No blogs for a while

The party!

The birthday girl

The birthday speach

The granddaughters



We couldn't find 90 candles...



RIPD, B&D and the bad thing

RIPD, D&B and the bad thing

If Jeff Bridges is your favorite actor then RIPD is the film for you.  Plenty of action.  Actually has a plot with romance, saving the world.  Otherwise…

On a lighter note, we got Debbie and Bastian so we’re all together.  Yeah!

On every trip that I have made to Minnesota there has always been an incident; a tornado, temperatures 20f below, humidity that no one could bear…you name it.  My ‘eagerness’ to return is always muffled by past experiences.  And so, here I am again, waiting through the most excellent and beautiful weather.  My sandals are actually making a tan line on the top of my feet!  So now it’s happened, the lowest high for this day, July 27^th, in history…something below 70f.  This is what happens when I come to Minneapolis…bizarre weather.

Rum River and ice cream

The Rum River flows south from Lake Mille Lacs 145 miles to its confluence with the Mississippi river in the city of Anoka.  The first (log and dirt) dam was built in 1853 and destroyed in 1854, then rebuilt in 1854.  Five sluiceways provided inadequate power for five mills.  Steam engines were added to supplement the river’s energy.  One can see the 10’-12’ spill over the Rum River Dam, compared to the 40’-50’ plunge at St. Anthony Falls, what a difference of economies the rivers produced.  But in its twenty productive years sawmills, flower mills, wood working plants, and cooper shops all lined Rum River’s banks.  Before the Red River Valley opened, Anoka was the center of potato production.



Weir of Rum River Dam





Rum River Dam



 

And there’s a great ice cream shop in Anoka! 



Homemade chocolate chip icecream sandwitch

Rasberry cheesecake with soft chocolate pieces

Spending a day with Peter and Gayle…

Farming

Lower water pressure with downward facing nozzles saves reduces evaporation and lowers energy costs.The 'gun' on the end covers the corners and irregular sides of the circle.  So the quandry of this orchardist (whose orchards are either squares or rectangles), how does a circle have a corner or irregular side?  Well, I know now!

Recreating



Pete and Gayle





and watching recreating

I can do this!  (40 years ago)  Ha!

And bird watching



Loon--Minnesota State Bird






Sand Hill Crane







St. Anthony Falls, The Mill District and Joseph

The lumber and wheat milling industries, and later the textile industry, were powered by the only true falls on the Mississippi by Francis Turbines.  Laid on a bed of sand and sandstone is a layer of limestone.  Above the limestone is cobbles and dirt and sand and, of course, the river.  Damming the river prevented the gradual upstream progress of the falls, estimates of four feet a year, as sand was eroded away undermining the limestone.  Locks were installed and are presently operated by the Army Corp of Engineers.  Tours of the locks are suspended (sequestration?).

In the mid-1800’s Mill A’s flower-dust explosion was felt 7 miles away (it was thought to be an earthquake), killed 18 and destroyed half a dozen nearby buildings.  The remains are now the Mill Museum; to the right of the grain elevators.  To the left of the grain elevators is the Endless Bridge of the Guthrie Theatre.

And tonight, a performance of “Joseph and the Amazing Multicolored Dreamcoat” at the Chanhassen dinner theatre.  Fabulous!  

Mt. Rainyer

The drive to Seattle was a bit exhausting but we made it…a tough night but Lynn insists that I did a good job snoring…but every time we saw Mt. Rainer (Rainyer) the camera was not at hand.  It was a little disappointing but it is what it is.  I had to give it up.

Early at SeaTac, aboard the plane, and the earliest tomato, vodka, Tabasco drink I ever drank (I’m on the verge of becoming a wreck), I read Louie L'Amour and dozed through the flight AFTER I got these shots of Rainer…and St. Helens…and Hood…and another!  Of course I couldn’t get all four at one time so take a guess at the others.  Hint, see the giant landslide on Rainer?

All is well in Minnesota…the temperature and humidity have dropped…but as I told the in-laws, “I’m here so something bad is 'bound to happen”.

Best, David

Etymology and travel

We speak differently, it seems, as we chatted with our friends.

“How did you say that?”

“Willamette”

“No, you say it ‘Willamette’” (okay, it did sound differently)

But we’re foreigners to this country and how could one ever know how to say words like, Skagit, Snoqualmie, Cle Elum, Puyellup, Chehalis, Obanepecosh, Enumclaw, Osoyoos, and who would name a town ‘Sedro Woolley’?  And ‘Rainier’ was mentioned.

