Merry Christmas

As I was under the glaring spotlight of a deadline to get our annual Christmas letter done, I thought to myself, "why should I only subject this drivel to the undeserving 50 people on our Christmas card list?" And so, I decided to expand the carnage to the people on the "Off the Mark" mailing list also. I occasionally mention the fact that, according to the counter on the website, about 100 people click on the link and read all or part of it. What I don't mention is the fact that there are 150 people are directly emailed the link to my blog, leaving about 50 who want me to THINK they read it, but really don't want to suffer through it! What you are about to read may be one of the reasons for that defection rate.
Ladies and gentlemen, I give you our 2011 Christmas letter. (For those of you on our regular Christmas card list, you have the satisfaction of ignoring it TWICE this year!)

Torii

Merry Christmas everyone! For those of you who were thinking, "I just can't wait until the annual holiday letter from Mark, Kathy and Lindsay arrives," your wait is over. For those of you who are thinking, "HOW DO WE MAKE THEM STOP," please just skip to the asterisk at the bottom of the page...

January got off to a rollicking good start with Mark getting sent off to Tracy, California for some work training. He chose to drive instead of fly...his chance to get an up-close look at parts of the country he had never seen. Unfortunately, he ended up in the hospital fighting an infection for the four days preceding his departure. It took more than a little sweet-talking for him to get sprung from his hospital bed in time to make the trip. Heavily medicated, he made the trip and loved every minute of it...as Kathy and Lindsay were back in Minnesota shoveling snow.
The women got a bit of a payback however, as at the end of the month they made a trip to TwinsFest in Blaine with Todd and Nicole Denney. Lindsay even got to hang with mascot TC for a bit...
In March, Lindsay started part time at Miller Legal Strategic Planning Center (where Kathy works) while finishing up her final semester at MnWest in Pipestone. Later this year (September) she was hired full time. She still works there and is living in Tyler while she searches for employment in other areas.
During her spring break in March, she was able to thaw out her feet for a short time with a trip to Sanibel Island in Florida.

Relay for Life 2011

Mark and Kathy spent the second weekend of March in an equally hot spot...the 20th-plus annual Wilmes Family Board Game Weekend. We gave Mark's brother Clay a one-year respite from hosting and the event was held at the Tyler Senior Center.
The biggest news of March, however, had to be the new arrival to our home—a beautiful two-year-old kitty named Torii. We have loved every minute of her time with us...and as far as you can tell with a cat, the feelings are mutual.
Mark spent a lot of time this year at the Lake Benton Opera House. He performed in the "Broadway Meets Lake Benton" show in March and directed a comedy called, "'Til Beth Do Us Part" in April. Not quite having enough of a theater experience, we all made the trip to Chanhassen at the end of April to see "Jesus Christ Superstar."
On May 12th, Lindsay graduated from MnWest with an AAS degree as an Administrative Assistant. Her and Mark were honored to sing at the graduation ceremony, performing "Somewhere Over the Rainbow." Armed with her new degree, to go with her previous degree in graphics, she hopes to take on a tough job market and score a career.
In June, Kathy and her sister Karen spent the weekend at the Sculpture Walk, as well as visits to Indian Island and Morgan Creek wineries in the Mankato area.
The first weekend of July ended up a memorable one, as horrific straight-line and tornadic winds hit Tyler and took with it many beautiful trees and damaged scores of homes and businesses. We had two trees uprooted in our back yard and two more snapped off, as well as thousands of dollars of damage to our house. Somehow everybody in our little town survived, and with the help of countless hours of work from volunteers from surrounding towns, we are getting back to normal.

Cast of "The Dixie Swim Club"

On July 9th, Kathy's dad, Lowell married Doris Kjellsen in Badger, South Dakota. The whole family moved to South Dakota for the weekend and had a great time.
Much of July for Kathy was spent as co-captain of her Relay for Life team, CUREious George. This year we combined with another Tyler team, CancerMals. It was a fun and rewarding experience. Mark spent much of the summer back at the Opera House directing the musical, "Camelot."
Lindsay's 10-year high school class reunion was held on Aebleskiver Days in Tyler. She also got to see many Jensen family members from Iowa, Colorado and Arizona at a family reunion.
It was trip time again in August, as Kathy and Lindsay spent a few days at the Wilmes Women Weekend...this year in Door County, Wisconsin. Lindsay also spent some time roughing it in the Apostle Islands with her cousins and some friends. In September it was another winery. This time Kathy and Lindsay made a trip with our sister-in-law, Linda, to enjoy a "grape stomp" by Jordan, MN.
On October 1, Lindsay was back at Chanhassen with some high school friends to see "Hairspray."


Merry Christmas from Mark, Lindsay, Kathy and Torii

Kathy and Mark were both at the Opera House in October. Kathy starred with four other women in "The Dixie Swim Club." Mark directed, and after two weeks at the Opera House, the show moved to Pipestone for one weekend.
Lindsay was back in the air again in October, off to see her friend Jessie in Little Rock, AR. Kathy made a weekend trip to the Twin Cities with co-captain Carrie Johnson for a Relay for Life Summit.
November saw Kathy and Mark on a return trip to Chanhassen to see "Hairspray." The first weekend in December both Mark and Kathy performed in the Opera House Christmas Show. Mark directed this show also.
*

Here's wishing you all a very Merry Christmas!

Mark, Kathy and Lindsay...

Happily ever after…

It seems I find myself constantly reminded of how quickly our lives go by. Here we are poised at the start of another holiday season, with sale ads trying to tempt us with discounted prices on artificial Christmas trees. If my first half century is any indication, the next two months will breeze by at a breakneck pace. I do love those holidays. While we are on the subject of time going by, I find it unbelievable that it has been 20 years since the infamous “Blizzard of the Century,” when a large swath of Minnesota was beaten senseless with several feet of snow and high winds.
That also means that come Thursday, November 3rd, Kathy and I will be celebrating 20 years of wedded bliss. For those of you who were there with us, you know we were supposed to be celebrating that milestone on Wednesday, November 2nd.
The quick recap, hitting just the high points, went something like this:
Halloween was on a Thursday in 1991. I was still eight years from ending my career as a rock band bass guitarist/lead singer. I clocked out of my job that afternoon at Tyler Wholesale and it was raining in Tyler. I packed up my band equipment and headed for the American Legion in Windom to play for a dance. My plan was to be back later that night, and use my Friday off to help with our final wedding preparations, slated for Saturday, November 2^nd. It was three days later before law enforcement would let me out of Windom to come home and get married.
I was snowed in with band mates at the Johnson Motel, and Kathy with my family back in Tyler. Our groom’s supper was the first victim, it was cancelled early. As the snow continued to fall we cancelled the dance scheduled for Saturday evening, and it became evident as the hours went on, the wedding wasn’t going to happen either.
I finally made it back to town on Sunday morning, by way of Worthington, and we had wedding rehearsal as our guests were arriving for our postponed vows on Sunday afternoon. Our wedding trip to the Metrodome to watch the Vikings play Tampa Bay was history.
The biggest downside was the fact that the wedding had to go on without some of our family and friends who were still unable to make it to town. The upside, I guess, is we have quite a story to tell of that weekend two decades past. It was even documented on the front page of the Windom paper.
Here we are 20 years later, still blindly, crazy, madly…okay, well we still get along pretty well. We still connect with a palpable unspoken closeness at home after all these years…me from the desk of our home office and her from the bedroom where she is watching “Project Runway.”
I get emotional when I think of all the ways Kathy has made my life better.
For starters, I never have to make a major decision in our life, although sometimes I get to pretend I do. Young people can’t imagine what a stress reliever that can be!
My days aren’t bogged down by financial management. My paycheck gets deposited directly into “our” checking account, and I never see it again. I don’t even have to think about it…as a matter of fact, I’ve been asked NOT to think about it many times.
I’ve been freed of any temperature control responsibilities in my home. I don’t even have to think about where the thermostat IS in our home…and yes, you guessed it…I’ve been asked NOT to think about it many times.
Yes, ladies and gentlemen…it’s the married life for me. I highly recommend it.
Of course it is not just me who has lived a blissful existence. Kathy never has to worry about me botching a handyman project around the home…although I’m pretty sure we have some tools somewhere in the house. No Tim Allen-type issues for her.
I selflessly keep the DVD shelf stocked so she doesn’t need to even leave the house if she needs entertainment.
There is seldom a day goes by that we don’t have access to some sort of pizza.
I almost blush when I think about how she must go on about me when she is out with her friends.
Of course, the fact that we live in such an elevated state of happiness has its drawbacks. Time flies when you are having fun.
Before we know it the date will be November 3^rd, 2031 and we’ll be celebrating our 40^th wedding anniversary, spinning tales about our snowy wedding weekend.
And, of course, if I have my way, we’ll be celebrating with pizza and a movie.
Happy Anniversary Kathy! Here’s to setting sail on our next 20… How lucky are we?

