality by his saying that he would go out and check things out and maybe take the tractor to a field where some black dirt could be had.  By yesterday afternoon, a major lawn repair project was in full swing.  It was cold and the wind was blowing at near-hurricane force out of the frigid northwest…it felt like it was coming down from the Arctic ice fields off Alaska’s north shore.   I felt guilty for not being out there helping, so I put on my heavy sweatshirt and really dirty jeans and muddy garden shoes and took myself out to the raspberries once again. (they are close to the shelter belt and you don’t get the northwest wind so badly when you are kneeling close to the raspberry canes.)  I finished raking with my little hand cultivator…got all the leaves, coffee cups from the roofers and other detritus out of the patch.  I cast dry fertilizer into the rows of canes.  And then I retreated into the house,without assisting with any of the lawn repairs.  IN my  own defense, I WAS baking a big batch of graham bread and had to keep tab on the risings and kneadings and bread- loaf-forming, followed by more rising and then finally the baking.

Today I participated.  I came home from my morning of swimming and going to Silver Sneakers and found my Better Half still working on the lawn reseeding.  He pleaded with me to help with the raking….he had developed a mighty big backache by then.  I bravely changed clothes and went outside, put on my garden gloves and picked up the rakes and went at the black holes in the lawn with all the enthusiasm I could muster considering that my shoulders are very vulnerable to pain and misery.  I worked for at least one hour before declaring "Uncle" when my shoulders and back told me "that is enough".  We got a lot done with two of us working on it.  If this grass seed sprouts, as it should, in the most ideal time to sow grass seed….we are going to have green velvet once again in June and July.  We have a few more black holes to deal with but tomorrow is another day….but I have an eye appointment and need to do some errands and shopping so I am not going to be available for the entire day.  If my Best Friend is not bedridden from his efforts of Monday and Tuesday, we will get this job done and I will care very much again how the lawn looks this summer. One of these years we are both going to have to cry "Uncle" when it comes to maintaining our acres of grasslands and smaller acreage of flower and vegetable gardens.  I dread the day but it is bound to happen.   

I wonder if the three sons will answer any of the calls for help or if they will just haul us "off to the Home" as the Biggest Joker among them has threatened to do for years and years!!! His plan is to "Put you both in the Home and then take the farm away" from both his brothers.  Big Talk and Big Joke..but the day will come when we cannot do the stuff we still do now…I used to be good for 8 hours of lawn and garden work and that has been reduced greatly, with many stops for nice rests in the house in front of a fan when it gets hot.

Getting older is NOT for sissies.

Before I get into my true blog topic, I  must report on a report in the London  SUN today. The headline says "Fatties Cause Global Warming".   As if fat people do not have enough to obsess about, now they can shoulder blame for global warming!  A group of British scientists (it seems a bit questionable to call them "scientists" in light of their research results)…  has come out with this information.  Fat people cause a need for more food production and more food production causes more CO2 and we have all been told what a bad gas that is! Not only do the Fatties eat way too much but they are also lazy and drive cars more and that increases the CO2 in the atmosphere even more.  Alas!  Woe is us!   Fat People are so dangerous to our planet’s health and welfare.   This sets me to thinking:  Do Skinny People cause Global Cooling?  There must have been a lot of skinny people prior to the last great Ice Age when glaciers covered  the entire northern hemisphere of the entire globe (Earth). Now… according to the British science group, those glaciers are being melted by Fat People eating too much and driving too much. 

I am doubtful of the theories of both Fat People and Skinny People causing any kind of global climate changes…..during the Ice Age I think there were lots of  Eskimos around in that era—–I ask you now, have you ever seen a skinny Eskimo?????  Anyone who subsists on whale blubber, seal blubber and walrus blubber plus a steady diet high in fish OIL is bound to be rather tubby under all those furry clothes.   I think I heard somewhere that those same British Scientists are working on getting elephants to reduce their weights enough so they can be taught to fly just like Dumbo did.

But now, "For The Love Of Mike"…..when I was browsing last week in one of the libraries I enjoy haunting, I came across a book on display that delighted my senses as soon as I saw it. It is a newer collection of the columns of one of the two newspapermen whose works I love to read the most…..Russell Baker and Mike Royko. "For The Love Of Mike" is a collection of Royko’s best columns over many years.   Royko died in 1997 at the relatively young age of 64 but his columns live on in collections published as books.  Prior to Royko’s death, I enjoyed his columns which were printed in many newspapers across the country. He used to appear regularly in the FORUM.    His humor was incomparable, especially when he discussed his legendary boyhood friend, Slats Grobnik.  Royko also made famous his favorite watering holes in downtown Chicago….particulary  Billy Goat’s tavern and one called the Acorn on Oak.  Some of Royko’s best material came from his conversations with customers at Billy Goat’s or the Acorn.

