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Ready, Set, Go

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Today’s Farming Update comes from Ben.

We took a long weekend last week. Daughter has been saying we needed to take a vacation, and we fully agreed with her. But May through July is Kelly’s busiest time, and of course spring is bad for me, and, well, we can always come up with an excuse NOT to go somewhere. Spur of the moment, we decided, let’s just take a weekend. We asked daughter what she thought we should do; I mean are we renting a cabin on a lake or are we going to a hotel. Well, she wanted swimming, and rides at Mall of America. OK, sounds like we do the Embassy Suites, which has been a family favorite over the few years because they do complimentary breakfast really well. They set the standard for hotel breakfasts! Fruit, yogurt, Sausages, bacon, eggs (not as good as ours of course), hashbrowns, bagels, made to order omelets, cereal, drinks: milk, juice, coffee. 

We got there late evening Thursday and had supper at the hotel restaurant. Friday we all slept in and took naps and didn’t leave the room until 3:00 PM. Over to “THE” mall and had lunch, then walked around a bit and bought some ride tickets. We waited in line for an hour so we could all do the log flume ride. Because there was some bad weather in the area, the rides were going at half capacity, so the wait was longer than it should have been. Boy, if we didn’t get covid waiting in that line. Then daughter and I did a crazy spinning loop de loop roller coaster and I think I learned I might be too old for those rides. Woo boy. A couple times I had to just put my head back and close my eyes and I’d think, “DON’T CLOSE YOUR EYES!” There was a young boy about 8 years old who was on the ride with us; he said he had two little sisters and mom had to stay with them. After the first spinning loop he said “That was unexpected!” Yep, sure was! When it was over, I told him I had no idea what had happened in the last 40 seconds.

Even daughter, who’s a daredevil, was a little shook up after that. We all went to the Ferris wheel from there. And then Daughter and I went on our favorite roller coaster from 10 years ago; the one that goes straight up, then straight down. And upside down and right side down and over this way and around and back upside that way. Aye aye aye. Whew. That was easier last time I did that. Kelly and daughter did the carousel and we decided that was enough. I saw a sign that read, ‘Barking Lot  stroller parking’, and I thought it said ‘Barfing lot’ which I thought was really appropriate. 

I bought the 30 point arm bands, but no one put them on our arms, so I’d just show them to the ride operator. The first ride scanned them all. The second person was talking and looking away and only scanned one, and the third ride just put us on without even scanning the tickets. We gave them to a young couple and told them to have fun. 

Daughter also wanted Red Robin for supper. We don’t have one of them in Rochester. At some point in her brief past, she had a shake at a Red Robin she really liked and wanted another. Supper was really good there and my vanilla malt was yummy. I don’t know about hers. 

Saturday, we got the swimming in and had the pool to ourselves for an hour. We saw the Barbie movie, (and got a free icy drink), and had supper at Giordano’s pizza with a hostess named Joy who was super helpful and sent us back to the hotel with plates, drinks, and plastic ware. 

Sunday, we stopped to see our son and daughter in law. When we got home, the dogs were glad to see us, (our neighbors took care of the dogs and chickens while we were gone) and Humphrey just had to stay outside for a couple nights. Once in the house, he had a big drink of soft water, and slept for several hours on his pillow. 

Everyone survived on the farm, and Monday morning, daughter said she wasn’t ready to go back to her program. None of us are kid, none of us are.

We called this our ‘practice vacation’ to remember what works and what doesn’t when travelling together.    

The soybeans are looking good, you know, for 6 weeks behind. They’ve finally started to canopy and, to add insult to injury, the weeds are coming too. A few buttonweed, lambsquarter, and ragweed are towering over the soybeans. Plus, a lot of volunteer corn. Which doesn’t really hurt anything, it just looks bad in a nice field of soybeans. 

I started working on the shop again and started getting 2×4’s put on the walls and removed from the work bench an old radial arm saw that I haven’t used in I-don’t-know-how-many years. Back on Amazon Prime day I ordered one of those 360 degree green laser levels. It is pretty cool!

Remember a few months ago I showed a bunch of eggs under the deck? Well, the chicken hatched out 13 baby chicks the other day. She’s a good momma and moved them down to the main pen and she’s keeping a good eye on them. Thirteen chicks?? Don’t hold your breath for all of them. The other chickens seem jealous: ‘How come YOU got chicks!??’

My brother came out and we unloaded the last load of straw into the barn. 600+ bales in there again. Coming up, planting winter rye as a cover crop! Deep roots good for the soil, but it will over winter so it will have to be killed off in the spring before planting corn.

And back at the college, all my computer stuff is working this week! Yay! 

College classes begin Monday.

WHAT WAS / IS YOUR FAVORITE AMUSEMENT PARK RIDE?

WHAT RIDE SHOULD THERE BE?

34 thoughts on “Ready, Set, Go”

  1. Glad you got a few days of fun… I was going to say “relaxation” but the day of rides doesn’t sound relaxing to me.

    I have actually never been huge on rides – anything with heights has always given me the wllies and I’m not good at spinning rides either. Carousels are fun and calm water rides are relaxing to me (unless you have to hear the “It’s a Small World” song 1,000 times).