Another year closer to being my dad…

There are those who are said to wear their hearts on their sleeves. Some profess to wear their sunglasses at night. According to the old song from “Annie,” you are never fully dressed without a smile. Me? I guess you could say I’m never fully dressed without wearing part of my lunch on the front of my shirt.

It doesn’t seem to matter how careful I am. I can lean over my plate. I can hold my plate under my chin. I can wear my napkin as a bib. It just doesn’t matter, I always end up with something dripped down the front of my ample upper torso…and seemingly always within the first two or three bites. There are times when it happens BEFORE I take my first bite—I can’t seem to open a cup of yogurt without shooting an array of milky splatter art on my bosom.

My reputation of proudly displaying my leftovers is well-known to friends and relatives. Last year Santa left me Stain Stick in my stocking.

My favorite shirt is a Beatles shirt because when I wear it, it actually looks like John, Paul,George and Ringo have grease spots on THEIR shirts, taking a bit of the heat off me.

At the end of the day, I do my best to track down any residue from the day’s errant vittles and smear a modicum of waxy stain remover on each tasty splotch.

Unfortunately, it seems like more often than not, I apparently miss a spot or two, and when I pluck a shirt from my closet in the morning, a glaring grease spot or two mocks me from the bathroom mirror. Some mornings it is bad enough that I have to grab another shirt. I remove the soiled blouse and slather it with more magic potion before tossing it in the hamper. Most mornings, however, the imperfections are faint enough to pass my fairly flexible standards for acceptability and I’m off to the office.

One morning last week, however, I scored…big time. I slogged through my workday pre-dawn regimen, and after donning my shirt, I did my daily visual shirt scan in the bathroom mirror…and I saw a perfectly spotless façade. I rubbed my bleary eyes, thinking that my usual morning fogginess was playing tricks on me. Not a chance. I had achieved what I had previously assumed was unachievable. My shirt was spotless.

I left the house that morning armed with the confidence that nothing could ruin what obviously was going to be a great day.

I spent my day exuding confidence that could only be realized by a man with a spot-free frock. Breakfast came and went without anything tumbling on to my belly. My post-lunch inspection somehow found me devoid of any peach Yoplait residue staring up at me from my bellyshelf.

I was on a roll.

The steak we had for supper that night, held onto every single drop of my Heinz 57 sauce. I was beginning to think I should have picked up a lottery ticket—it was my lucky day.

Bursting with pride, my day ended as it began…scanning a spot-free t-shirt in the mirror before doffing it to step in the shower.

That’s when my rosy cheeks went ashen. My heart skipped a beat or two. The t-bone in my tummy rolled over once, then twice.

It nearly escaped without notice, but it was unmistakable…the small white corner peeking out above the neck of my shirt. I had spent the day at work wearing my shirt backwards. Pouring salt into the gaping wound of my self-confidence, I spun around and confirmed what I already suspected...the “back” of my shirt was riddled with grease spots.

Nobody said anything to me at the office. Maybe they didn’t notice. Maybe that glaring white tag remained hidden, keeping me from the hoots and catcalls of my co-workers.

Or maybe the punch line of the day (when I was not in the room) was, “on the bright side, there are no spots on his shirt!”

Nothing will surprise me from here on out. I fully expect, someday, to find my shirt tail sticking out the front of my fly, or my pants leg tucked in my sock. Maybe someday I’ll catch my reflection in the mirror at work with my shirt crookedly buttoned. (Kathy will try to tell you this has already happened.)

It was probably only a matter of time before something like this happened. I’ve been known to stand in a room full of people and wonder why they are looking at me…as my cell phone rings in my back pocket. Some of you have probably followed me for 10 or 15 miles with my blinker flashing.

I’ve most likely snored in church.

I’m a pair of Khaki shorts with black socks away from being that old guy I see in Wal-Mart once in awhile.

Golden years, here I come.

What I did on my summer vacation…

I was thinking the other day that I have a lot of things that make me happy in my life. I’m happy that I still like watching the Minnesota Twins, even though they aren’t doing very well this year. I’m happy that fall temperatures are just around the corner. I’m happy that I’m not Muammar Gaddafi right now.
I was so busy this summer that for a short time, I forgot I was happy. But then August arrived.
Ahhh, August. That light at the end of my proverbial summer tunnel. The pot of gold at the end of my humid rainbow. The carrot dangling from the end of my yard work stick.
Each year, August provides me with a short respite from the extracurricular activities to which I regularly subject myself. The summer musical is done and there is a gap of a couple of weeks before tryouts for the fall play. There is little activity in my world of part-time photography. Most of the weeds on my lawn have slipped into a drought-induced dormancy…
This August provided me with a particularly blissful lull. This year’s “Girls’ Weekend” for the women in the Wilmes family spanned five days…August 9-13. Kathy and Lindsay were headed for Door County, Wisconsin for five days, and since I had accrued a couple of days of vacation that were burning a hole in my pocket, I bestowed upon myself a four day weekend of my own. Just me and the cat.
The nice part about a four-day break is that it gives a person a joyfulness that spills over into the days preceding. The anticipation that comes with knowing that the time off is on the horizon is delicious.
When I was a kid, our family would take a week-long vacation every year. Without fail, an annual summer trip found us heading “Up North,” and trips to places like Paul Bunyanland and Deer Park and the Alexandria resorts were some of the fondest memories from my youth.
Somewhere in the ensuing 40 years, I’ve become a lump, and the joy I get from staying home rivals the memories of those wonderful childhood excursions.
The first thing when I got home from work on that Wednesday evening, Torii, my feline co-vacationer, thought we needed to order pizza. I looked at her and said, “you don’t eat pizza.”
“Then you’ll have to eat it yourself,” she meowed.
Forty-eight hours of leisure had begun.
While I certainly enjoy recreation as much as the next guy (we squeezed in a total of nine movies over four days), I get nearly as much pleasure from tending to my to-do list that grew longer over the summer. The relief that comes with knowing that long-overdue tasks can be put behind me brings me as much enjoyment as watching the Jason Bourne trilogy on DVD.
And that, my friends, is what I did on my summer vacation. Torii, who was apparently a bit lonely for the women of the house, seldom left my side. My home office also doubles as the coat closet, entertainment library, extra mattress storage and exercise room. My needy kitty spent the bulk of the four days hanging out next to me on the seat of the exercise bike or curled up in my orange plastic “IN” basket.
Although the break didn’t seem long enough, it nevertheless made heading into the next workweek somehow less daunting. I guess if you count the days of anticipation, the actual vacation, and the residual elevation of mood over the next week, I had about a two week break!
Life is back to what I consider normal now. Tryouts for the fall play were Monday evening, I’m back to taking sports pictures for the county schools and Torii is back to ignoring me.
And somewhere in my 70s, I’ll be hanging out at the Senior Center, reminiscing with some other wrinkled person with cataracts about that August back in 2011 when me and my cat sat around for four days watching movies, scarfing down pizza and swilling Diet Mountain Dew.
I hope I won’t have to listen to him ramble on about his trip to Arizona.