One of Royko’s columns which I read the other night while lying in bed was one about Mike’s advice to a young man who was contemplating a second marriage to a really wonderful woman after the first wife did not work out too well.  The young man confided to Mike that he and his Intended were planning to take a trip together to the seaside for about a week so they could learn from that togetherness experience if they were truly made for each other.  Royko did not approve of this plan and told the young man that running in slow motion on a sandy beach into each others’ arms and dining by candlelight each night was not the real way to get to know how each other would react in a marriage setting.  Royko had his own set of "tests" for a successful marriage.  He suggested that the young man do the following: 

  "1.  Intead of going to the seaside, go to the A. and P. on a Saturday afternoon to buy groceries.  When unloading the basket at the car, see if she can handle the really heavy bags or if she sticks you with them.   2. When changing your clothing, throw your underwear in one corner, your socks on a lamp, your shirt on the windowsill and your pants on the stereo.  See if she picks them up.  3. Borrow or rent some small children with runny noses and a tendency toward car sickness.  Put them in the back seat of your car and drive to the Wisconsin Dells on a hot humid weekend….pretend the Air Conditioning is broken and do not turn it on while you are driving.    4.  Tell her you are going out for a fast game of softball.  Say you won’t be gone long.  Wander into the kitchen about 2 a.m. with a dozen teammates and sit in the kitchen drinking beer, swearing, and loudly telling stories about all the lewd women you have known.  Ask her to make some sandwiches for you and your friends.  See if she appears to be visibly happy about  the opportunity act as hostess to your softball friends.    5.  Get a really bad cold.  Spend a weekend lying around on the couch, watching ball games, wheezing, sneezing, coughing, hawking and  complaining that you are miserable. Ask  her to bring you aspirin, soup, or orange juice, or to scratch your back, dry your brow, and change the channels on TV.  If she moves too  slowly, yell at her to snap it up.  Watch closely to see if she appears grateful for the opportunity to take care of you."

I am going to sleep each night with a smile on my face and an aching set of abdominal muscles from laughing so heartily at Mike Royko’s good humor and his many magnificent insights gained over the years of living in  Chicago and writing for at least 3 of the Chicago papers since the mid-fifties when he began his career as a columnist, almost by accident.  I feel quite confident that I am not done sharing a bit more of Royko’s humor on the blog before I finish with the book.   I intend to track down the other books that he has written also….I can never get too much of Mike Royko.

 Late Sunday afternoon (April 19)     Oh My!    My husband has just summoned me outdoors with the words "If you want to see your cranes, you better get out here right now!" I rushed out without a jacket or sweater and almost without my shoes—-but I got out in time to see a magnificent flock of Sandhill Cranes flying northward over our bluff!   Actually the were not flying…as I have researched these wonderful cranes, I have learned that they wait for thermal updrafts on days they fly….they ride the thermals and avoid wing flapping like geese…Sandhills are huge heavy birds and it must take way too much energy to actually fly like other birds do.   These cranes were in a "Vee" formation when I first looked up and saw them clearly.  The "vee" shifted and suddenly there were two groups soaring on the strong southerly winds.   Then they melted back into a perfect "vee" again and by that time I lost sight of them.      Their cries were so audible!    That strange eerie calling sound they make is marvelous to hear as they communicate all the way on their migratory routes north.

If you are as fascinated by Sandhill cranes as I am…Google "sandhill cranes" and read the many sites you will find there.  There is as tape of the crane’s cries on one of them.

I so much want to get to Nebraska and the Platte River in the migratory season.  The cranes gather by the thousands at sites along the Platte River as they "stage" for migration.  A description on one site…..a website for one of the national crane refuges…tells how the birds practice riding and testing the thermals before they actually take off on the long flights northward to reach their summer habitats in the farthest northern reaches of Canada and Alaska.  The migratory map for cranes shows their amazing ranges from South to North in differing seasons.

I have had my exhilerating experience for this spring now that I got to see the Sandhills flying directly over our house today.  It has been several years since I saw a flock and today was wonderful.   So glad I was home and had a watchful husband who heard them first and called me outside.  It was worth it to get chilled and to have extremely dirty white socks.

Godspeed, beautiful birds!!!!!

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I am hoping that John Lundy of Duluth… the Wannabe Birder… will do a blog on Sandhill Cranes. Hope you see this blog, John!!!!

I have been "retired" for nearly 5 years (next month will be the 5th year anniversary of the retirement)    My Best Friend has been retired even longer than I have but you would not know it by the schedule that is kept around here at the Buffalo Bluff. 

There are so many things to work on around a farm!    The pole building (a.k.a the "Polar Barn"…a leftover cute saying from a young grandchild years ago)  contains all sorts of possibilities for projects and hard work that can easily consume 8 or 9 hours a day. There are things to weld , things to build out of the Buffalo Bluff supply of our own ash lumber, there are wheels to be greased, there are tractors to be conditioned…it is an endless list of jobs that must be done in 8 hour shifts and sometimes even at night til the light is gone. I need my little push mower revved up for spring work..that is another project I will push for.