Lynn spoke up, “Ya know, I know the etymology of that word…ya see, when the Finnish explorers were passing this way they saw that big mountain and named it, ‘It’s rainer here than anywhere else’ which was shortened to fit on the map to ‘it’s rainer-here’ and then shortened again to ‘rainyer’, then re-spelled to Rainier.  Ha!

Or stay here in the North West I found a way to Minnesota.  Lynn can take the plane but with this boat, I can meet her there.  Lewis and Clark did it.

See you in Minnesota…    

La Conner

What was once a thriving farming and fishing village where money from hand-shake deals and production flowed out into the economy, La Conner is now overrun by yuppies.  The character of the old town remains…with facades…last night’s choice of B&B seemed ancient but eloquent; built just 15 years past, a remarkable representation of histoic preservation.  But there are still a few remaining relics as this morning, 7:30am, there sounded a siren (a repeated siren, I must add) howling up, then down with a funny ‘dribble’ of a noise and then repeating again, up, down, with a ‘dribble’.  And as this went on (we’re now awake) Lynn and I guessed its meaning; she guessing it to be a volunteer fire department, I was guessing it a tsunami warning.  It was later in the day that Steve and I, while chatting with a farmer, learned that this siren is a surplus air raid siren confiscated by the local volunteer fire department.  Its tone is resultant of the siren being wired three phase and being installed in a single phase firehouse.  Through a phase rotor(?) (or a flux capacitor?) the power is developed into the proper three phase needed.  And so, the siren’s sound whirrs up to a mighty howl, then whirrs down to the beginning tone, then the ‘dribble’ (growl while rolling your tongue) as the siren winds down to unusable levels of electrical phases.  (I’m explaining this to all you laymen as many technical 'lectric terms are unfamilier to me).

And so it’s only in La Conner you can find a mix of army surplus and a fireplug in a potato field (the yuppies are quite fearful of potato fires.

And it’s only in La Conner you can find a reminder for the yuppies to share the road with farm equipment.  Now, if they would only quit honking at me while on the round-about of the wheat field.

And it’s only in La Conner you can find an organic beat (and weed) field.

And at my friend’s back door, a spinach field planted for seed.  Awesome!    

Eugene to La Conner

Firstly, one must note that the geology is rather boring:  descending blocks of basalt, volcanic tuff, ocean floor, mercury mines, fault lines, coal seams, and dislocated rivers.  It’s just pretty boring.  The traffic, on the other hand, was anything but boring with traffic jams from Tacoma to Seattle.  We had a bout with road-rage.  At something above 70mph, tailgating, jamming past with a dirty look then sudden braking, all in the fast lane.  What the hell?  We watched as the offending, red pickup worked its way up traffic, finally losing sight some half hour later.  Then there was the motorcycle, driver and rider, looking for a fast way to an end time.  We had gone through and come out of the wormhole to Southern California.

Only in La Conner can one find three, sixty-something young Cal Poly friends in the center of a round-about of a wheat field.

And only in La Conner can one find a pier with a waterfall.

Lost in Klamath, looking for a restaurant, we ended up going the wrong way on a one-way street.  Allowance was given us to make a turn-around.  We found a nice deli, A Leap of Taste, http://aleapoftaste.com/about

Lunch…tasty…which included the weirdest drink, Lemon Elation.  I liked the look of the can.

  On a whim I bought a mushroom kit to “grow yer own”.

FYI, there is no 4-G connection on the Willamette Pass.  As we were on the only road between 97 and I-5 I’m sure we weren’t lost but the new I-phone was a colossal failure for directions while following the Willamette River downhill…back to the paper map.  Old “tech” is best.

Eugene was a welcome sight as well as our first B&B, McKenzie Orchards B&B in Springfield.  Deb, our host, served a Pinot Noir of the Willamette Valley, with crackers, cream cheese, pepper jellie, olives and feta.  She recommended The Chief Brewhouse (as she was their pastry chef).  We spit a dinner of BBQ chicken, pulled pork, and brisket, and a cream-type apple pie for dissert…not the mention the French fries and broccoli (Lynn forced me to eat).  I had a black beer.  It was all pretty good.

‘xcuse me as I got’a go floss.