Maybe if Congress would settle their differences by jousting…

Hello all! Long time, no blog.
As many of you probably know, I have been knee-deep in another Opera House production over the past seven weeks. We are in our final week of productions, so I can breathe a bit easier again...or at least I would be able to breathe easier if I didn’t have a summer chest cold for the second consecutive July/August.
For those of you who may have been worried that I wouldn’t have an online entry bragging about the cast of the current production, you can relax. Here it is!
First of all, thanks to George Jorgensen and Clarice Nordmeyer for the complimentary letters to the editor in the local papers about “Camelot.” Also, thanks to everyone else who have went out of his or her way to tell the cast members how much they liked the show. It’s not too late if some of you are still interested in seeing it. We have shows tonight (Friday, Aug. 5) at 7:30, Saturday at 2:00 and 7:30 and Sunday at 2:00.
I would also like to say thanks to a remarkable cast for another splendid summer. I am about to finish up my 20th consecutive summer spent at the Opera House. This year’s cast of “Camelot” made my job about as easy as possible, by working as a team, and more importantly, saving all the drama for on the stage!
The major characters are played by John Voit (King Arthur) of Ghent; Emilirose Rasmusson (Guenevere) of Ivanhoe; Erick Harper (Lancelot) of Tyler; John Williams (King Pellinore) of Brookings; Taylor Holck (playing both Merlyn and Mordrid) of Ruthton; and Paula Nemes (Morgan) of Marshall. These people and about 20 others on and off the stage have created a magical experience for the audiences. Their dedication to the development of their characters has been a joy to behold, and I have the pleasure of watching them perform that magic every evening.
The honest truth is that the audiences have averaged under 100 per evening. The summer musical is counted on by the Opera House board to provide most of our operating revenue for the rest of the year. We are hoping that word-of-mouth will help us build some crowds for the coming weekend. Not only would it help a long-time non-profit organization, but would be a great payoff for a couple of dozen volunteers who have been giving up their evenings over the past two months.
To conclude—thanks to everyone on stage and behind the scenes who have given of themselves while only receiving a compensation of the pride they feel in what they have done.
If you haven’t seen the show yet, time is running thin. Come and escape to the days of the Knights of the Round Table. Forget the woes of a tepid economy and dysfunctional government and television reruns and enjoy the efforts of a group of your neighbors and friends. I can’t imagine how anyone would regret it.
Oh yeah…and it is in 3-D. No weird glasses required!!!
See you at the show!

A little help from our friends (and a couple of kind strangers)

It seems like I’ve been struck with a bad case of sporadic blogging recently. A combination of lack of time and…okay, just a lack of time, has kept me from imparting my useless nattering upon the masses. By masses, of course, I mean the approximately 100 people who trip the “unique visitors” counter when I post a new missive on my blog spot.
The weekend storm in our area prompted me to come out of semi-retirement from blogging. It was an amazing and breathtaking event. (I mean the storm, not my coming out of retirement.)
Last week at this time I was looking forward to a relaxing three-day weekend from work. Once again in the middle of rehearsals for an Opera House show, I allowed many of my obligations to stack up and was planning to reduce that ominous stack considerably, beginning first thing Saturday morning.
Then Friday happened.
I didn’t experience it first hand, but I was on my way home from work when it hit. I could see the big green wall over Tyler. I was traveling north on Highway 91 when the front arrived at my Blazer, along with a strange sensation that it was going to roll me right into the ditch. I pulled over to the side of the road, but winds stronger than I had ever experienced had me hoping over the span of the next 10 minutes that I would remain upright.
When I was finally able to proceed, I became more and more concerned with the state of the place I call home. Cell phone service was spotty at best, and Kathy (in the basement at Miller Legal) and I were somewhat able to communicate with each other in limited fashion. I got a message that I was supposed to swing by our house to make sure it was still there and to check on the kitty. It was over an hour, however, before I could get to town. I was turned around on Highway 14 due to downed power lines. I tried going north on Highway 23, but power lines and a rolled semi truck turned me around again.
I went south to Ruthton and was again stopped on the south end of Tyler. Finally I found a way in from the west and made it to downtown before having to park and walk the last block home. I was stunned at the amount of damage that surrounded me.
While we were thankful that we were all safe (although Torii was one skittish kitty after riding out the storm alone at home), and our house only had damage to a few windows and shingles, we were overwhelmed by the fact we had four trees lying in our yard. We weren’t sure where to start.
And we were among the luckiest residents in town.
Assuming that most of the equipment in town was engaged in bigger emergencies than our own, we waited and mulled our options. We kept ourselves busy by moving all the contents of our freezer to some friends who had power in Marshall (Thanks Chris and Michele). We filled our spare time bailing water out of our sump hole and lugging it to the sink across the basement. You wouldn’t believe how many five-gallon pails it takes to make the water level go down a half inch!
Somewhere around mid-afternoon we had a gift sent straight to us from heaven, in the form of nine gracious volunteers and a few pieces of equipment, large and small. A couple of chain saws, a backhoe and a skid loader descended upon our back yard and accomplished what an hour earlier seemed impossible. The crew: Darrell and Bernice Oerter, Todd and Nicole Denney, Brice Denney, Tyson Nielsen, Derrick Stage, Wally Lipinski and neighbor Don Mulloy pitched in and cleared our yard. I was humbled at the good will that was bestowed upon us. Somehow I got through thanking them all without standing there and blubbering, but not sure how I pulled it off.
The town was filled with Good Samaritan stories like that. Fire departments and electrical crews from all our neighboring towns were there to give up their holiday weekends for us. How do you say thanks to that?
We got our power back Sunday afternoon. After the sound of volunteer chainsaws, there is not much better than the sound of a sump pump sucking water out of your basement. It was sweet.
If there is a slacker in the area it would have to be (no surprise here) Mediacom. Six nights later we still have no cable or internet service. Anyone who knows me would have to wonder how I have survived. I’m usually connected around the clock. With intermittent cell service, my Droid phone occasionally had enough reception to get an infrequent glimpse at the outside world.
Near as I can see Mediacom has put in a couple of grueling six hour days. When Kathy called them to let them know we were still without service, the recording said that they were not aware of any outages in our area. Now THAT is customer service. What makes me even MORE frustrated is that when I actually did see them in town, they had a trailer holding a spool of coaxial cable parked on my back yard, right next to the pile of severed cable that once led to our house. That was two days ago.
I’m sure they will refund our money for being without cable or internet for a week.
Fortunately I’m still buoyed by the elevated mood that was infused by the good will of others, so I haven’t snapped…yet.
All-in-all I came out of the weekend thankful for our health, thankful that the damage wasn’t worse and thankful that (outside of cable and internet providers) we can count on the selfless kindness of our neighbors far and near.