  Today I came home from being a gad-about slacker who had gone to a church rummage and plant sale in town to find two of my family….husband and son…..putting in their 8 hours even on a Saturday.  One of them is engaged in changing oil on a vehicle and the other has a big horse trailer backed up to the garage.  The trailer is being partly filled with the "Non-recycle-able" garbage which is destined for the county landfill, eventually.   I feel guilty as all get-out, because there is an unloaded "other trailer" parked inside the garage which is my 8- hour a day job just now.  I have ignored it for about 4 days so far… but the guilt is getting to me. This trailer contains all the contents of an RV which has been sold to another couple who have better use for it than we do.   Now it had to be unloaded and cleaned up and I did not lift one finger to help with it because I reasoned that I was not the one who sold it!  How is that for irrational, but necessary reasoning for one who did not want to go out and do a retired person’s 8- hour day on something that no longer belongs to her????

Where am I going to put all that stuff on "my trailer" that is sitting in the garage with all the RV stuff on it???    I have lots of "silverware" already…and the stuff from the RV is definitely not precious stuff having been bought from rummage sales and second hand stores.  The towels and washcloths can be used but I need another cupboard for them.  I am not a carpenter and I am also too cheap (retired income is not lavish) to buy a cupboard or storage shelving unit.  Where will I put all the "grocery items" (mostly paper products) that have sat in the RV cupboards?  Tehre are blankets and sheets I really do not need in the house.    Why didn’t that church rummage sale have anything like an extra cupboard  for about five bucks?  I would have snapped it up in an instant.  I am already filling the nice storage spaces in my little "Hytte" (cabin) with plastic-lidded storage bins full of Christmas decorations and other seasonal decorations.  The Hytte cabinets are filling up with my craze for collecting old  glass malted milk glasses and tulip sundae dishes.  I live in a very large house with many rooms and I cannot think where to put the RV stuff!    I know a commenter will tell me to get rid of some of my stuff (junk) but I am my mother’s daughter.  My mother had a hard time parting with ANYTHING due to the fact that she came of age in the very hard times in the 1920′s to say nothing of the Depression when she married an equally frugal husband.  That generation did not want to throw out anything since who knew when the Hard Times would return and you might need the stuff again????

I think my Best Friend is blood-related somehow to my own mother.  He also, does not like to get rid of stuff in his Polar Barn.  Rather, it is much more fun to put more stuff in there and collect stuff.  Everyone who comes out here to visit, who is a collector,  loves the Pole Building…it is a collector’s delight.   My Dad when he was alive used to say "anything you need you can find it in G’s pole barn!!!"    He could have said the same thing about some of the closests I am responsible for….although I do put in 8 hours on a few days and go through the collected closet stuff…..there are things that cannot be disposed of, however.  Nobody will every convince me to throw out any of the 1960′s-70′s vintage Fisher Price toys my boys used to play with.  That F-P castle and all its occupants and the Pink Dragon, the King’s carriage, the tables and beds and all that good stuff must be worth a fortune by now. I intend to take it to the Antiques Roadshow in about another 20 years and find out how valuable it really is.  No 8- hour- a -day work cycle on closests will NOT find me throwing out that Good Stuff.  I still have a pair of shoes I bought in Vienna, Austria , in the summer of 1958.  I cannot, and have not, worn them for decades, but who can get rid of a pair of Cinderella- like, high heeled slippers that came from Vienna?  I cannot.  I won’t even mention the green wool size 6 "sheath dress" in another closet that used to fit me like a glove back in the late 1950′s.  It is such a great reminder of a lost "figure" from my 20 somethings.

But getting back to the Retired Person’s 8- hour- a- day work schedule:   if I go out and appear to be really working hard in the raspberry patch, maybe I won’t get any scornful, "you-lazy-bones" look from either of the Male Members of the family later today.  What I need to do is go outside and work awhile and then come back in the house, lie back in the recliner with a pitiful look on my scratched-up face (raspberry barbs) and put on the blood pressure cuff to feign an appearance of being overwrought by the hard work I have done.  It usually works so what is the harm in doing it one more time??

The only good thing about going out today (it has gotten colder) is that I will not even have to think about any flying bugs that usually bother me terribly when I go into any space associated with gardening.  Even the early flies of spring have a way of hovering around my face and head.  I can think about our good friend, Stan, who reported that after he retired, he got so busy he was thinking of hiring a guy, half time to help him with his 8-hour a day work projects on HIS farm which lies just a few miles east of ours!

The guilt has gotten to me….I have to get outside and get to work on a Saturday….but it will not be for 8 hours like others around here that are related to me are putting in today.