    So I’m a bust at a typical amusement park. The Midway is the one area of the fair that we never venture into at the Fair.

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  2. What a good idea the ‘practice vacation’ is, Ben!

    Yeah, , at this point I’ll take the ferris wheel, or the carousel, maybe if they have bumper cars… I used to love the Tilt-a-Whirl; have only been on a big roller coaster once, and I’ve never done the Flume.
    Love the 8-year-old saying “That was unexpected!”

    So glad the computers are back on track before classes start.

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      1. That was a sunset a few days ago. Living down in the valley, we don’t often see sunsets. Kelly says it’s the one thing she misses from the flat lands where she grew up.

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        3. I lived and worked in Martin County for 4 1/2years. That is where I started my career. Ceylon had the strangest CPS (Child Protective Services) cases ever.

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  3. Rise and Shine, Baboons,

    As a kid I discovered spinning rides at the Orange City (Iowa) Tulip Festival. I knew there were rides at the county fair, but my parents only did the Merry-G-Round and the Ferris Wheel. For a long time the Ferris Wheel was enough of a thrill for me given my aversion to heights. But then when the band started marching at the Tulip Festival, I was there with friends who loved spinning and I had my allowance money and there was no parent there. For a few years I was a Tilt-A-Whirl fiend. Then I got over that after throwing up. Too much of a good thing.

    I also experienced the Arnolds Park Amusement Park in decline in the 60’s. They had a “sugar bowl” thing that spun while you tried to climb up the side. Wow. The wood slide was fun, though. Since then I have stayed with the relatively staid roller coaster and log flume. No more spinning. And that was 25 years ago. BTW, the Arnolds Park Amusement Park has been completely refurbished. My friend has a “summer cabin” (house) there where my high school group has been gathering for a summer weekend. I missed it this year because that was the week my mother died. Her brother, a NW Iowa businessman who invented floating docks, donated much of the money for the project. The area which had been an eyesore, is again the source of lots of fun for young families.

    I have no suggestions about what ride should exist–I like my feet securely feeling the floor and my eyes looking straight ahead. I cannot think of anything worse that having a FerrisWheel stop, stuck at the top.

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  4. I used to love all kinds of rides up through my early 30s – especially the Scrambler, pretty much any roller coaster, the swings, the carousel, the Octopus, etc. I used to take my two youngest nieces to ValleyFair when they were elementary school age and I did nearly all the rides there. My favorite was the water park. I wasn’t a big fan of the Ferris wheel – not because of the height but because it stopped so often to let people on and off. I liked the Tilt-a-Whirl until the one time I threw up after – haven’t been on it since. I remember one ride at our county fair – it was like a big centrifuge. You stood against a circular wall, it started rotating faster and faster until the floor dropped out and you were plastered against the wall. I can’t imagine doing that one now. Same with the Loop-0-Plane. These days I prefer the carousel and any ride where you only go forward and don’t spin or get jerked around. My nightmare ride would be a spinny one where the stop lever fails to work.

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  5. Carousels/Merry-Go-Rounds are my favorites.
    We had one down in Woodlawn Park, Moorhead.
    That tiny one was kid powered and sadly, deemed an unacceptable hazard along with monkey bars in later years.

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  6. I’ve separated this answer to the questions. I’m feeling yuuuge, bigly annoyed.
    There should be a roller coaster ride for supporters of XXXpresident Donny. Horrific highs and lows. Admission by signing all Social Security checks over to him. The ending of the ride puts the occupants in a sewage treatment pond.

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  8. I loved the Ferris wheel and the merry go round. I never liked wild rides, and I am totally unwilling and unable now to tolerate anything like a roller coaster or tilt a whirl.

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  10. I was looking for word about PJ. Hoping for her best.
    Favorite carnival ride: a nice park bench off to the side. With my sensory input issues, no rides at all please.
    Sandy 9is consuming my time and my health and finances! Every day another stressor hits me in the face. Even on Sunday!

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    1. Thanks, Clyde. I know you’re all wondering what the heck I’m up to, and why I’m not communicating more. The truth is that I’m still too fatigued to really do much of anything, much less give you a realistic assessment of my current state and the prognosis moving forward. I do realize that I’m extremely lucky to have survived this past week.

      This afternoon I’ll be transferred from the hospital to a rehab facility, the same one I was in after my fall in 2012. I’m hoping to build enough strength to be able to transfer home in about a week.

      I’m healing well from the trauma of the emergency surgery last Sunday, and they’ve identified an underlying issue that I apparently has been dealing with for quite some time, but we’ve just now come to grips with. So that’s certainly hopeful.

      There’s nothing much any of you can do to help at the moment, just know and trust that I’m in good hands, and well taken care of.

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  13. Update! Thanks everyone for you messages, they give me a nice little boost. I’m now in the Capitol View rehab facility within Regions, and slowly settling in. Tomorrow will be a busy day, I’m sure, meeting with various therapists, a social worker, and several doctors tasked with guiding me through this. I’ll know more definitely within a few days what lies ahead, and I’ll keep you all posted.

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