We now pronounce you the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge…

Hello all! I have afforded myself a bit of a break from blogging over the past few weeks. I’ve been a bit too busy playing with my new kitty. To avoid, however, being labeled as a middle-aged kitty blogger, I will save my Torii update for a future subject.
This week, of course, there is much bigger news than the daily antics of my cat. The news, in fact, is bigger than anything else happening on the entire globe. If the news cycle is any indication, it is the biggest news of the year.
I speak, obviously, of the Royal Wedding. William (not Bill) and Kate (not Catherine) have finally tied the Royal Knot.
I don’t get the appeal. It must be a guy thing, because I don’t see what all the fuss is about. How, I wonder, can we experience any joy from the marriage of a couple of Brits when my Twins are sucking so badly? Shouldn’t we be in mourning?
Being a dedicated Facebook user, I noticed many of my online friends getting very excited about the event over the past few days. It ranged from cracking open a bottle of champagne at 4:00 AM to a sleepover party to watch the ceremony. Now that I think about it, they were all female posts. The men were a bit distracted by the first round of the NFL draft.
To me, even more astounding than the general obsession with the wedding, was the fuss over Kate’s dress...and the work that went into making it.
The dress was designed by a woman named Sarah Burton, who counts among her customers a range of people from Michelle Obama to Lady Gaga. There was no word if she was the genius behind Gaga’s meat dress.
The details of the wedding gown have been protected as Top Secret for months. Not even WikiLeaks could sniff out the information. There was even a tent put up to hide her until the last possible moment! Can you say “over-hyped”?
I saw pictures. It is long and white…yup that’s a wedding dress.
According to USA Today, the dress was a “lacy, long-sleeved, sweetheart-neckline gown with lace overlay. With an ivory silk tulle veil trimmed with hand-embroidered flowers, sparkling tiara (thankfully she didn’t go with the non-sparkling tiara) and her hair swept half up, Middleton was the picture of princess perfection. It took some adjusting to fold the almost-9-foot train into the car, where she was seated next to her father, Michael Middleton.”
Here is where it gets freaky:
“Great care was taken in constructing the lace, a task that went to the Royal School of Needlework. According to details posted on the official royal wedding website, ‘the workers washed their hands every 30 minutes to keep the lace and threads pristine, and the needles were renewed every three hours to keep them sharp and clean.’”
Talk about feeling inadequate as I sit here typing in my faded sweatpants and “Real Men Eat Cookies” t-shirt.
There was no mention in any of the stories I read, if the people making William’s jacket washed their hands.
I guess if there was an upside for me in seeing non-stop wedding news over the past few days it would be that we got a bit of a break from listening to Donald Trump. Although, not unlike Kate Middleton’s celebrated wedding dress, that hair of his (which coincidentally is “half swept up”) must also take quite a team to construct.
Sorry girls, the excitement is over and now all us mere mortals must return to our mundane lives where tents are used for keeping the mosquitoes away and the people making our clothing seldom wash their hands.
And most days the only thing we’re cracking open at 4:00 AM is the bottle of Pepto Bismol.

Kitty shopping part 2: it’s a tortie!

When I left you last week, I was describing our shopping trip to the Sioux Falls Area Humane Society and our search for a new kitty. We met a lot of cats that day who were fairly begging for our attention. I felt a tug from many of them. I had a hard time leaving the big old gray cat that had been there way too long. He didn’t stand a chance competing for attention with all the young, frisky fur balls. I was dazzled by young brothers Mikey and Melvin, two orange tiger-striped kitties who were adorable, but were only available as a package deal. The shelter wanted them to stay together, which is the only way I could imagine them. Of course, I kept wandering back to Fallyn…she was just so needy. Despite whatever my ego was trying to tell me, I noticed that it wasn’t just me, she reached out to everyone who walked by her cage. After much deliberation, and one more trip back to the Get To Know Them Room, we decided on a friendly little cat named Carmel. She was just the right mix of friendliness and playfulness. We paid the fee and signed all the paperwork, including a promise to get her spayed within 30 days. It was a good day. The only way it could have been better is if I would have been allowed to bring home two. Unfortunately, as with many disagreements in our home, I lost that vote 1-1. Our new family member is multi-colored—chocolate, cinnamon and cream, which I’m told makes her a tortoiseshell cat, or a “tortie.” Torties, in many cultures, are considered good luck. She was born in December of 2009, making her a little more than a year old, but small compared to my late buddy Joe. I was on a rollercoaster of emotions as we were heading down the interstate on our way home. At long last we had a pet to fill the void left by Joe and I was thrilled, but I was conflicted with feelings, knowing that we were leaving a lot of small cages filled with adorable friends behind, and there was nothing more I could do about it. I couldn’t get the vision of Fallyn out of my head, trying so hard to reach me from her cage; of Mikey and Melvin and their adorable playfulness; of poor Piper, who didn’t realize how close she was to coming home with us. I can’t imagine, now, making a different choice. I love our new roommate. After a few days of struggling over her new name, and lots of suggestions from family and Facebook friends, we stuck with a baseball name. She is now affectionately known as Torii. She has taken to our family very nicely. That nasty visit to the vet to be spayed is behind her and despite her continued fight against a little gingivitis, she is doing great. She has her own set of quirks. She likes to curl up and sleep in a tiny basket in the kitchen; she is obsessed with drinking out of the bathroom faucet; and she lets us know what is on her mind with a strange, low growl/meow that is about three octaves below what we were accustomed to with our old friend Joe. She loves to greet me when I get home from work, first by shouting her impatient growl/meow that she wants a trip to the bathroom sink…NOW! Then she insists on following me to my computer chair, where she climbs me and starts purring, with her front legs hanging over my shoulder and her back legs stretched to my waist. Joe used to wake me every morning between 4:00 and 6:00 AM. Torii lets me sleep and instead attempts to rouse Kathy. Gotta love this cat. As I said earlier, I left the shelter feeling a bit helpless, as if I was deserting lots of deserving pets who needed a home as bad as Torii, but I was wrong. I can work on YOU people to go for a visit. Start with a visit to http://www.sfhumanesociety.com/custAvailablePets.asp. Click the silhouette of the dog or cat to see what is available. A click on the rabbit silhouette will take you to a variety of other kinds of animals that are up for adoption. Check out the pictures and videos. I’m not sure how you could resist the lure of such friendly looking kitties as George or Scooter or Whitey. Check out the picture and video of the cat named Mouse or Herman or Al. Please…take a look at Piper! She is sooooo cute (and a little bit cross-eyed)! Go now and look………………………………………….um, what are you waiting for? Of course making the decision to adopt is only the beginning. If you aren’t interested in investing the time and affection involved, then don’t bother. I guarantee you if you make the commitment however, your affection will be returned tenfold. They grab you by the heart. Fortunately for me, my life is such that I have a few built in protections, but if circumstances were different, I could easily become one of those cat ladies you see on the news from time to time. Go now and check them out. A dog will absolutely turn its life and loyalty over to you and become your best friend. A cat isn’t quite as needy, but don’t require quite the time commitment. They can love you just as much as a doggie, they just don’t go advertising it all the time! If you can’t commit to adopting, there are other areas where you can help, with a donation of money or food for the animals at the shelter. There are shelters in our area also that could use your donations or adoptions. I’ll continue to check on my friends online. Fallyn was finally adopted a couple of weeks ago and she no longer needs to beg for affection through the front of her cage. Mickey and Melvin are sharing a home somewhere…they also were adopted. I won’t be happy, though, until Piper finds a home. Go now! Ask for her by name! Here is her link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ytpnkFim1cY&feature=player_embedded. You will not be sorry.

Kitty shopping!

Okay, I think it is time to make the official blog announcement. WE HAVE A NEW KITTY! Several months after we lost our young friend Joe to some weird, disgusting attack on his lungs, we finally have another furry housemate. We adopted her from the Sioux Falls Humane Society on March 6th, but I dared not blog about her until my excitement had somewhat abated, lest I should sound like a 6th grade girl (right, Noelle?). For several weeks Kathy had been monitoring the Sioux Falls Area Humane Society website to see what cats they had on hand. It is a great site that has a list of dogs and cats that are up for adoption, with a small description, a photo and usually a short link to a YouTube video. The actual trip to Sioux Falls, however, kept getting put off. Finally, in early March, my niece Nicole and her husband Todd invited Kathy along for a shopping trip to Sioux Falls. I seized the opportunity and sent a text to Nicole, encouraging her to suggest a stop at the Humane Society while they were in town. It was decided that a pet carrier would be slipped into the back of the vehicle just in case. The plan was hatched and when Saturday came, I waited in painful anticipation for word from Sioux Falls that Kathy had made an adoption. After several texts and calls to my cell phone, I learned that she just couldn’t make a decision, and they were coming home empty-handed. I was bummed. Apparently, however, Kathy was also bummed, and when I suggested a return trip the following day, she consented. Ninety minutes later, we pulled up in front of the Sioux Falls Area Humane Society building east of town. It was hard not to get caught up in the excitement before we even entered the building. Jubilant children (and adults) were outside giving a test drive to several dogs who were bubbling with happiness at the prospect of making a new friend. Once inside, Kathy led the way to the kitty room, and I was about to fall in love…somewhere around six or seven times. A room with maybe 35-40 cages awaited me, filled with kitties passing the time as best you can in a cage. Half of the inhabitants barely noticed me walk by. The other half vied for my attention. We opened many of the cages—with a required trip to the Purel bottle between each—and held, petted and struggled to make a decision on which of these needy felines we would take home. The one Siamese mix kitty named Piper that Kathy had fallen for the previous day sealed her own fate by taking a bite out of her hand. Probably more a result of a long day of strangers handling her than her regular demeanor, but when you are making a choice that you have to live with for many years, the smallest thing can make you turn your attentions elsewhere. Unfortunately, as of today, poor Piper is still waiting to get adopted. (Maybe we should go back and rescue her?) In a cage near Piper was a small orange and white kitty named Fallyn that was doing everything in her power to get my attention. She meowed and meowed and stretched her “arms” out the front of her cage as far as she could, and fairly begged to be hugged. I could not resist her charms. When I opened the cage she fairly jumped into my arms and a round of purrs began immediately. She scaled every inch of the ample real estate that I call my body and made the most of her trip outside the cage. We took her in the “Get To Know Them Room,” and the hyper fluff ball jumped and played and spun. She was a handful, to say the least. Since we wanted to see all the kitties before we made a choice (and since Kathy didn’t really seem all that enamored with my frisky little orange friend) we tucked the reluctant tabby back in her cage. She immediately pressed the side of her furry face against the front of the cage and thrust her little arms out to me, meowing excitedly. It seemed that another potential owner who failed to succumb to her adorable presence was about to walk away, she no doubt was thinking. I wondered if all the previous potential owners who walked away experienced the same tug in his or her heart that I did. Next week: We added to our family…and you should too.

My January, The Final Chapter: Ready to do it again…

As I mentioned last week, I was out of the training classes early on the final day in California. While it would have been fun to lollygag around in the 60-degree weather, my hopes were to make the drive back at a bit more leisurely pace than the trip out was. I decided to split up the travel over an extra day on the way back.
On Thursday, January 20th, after finishing my obligations in California I pointed my vehicle east. I was surprised how much less intimidating the Sierra Nevada mountains were heading home than on the trip out. While it seemed like 50 miles straight down hill when heading west, it actually wasn’t nearly that bad, I noticed, when I didn’t have to worry about a deadline.
I drove past Reno and well into Nevada before stopping for the night. I remember from my trip out, a sign caught my eye that said “Downtown Lovelock.” I contemplated how a town could get a name like that, and tried to remember the last time I myself had had a good downtown lovelock. That was enough to make me pull into Lovelock, Nevada and bed down for the evening. Turns out, Lovelock appeared to be a long-time casino town. There were several older hotels that all seemed to have been constructed some time back in the 1950s. I chose one at random and checked in for the night. It turns out, according to the signed photograph on the front counter that Merle Haggard had stayed at the motel at one time. I figured if the place were good enough for the Okie from Muskogee, it was good enough for me.
While it was most definitely an older décor, it was clean and comfortable, complete with a kitchen and a nice, fast internet connection. This seemed incongruous considering the TV channel lineup still listed “The Nashville Network” on the list. There hasn’t been anything called “The Nashville Network” for many years (it is now called Spike TV).
All in all, though, a pleasant stay, and now, if anyone asks, I can say, “yes, I actually had a downtown lovelock in January…it was great.”
On Friday, the 21st I hit the road again, with the goal of getting to Salt Lake City and picking up a new supply of insulin. It was my misfortune that I was arriving in Salt Lake City at about 5:00 in the afternoon, and the traffic was crazy. My GPS decided to display its sense of humor again, and after several times around several blocks and some very narrow streets, I finally found the Walgreens and scored the rest of my drugs. The bad news was that it was closing in on 7:00 by the time I made my way back to Interstate 80 and resumed my return trip.
With a more flexible travel schedule on my way home, I had the opportunity to stop occasionally and take some pictures that I wished I had taken on the way out. I scored my Tree of Utah picture, but mostly pictures of signs I found amusing. Weird, I know.
Some of my favorite signs I saw during my travels included the sign marking Old Woman Creek and an eating place called 9 Beans and a Burrito. Signs throughout Utah that lectured me about driving drowsy were somewhat entertaining. One sign I saw, I think it was Lusk, Wyoming, was a sign that encouraged people not to drive drunk. It said, “Santa Claus is coming to town. Don’t hit him.” Unfortunately, I was in traffic and didn’t get a picture of that one.
Another of my favorites was a sign marking the Boner Ranch. Owned, I presume, by Mr. and Mrs. Boner and inhabited by several little Boners. Another 50 miles down the road I saw another sign for a ranch. I don’t remember the name of the ranch, it was something like “The Triple R Ranch.” It was the small print at the bottom of the sign that caught my eye. “One of the proud family of Boner Ranches.”
My trip back was mostly uneventful, but I did finally run into some bad weather. Not long after I turned off the interstate in Wyoming, I drove into some whiteout conditions. A group of four or five of us crawled the last five miles into Lusk, Wyoming. It was about 4:00 Saturday afternoon, and the weather had been perfect up until that point. When I learned that teams from a local basketball tournament had been instructed to spend the night in town, I decided I would cut my day short. I checked into a Best Western motel, braved blizzard conditions to make it to the Subway and back for a sandwich, and kicked back to watch a couple of movies on my laptop.
This made my final day of travel, on Sunday, longer than I had hoped and I arrived home at around 7:00 with a back seat full of laundry and a need to sleep in my own home.
People still look at me like I’m nuts when they hear I drove to California and back, but I would make that choice again in a snap. I love driving to begin with. I like being alone with my thoughts or with an exciting audio book. I like the fact that nobody tells me where to sit or when I have to board or when I will be rationed a beverage. I fit into my seat…that’s a big one. I can carry on as many bags as I wish. I can sleep in until I’m rested and entertain myself as late as I wish. If I want an Egg McMuffin for breakfast, then by golly that is what I’ll have.
Never once during my trip did I look down, outside my window, and see lightning. Yikes!
I got to see the U.S.A in my Chevrolet, and thankfully it was somewhat dampened by a bum leg, or I may not have come back. There are thousands of signs out there just waiting to be photographed!

My January, Part V: The search for drugs continues…

My two days in California were relaxing. My purpose for the trip was to get educated on how to train new hires in the company in general policy and safety issues. The organizers were very gracious and made sure I had an extra chair on which to perch my swollen right leg.
Speaking of the infamous leg…the infection was doing all kinds of crude things, reminiscent of the great plagues of biblical times. It gradually went from blisters to open wounds to crusty protrusions over the span of the trip, covering about 50% of my leg from toe to knee. One night I woke up and I believe I saw locusts circling. It reminded me of what some of the zombies looked like on the recent AMC “Walking Dead” series. The swelling, however was going down, and I would find on my way home that the coverage of the disgustingness gradually decreased.
You may recall from about three or four blogs ago, I was prescribed lovenox as I headed out on my trip, and they could only find three days of dosage in the entire city of Sioux Falls. That means I had to find some more in California.
In addition, I had horribly misjudged the amount of insulin I would need to get me through until I got home.
A quick call to Dr. Snow’s sidekick Nurse Linzie, and she called ahead to a Tracy Wal-Mart with a prescription. Having an hour for lunch during the training, I thought I would make a quick run to pick up the meds. Of course, nothing goes quickly when you need it to go quickly. I arrived to a very long line at the Wal-Mart pharmacy counter. About 45 minutes later, I found myself at the front of the line, ready to grab my stash and make a run for the training center. Yeah, right.
We are sorry, we don’t have any lovenox in stock, if you would like we will make some calls to other pharmacies to try to locate some,” the beleaguered young counter jockey told me. I thanked her and said I didn’t have enough time but would come back later in the day. “And,” she added “you will be able to pick up your insulin on February 3rd.”
I told her that yes, I had plenty at home, however I needed one vial to get me back to Minnesota, as I had not brought enough with me to make it home.
She apologized that there was nothing she could do about it.
I told her I would be back later in the day to attempt to resolve the issues, and made a beeline back to the training facility.
After another two grueling hours of training we were released for the day, and I returned to the friendly local Wal-Mart.
To my dismay, I found another long line. I plopped myself down between a funny-smelling old guy with a walker and a young mother with two very vocal babies on one of those metal benches the store provides.
I was hardly there for more than a couple of minutes, thinking I would really like to move, but didn’t want to look rude, when one of the pharmacists came out to talk to me. Things were starting to look up. He recognized me from earlier in the day, and remembered that I left wanting, but couldn’t remember the specifics. I explained the lovenox issue and he escorted me to a different window, where a young woman was asked to find me some of the elusive drug in the surrounding area. I stood at the counter for a long period of time while the pleasant attendant repeatedly made calls and was rejected by stores that normally are their competition. After maybe 20 minutes, another lady came by and offered to help make calls. I was impressed that they were taking these great lengths to find me some blood thinner. After a few more minutes, the second lady handed the phone to the first lady, and told her she found some. A Walgreens a few miles down the road had the other four days of dosage I would need. I thanked them multiple times and headed for Walgreens, where I scored my stuff.
Still looming was the problem that I would be running out of insulin by Friday evening.
Being the procrastinator that I am, I left the issue until Thursday.
Originally, my plan for Wednesday evening was to take the one-hour trip to San Francisco and do a bit of sightseeing, but I had promised to behave myself, and I headed to my room to put my leg up and watch a couple of movies.
Thursday was a shorter day of classes, and at about 1:30 I stepped out into the glorious 60 degree sunshine, and started my long journey home.
When I finally remembered I still had drug issues a couple of hours later, I placed a quick call to Dr. Snow and he recommended that we switch to another type of insulin that would get me past the Aetna issue. Forgetting I was two hours earlier on the West Coast than the Midwest, I placed a call for Nurse Linzie and was told she had left for the day. After I realized my mistake, that I was still mired in Pacific Time, I resolved that I was going to have to wait until Friday and cross my fingers. The unlucky person who answered the phone, another of my fine care-givers, Nurse Laura, listened patiently to my painful story. We were about to conclude, when she spotted Linzie trying to head home and pulled her from the verge of freedom. She was summoned to the phone and I explained my plight. I gave her the name of a pharmacy I would be driving near in Salt Lake City, and she assured me she would fix my problem; as I mentioned last week she literally saved my life. Imagine me driving on the return trip through Utah, my blood sugar goes nuts I start sweating, my hands slip on the steering wheel, and I end up driving headlong into the Tree of Utah. I still get a shudder just thinking about it.
Next week: Salt Lake City during rush hour…the trip home continues.

My January, Part IV: California at last

One nice thing I discovered during the course of my trip was the fact that gas in Wyoming and Utah was 40-50 cents per gallon cheaper than in Tyler, but that started to change once I crossed the Nevada border. Just across the state line I pulled into a gas station in West Wendover, and the gas was suddenly up over three dollars a gallon. I would learn that the prices would continue to rise and would get to a ridiculous $3.35 per gallon once I crossed the California state line. Of course as of this week, we wish gas were only $3.35 per gallon here in southwestern Minnesota.
The other thing I noticed was the lack of rural dwellers. Here in our quaint little area of the country you don’t have to drive far to pass another farm place. You can head out past the Johnson place, turn left at the Hansen farm, wave at the Petersen’s on your way by and pull into the Anderson’s driveway all in the span of a few miles. Out in the Wild West, you can go many miles between towns and never see a yard light. That reality combined with sporadic cell phone coverage and it can make a gimpy post-hospital stay old fat guy a bit uneasy.
Nevada, while it also has its share of sagebrush, provided a labyrinth of twists and turns in the interstate, circumventing numerous small mountain ranges. The ups and downs traveling through valleys and mountain passes provided a stark contrast to the flatness of Wyoming and much of Utah. I had expected to be more in awe of the sight of the “mountains majesty” during the trip, but while fun to look at, they weren’t nearly as intimidating to drive through as I had imagined.
The whole intimidation part was ratcheted up a few notches, however, once I passed Reno. For about 50 miles it was a head rush of a half dozen semi trucks and me heading downhill. It was more than a little disconcerting.
In addition to being swept down the mountainside, there was a string of road signs that didn’t exactly get me in my comfort zone:
Trucks Must Have Chains
8% grade next 20 miles
Wildlife Crossing
Curve ahead-45 MPH!
And my favorite:
Beware of Falling Rocks.
It was kind of like playing Super Mario Brothers, except you only get one life.
Somewhere during that downhill slide, I crossed into California, and the trip turned creepy when I saw the sign announcing I was approaching the “Donner Pass.” On the bright side, I guess, nothing I would be encountering would approach the travails of the Donner Party members, who were snowed in the mountains in the mid-1800’s and began to eat each other to survive. Probably the worst-ever scenario as a result of lost cell phone reception. (Let’s pray nothing like that ever happens up in Hendricks.)
In the area surrounding Truckee, California, they are apparently quite proud of their Donners. If you spend enough time there, you will come across signs for Donner Way, Donner Lake, Donner Creek, Donner Peak and Donner Memorial State Park. I vowed if I came upon a sign for the Donner Diner I would be taking a different route home.
I didn’t.
Still hurtling downhill well past Truckee, I finally came across a sign for the Foothills Motel.
I could finally take my foot off the brake.
It wasn’t long before I was obviously in California. For the first time in my long life, I found myself being swept along in eight…count them…eight lanes of traffic all going the same direction. Crazy! If I wouldn’t have had both hands clutching my steering wheel, I would have loved to have brought back a picture of the sign that said, “Right 5 Lanes Must Turn Right.” Wow! Back home that would cover Highway 14, Highway 19, and half of Highway 68.
So, for the final leg of my trip, there was little chance to survey the scenery as I was forced to concentrate on driving 70 in a large crowd.
At that speed it wasn’t long before I reached the end of my 1800-mile journey and arrived in Tracy. The Travel Gods did get to enjoy one more jab, as my GPS, programmed to take me to the Hampton Inn, instead led me to Taco Bell, on my left, with the announcement, “arriving at Hampton Inn, on left.”
I swear I heard the GPS lady’s voice giggle just a bit.
A half hour later I finally found my hotel and it was time to relax.
I even had the good fortune of being next door to a Sonic Drive Inn, and scored a decadent double cheese burger and chili tots before retiring for the evening.
Well past the mid-point of my life, I finally found myself in California. Home of…um…the California Burger, I guess.
The temperature outside was just under 60, which I didn’t mention to Kathy, who was home scooping the driveway every day in temps hovering around 0. She reminded me of this each time we talked on the phone over the span of seven days, hardly noticing how good she was making me feel.
So the segment of my trip that worried me the most, getting to Tracy in time, was over and it was time to enjoy a couple of days of classes in sunny California.
Next week: Nurse Linzie saves my life. (This blog topic, incidentally, was suggested to me by the aforementioned Nurse Linzie.)

My January, Part III: Exceeding my recommended salt intake in Utah…

So as we learned last week, the barren nothingness that was South Dakota was only a warm up for the barren nothingness that would be Wyoming. The hundreds of miles of bushy weeds and ranchland gave me new appreciation for the lushness that is Lincoln County, Minnesota.
Understand, that I was still thoroughly enjoying myself, but what kind of blog would it be if I didn’t complain?
So, my hopes of getting a glimpse of Yosemite Sam never materialized on my sojourn across Wyoming. (Just a side note before we leave Wyoming…when you see those Verizon commercials on TV and the entire country is red except for an oblong stretch of white in Wyoming??? Yeah, I drove through most of that white.)
My spirits were jumpstarted as the “Welcome to Utah” sign stood out amongst the roadside brush. Certainly my stretch of endless Ponderosa was behind me. It’s no wonder the Cartwrights were always so crabby. (Sorry, that reference will only mean something to people late 40s and older.)
I wasn’t too far into Utah before I encountered my first of two bad weather events I would endure on the trip. Darkness had fallen and I was moving into the mountainous region just east of Salt Lake City. Several times I drove in and out of snow squalls and I got more than a bit nervous as they became longer in duration and more intense, making me rethink my plan to get as far as Salt Lake City before I stopped. A phone call home and I had Kathy and Lindsay looking for my next option for a hotel, and I ended up deciding to stay in Coalville for the evening.
When I was imagining how my trip would go before I left, I had visions of checking into my hotel each night and finding myself some good food before returning to my room, connecting to the internet to spend the evening answering emails, updating my family on the state of my problematic appendage and doing a little Facebooking. My Coalville stop at the Best Western was the start of bad luck for evening meals on the trip. The only other building in sight was the convenience store next door, and I ended up grabbing a blueberry muffin and a bag of Cheetos before heading into the hotel to check in.
The lady at the front desk told me she had a single room and said, “do you have an AARP card?” I looked around to see if anyone’s grandparents were checking in at the same time as me before realizing she was talking to me. I felt even worse when I realized I actually DID have an AARP card. “That will be $10 off,” she said.
She did NOT add, “…and by the way big boy, you don’t look old enough to be carrying an AARP card.”
My evening didn’t get any better when I got to my room. Despite following all the instructions and jumping through all the hoops, I COULDN’T CONNECT TO THE INTERNET!!!! I called the help line listed in the room info, and they told me they could not help me. (I resisted the urge to add the word “no” before the words “help line” in the hotel info.) I was told I had to have them reboot the router at the front desk.
So I trudged down to the front desk and she rebooted the router, to no avail. I still couldn’t connect. This issue actually ended up getting me another $10 knocked off the price of my room. Since the company was paying for my room, I would have gladly traded the $10 to be able to connect, but I resigned myself to digging into my spread of blueberry goodness and Cheetos and watch a rerun of “Everybody Loves Raymond.”
I was living the good life.
At least I had an insulin shot in the leg and a lovenox shot in my stomach to look forward to…
Tuesday morning ushered in new excitement as the snow had cleared and the sun was shining brightly. That was good, because it was going to be a long drive to get to Tracy, California by evening.
So, I’m not really sure what my mind had imagined I would see in Utah, but again I was in for a surprise in just how underwhelmed I could be. Drop a load of Round-Up on Wyoming, and you have the scenery encountered in Utah. Miles and miles of…um…of…sandy-looking mushiness. If I were to have conjured a mental image of quicksand, that is exactly what I saw lining the roads of Interstate 80. This stretch is also named the Dwight D. Eisenhower Highway, no doubt because the lay of the land resembles old Ike’s desolate pate. (Again, those under 40, feel free to Google an image of our 34th President) I always assumed that the “salt flats” were a small area around some town named Bonneville, but the brown, watery blandness goes on for miles. If the pictures I’ve found online since my trip are any indication, they may possibly turn white when they dry out in the summer.
Many miles of this bland panorama was suddenly interrupted about 100 miles west of Salt Lake City, when I came across an odd, colorful sculpture protruding on the horizon (pictured). With road signs threatening me that I wasn’t allowed to stop, I grabbed a drive-by, through-the-windshield photo of the peculiar monument. It wasn’t until I got home a few days later that I would do some research and find out what it actually was. I had no idea what it was called, or where to start looking, so I went to Google and typed the words “strange monument in Utah by interstate 80.”
It was the first link that came up.
My investigation revealed it was called “The Tree of Utah.” One site I was on said that it was built and installed “between 1982 and 1986.” So, apparently it was only about 25 years ago, but nobody actually wrote down the exact date that it was erected. Somebody apparently drove by it one day, hypnotized by hundreds of miles of salt flats, and said, “hey, when did they put that thing there?!!!”
And somebody anwered;
“Well, I guess it was probably mid-80s…I know it wasn’t there in ’81, and I remember I first noticed it just before Christmas in 1986.”
The website said it was built by a Swede named Karl, who built it to bring “bold color and beauty to the stark, flat, salty landscape.”
I, too, was startled at the vast stretch of nothing, but leave it to a Swede to actually stop and do something about it.
Next week…the ghosts of the Donner Party live on. (Google THAT one, kids, but not before you eat.)

Wyoming: “We have sagebrush.”

When we left my story last week, I had just whined my way out of the hospital and was due to make a 27-hour drive to California.
A little background first.
Several weeks ago, I was asked by one of my superiors at work if I would be interested in taking some training to be certified to train new hires in general company policies and safety regulations at enXco. Always willing to try to add something to my list of reasons that the company might want to keep me, I enthusiastically said, “yes.”
“Great,” said Chris, the Area Operations Manager, “go ahead and book a flight to Tracy, California. You’ll have classes on January 19th and 20th.”
There…I had done it again. The guy who made it through the first 51 years without having to fly, was facing the unpleasant reality of flying twice in two years.
If you have been reading this blog since the beginning, you may remember what happened the first time I flew, back in 2009. If not, you can scroll down to the archives on the left side of this page. Find the July 2, 2009 column entitled “You Want Me to What?” Over the ensuing five columns, you can learn about my near-death experience with United Airlines.
So here I was, facing another flight and I felt that familiar nausea creeping into my stomach.
The timing of the trip got me thinking of ways to opt out of the flight. It happened that it fell on a week when I already had Monday off, for Martin Luther King Day.
What if, I thought, I left on Sunday and drove to Tracy, California. I ran the idea past the Powers That Be, and was told I could get compensation for driving out if I chose to do that.
Magically, my nausea immediately disappeared.
In addition, other than in pictures, I had never seen any of our fine country west of Rapid City.
After a little online Mapquest research, I found that it would be an1,800-mile drive to Tracy…about 27 hours. I decided to leave Sunday morning, the 16th, and make a leisurely drive, arriving at my hotel in Tracy late Tuesday afternoon.
And then the leg thing happened (see last week’s blog).
In order to get the official okie-dokie to make the trip I had to make the following promises:
1. Give myself blood thinner shots in the stomach twice a day.
2. Closely monitor my blood sugar.
3. Stop every one to two hours on the trip and walk for 10 minutes.
Even with those promises, I seemed to get a look from LuAnn Weber, P.A., that said, “I can’t believe you are walking out of the hospital and driving 1800 miles.”
This is only slightly better that a look that would have said, “I guess I can’t stop you from dying if you want it that badly.”
The two looks are similar, so she may have actually been conveying the latter…
By the time I finished my hospital obligations and took care of a few urgent matters I had ignored while in the hospital, it was after 1:00 Sunday afternoon. I was already four hours behind where I wanted to be.
I was required to stop in Sioux Falls to pick up the Lovenox, that was in charge of preventing any blood clots forming during the trip. Unfortunately, there was only enough Lovenox in the entire city of Sioux Falls to get me through three days. Fortunately, it would be enough to get me to California.
After leaving late and another delay while Lewis Drug called around town to see if they could come up with more Lovenox, I only made it as far as Rapid City on the first evening. This would leave a healthy dose of driving to get to Tracy at a decent time on Tuesday night. I was not discouraged.
I departed Rapid City Tuesday morning with a belly full of Lovenox and a great attitude. Shortly thereafter, I proceeded to cross over into Wyoming. Their state symbol is a silhouette of a cowboy riding a bucking horse, but that is most certainly a misrepresentation. It should be a silhouette of sagebrush. I think I saw six horses, but hundreds and hundreds of miles of sagebrush. Although all the men do wear cowboy hats. (Much more fashionable, I suppose, than sagebrush hats.) I did get a bit excited in line at a Wendy’s somewhere in the Land That God Forgot. I was standing behind a line of seven gentlemen wearing big cowboy hats, and one guy that was actually wearing a baseball-style cap. I got a little tingle. It was short lived however. When he turned, I saw the front of that baseball-style hat. It was embroidered on the front with a silhouette of a cowboy riding a bucking horse. Yikes!
I did think, as I was driving across this giant ranch, that it was kind of quaint the way someone had painted mountains in the far distance, looming over the sagebrush, that somehow never got any closer. They were just…I don’t know…there.
And so for much of the first day of my first ever trip to California. I saw hours of tumbleweeds-to-be, interspersed with thousands of those old windmills and an occasional butte.
I got more than a little excited as I approached the Welcome to Utah sign. Finally, a little variety to the landscape.
Next week: Utah, land that looks a lot like Wyoming, without the sagebrush.

Another stay at the THC Hilton…

It seems that I have been slacking off in my blogging duties lately. Between a host of medical issues and traveling across the country, I haven’t set aside any time to write anything.
I’ve actually had a pretty eventful January…and not necessarily in a good way. The story starts back on Sunday, January 9th, when I came down with what I had diagnosed at the time as the flu, complete with fever and chills and about 36 hours straight of sleeping. After starting the year with a fresh set of five sick days at work, I had already used two of them by January 11th. I went to bed Tuesday night feeling much better and ready to get back to work on Wednesday.
I was about to change my diagnosis, as I think now, looking back, that the fever was a precursor for what would ultimately land me in the hospital.
When I got up for work on Wednesday, I was greeted by a swollen right leg from toes to knee, that was a sort of neon purple. In my divine wisdom, I decided I should go to work, as I had already missed two days that week, and made an appointment to see Dr. Snow after work.
Imagine my joy when the good doctor decided that I needed to check into a room for a few days. The diagnosis was an infection in my leg. The first 24 hours was wonderful…not. Wanting to keep my blood sugar stable, I was on an insulin pump, and I had to have my finger pricked every hour through the night and into the next day.
Complicating matters was the fact that I was scheduled to leave for California on Sunday for some training for my job. We needed to get me healthy and on the road.
It was like old home week for me. I got to hang with many of my nurse friends from previous stays. They provided their typical top-notch care and I racked up my typical amount of sleep. None. There is something about those beds…they are evil.
I have a history with my buddies at the hospital, where their names could show up in, at one time, a newspaper column, and now, a blog or a Facebook post. I have the advantage of saying anything I wish and their hands are tied for defending themselves due to the HIPAA privacy laws…right Charis? Unfortunately, they are all so good to me that it would be kind of thankless of me to taunt them. I hate having a conscience.
Whatever…the nice part is that they have to be nice to me. It is part of the job. I have no idea if they go to the break room and warn everyone that “he is back!.”
I’m probably a little more work than your average patient. I have to have my laptop, which requires a table and an electrical outlet, as well as my cell phone, which requires an occasional electrical outlet, and then of course a fan, which requires a chair and yet another electrical outlet. Fortunately there were still two outlets for my antibiotic drip and the insulin drip.
I will be the first to admit I am addicted to being connected at all times to the internet. Email, news stories, Facebook, opinion columns…it could be a full-time job if I so desired. When I’m not connected through my laptop, I am connected through my smart phone. During a nasty hospital stay in which I can’t sleep, it comes in handy. When I ran out of online newspapers, I had a stack of DVDs with which I occupied my time.
Whatever you may have heard, I have never asked for anyone to stand at my bedside and pluck grapes to drop in my mouth.
With a bit of begging and a few promises, I was able to be dismissed in time to head to California. On Saturday, I was able to talk a reluctant LuAnn into letting me check out so I could go home and get some actual sleep. I had to promise to come back every six hours through Sunday morning to get another bag of antibiotics. I slept like a rock in the comfort of my home.
After a week of being derailed with health issues, I had a few fires to put out at home before I could embark on my trip, and didn’t get out of town until after lunch, not a good start to my 1800-mile drive.
Next week, I’ll let you know how that went.

It could happen…

Everywhere you looked over the past couple of weeks, someone was making predictions about the coming year. In keeping with my own little annoying tradition, I bring you my top ten predictions for 2011.
10. The Hattiesburg, Mississippi Bingo League will grow frustrated in September when Brett Favre can’t decide whether or not he is joining.
9. In July, after six months of give and take and bipartisan bargaining over the big issues in our country and multiple meetings with President Obama, Democrats and Republicans will announce that they haven’t reached any agreements, but they have decided to break for Independence Day.
8. The New York Yankees will buy the Seattle Mariners.
7. Sarah Palin will “refudiate” the big government overreach of indoor smoking bans. “Ya know, our forefathers were known to light one up in the Oval Office once in awhile. Since when is this country afraid of a little lung cancer?”
6. Bad news: the Twins home opener will be snowed out in April. Good news: there will be no problem with the roof caving in.
5. Sports call-in geniuses will call for the firing of Leslie Frazier after the Vikings lose their first game of the 2011 season.
4. I will be the beneficiary of a rescue effort in February when an avalanche will bury me between the massive snow piles at the end of our driveway.
3. On her way out of her rehab facility, Lindsay Lohan will violate the terms of her probation and be escorted back in the building.
2. Wikileaks will reveal that the texts Brett Favre sent to Jenn Sterger actually contained pictures of Aaron Rodgers’ willy.
And my Number 1 Prediction for 2011…
1. In an effort to dramatically improve their bottom line, my insurance company will decide to just have me shot.