Category Archives: 2024

2024, animals, Farming Update, pets, Seasons, Uncategorized

Fieldwork!

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Today’s Farming Update comes from Ben.

It’s been another crazy busy week and all the farmers have been pushing hard planting corn in the neighborhood, trying to stay ahead of the weather. Not me, but everybody else. I have finished planting oats and I picked up corn seed. Considering last week I hadn’t even gotten out in the fields yet, things picked up fast and went pretty well.

I got the old tractor, the 630 running. That’s the one I rebuilt the carburetor on last fall, and while it’s not perfect yet, it does run, and I used it to re-arrange machinery to get the grain drill out.

I started planting with 48, 50lb bags of oats

I can tell I’m getting older as my fingers are getting stiffer as I lift them up to dump in the drill.

Meyer Seeds, where I’ve been getting seed for years, and where my dad even got seed, didn’t have oat seed this year, so they got it from another local place. There are not many places selling seed oats around here. The Albert Lea Seed House is a good source, but they’re an hour away from me and much more expensive that Meyers. Meyers have done such a good job cleaning seed over the years, on the rare occasion they don’t have any, other seed is dirty and dusty, and I even found a shriveled up, desiccated mouse carcass in a bag this year. I mean, what the heck?? Do better other people. 

I had planned to  finish planting oats late Wednesday night, and wouldn’t you know I ran out of seed with about half an hour left at 9:30 PM. Every year I tell myself, “order extra seed”. It’s not a problem to return it and it’s better to have extra than to run out with half an hour left, and I don’t know, next year comes and I forget. Thursday morning I picked up 8 more bags of oat seed, and got the corn seed, too.

I use the “Boating” app to track myself in the fields. I helps to find that corner I need to get back too, especially at night.

Everything in yellow is what I planted on Wednesday. I covered 12.9 miles, averaging 4.5 mph, and was out just over 4 hours. The time also includes stops and refilling.

The closer photo show every pass. Compare that to the actual tracks in the field.



It has been fun to be back in the tractors again. My brother usually helps do fieldwork, but he’s on vacation this year. My young helper is still in school, and the other helper has become gainfully employed. I don’t mind doing it myself, it just takes a little longer. My left arm gets tired because I run all the controls with my right arm, so the left arm is constantly steering. Building up my endurance I guess. I have acquired a second tractor buddy.

We don’t all fit into the cab so well.


Luna doesn’t look happy to be left home and she doesn’t look happy to be in the tractor. I don’t know what she wants. Bailey just lays on the floor, rests her head on the door, and sleeps. Luna moves back-and-forth and is in the way of either the clutch or the brake. And if I stop in the field and we all get out, she barks and barks to get back in. I think it’s still anxiety about being left behind.
I saw bald eagles, pheasants, turkey vultures, lots of deer, turkeys, and we’ve been hearing the sandhill cranes, I just haven’t seen them yet. Waiting on the first barn swallows. Should be a scout around any day now. They usually arrive about May 6.

Soil temperatures are in the 50s and GDU (Growing Degree Units) are at 177; 123 above normal at this point. The cereal rye that I planted as a cover crop last fall greened up but never got very tall. I had it sprayed this week to terminate it. It needed to be 12 inches high to get paid for planting it. However, because those fields are gonna be corn, having 12 inches of grass there was going to be a problem with residue, and I wanted it sprayed and terminated before it started to rain and I lost control of it. So it goes. It will still add organic matter to the soil.

Late next week I’ll start dealing with lighting for commencement on May 8th, so I’ll be busy with that for a few days. The experts says 100% of potential corn yield (in our area) comes from corn planted between April 22 and May 6th. I still got time!

FAVORITE FAMOUS LAST WORDS?

2024, Food, History, Travel, Uncategorized

Food and Friendship

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We are in Boston until Sunday, and are having a lovely time. I feel pretty spoiled to be on both US coasts in less than a month to sample great seafood in both places. The only thing better would be to eat homemade pasta in Bologna, Italy.

We had a wonderful encounter with the cab driver who drove us to the hotel from the airport on Wednesday. He was an East Indian man in his 30’s who has lived in the US for 14 years. He loved telling about the city and things we were driving past. He also was a great fund of information about good restaurants to try. Husband mentioned that I had made a good biryani recently, and I chimed in that I had made twenty chapati and almost all of them puffed up like footballs when I fried them. Our driver got really excited hearing that, and that we appreciated good Indian food, and he invited us to his Sikh religious community gathering on Sunday evening to try the food there. Were we not leaving early Sunday, we would probably have taken him up on his offer.

One story our driver told us was about the banning of Happy Hour in Massachusetts in 1984. Too many people were drinking and driving after work, resulting in several fatal accidents. The law is still on the books despite challenges from the hospitality industry. There are pretty strict rules about the size of individual drinks served between 5:00 and 7:00 pm, and how many people need to be at table per pitcher of beer during those times. It is not a problem for us, as I don’t think either of us have been to a Happy Hour in decades. Opponents of the law say it just reinforces the Puritanical stereotype of the State’s residents. The people we have met thus far have been helpful and friendly in the extreme, and not Puritanical at all.

Who have been interesting people you have met on your travels? What are your favorite foods you would like to eat in the places they originated? Do you still attend Happy Hour?

2024, Business, Food, Mysteries

Twins?

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There are a handful of ads that come into my Inbox (instead of Junk) – Einstein Brothers and Brueggers are two of those because they offer occasional coupons that I like, particularly my birthday freebies every year.  A couple of weeks ago, not only did an ad for each show up on the same day, they arrived one after the other in my Inbox.  If they hadn’t, I probably wouldn’t have noticed that they have both launched the same sandwich on the same day.  See the photo above – I won’t even tell you which is which.

My first, very fleeting, thought was that it was a coincidence.  Then I thought it must be an amazing corporate espionage situation.  But the pictures are almost identical so I ventured the thought to YA that perhaps Brueggers and Einstein Brothers were somehow related.  YA snorted and said “of course, they’re related –  they’re owned by the same company.” 

In the travel industry, hotels are always changing hands and my company had a actual department to keep track of this kind of thing (Industry Relations).  Who owns what was never interesting to me.  I had it suggested to me once that I could boost my career by keeping up with the industry better than I did.  Cue the laughter.  Despite both my sisters thinking of me as “a successful career woman” (cue more laughter), I never considered myself as such.  I had a job, a job that I liked, a job that I was very good at.  I didn’t want to be a team leader, a manager, a director… just wanted to do my job.  I did get every promotion along the way (apparently in record time according to my old boss) but it never changed the job that I did…. Only changed my title and added a bit more to my paycheck.

So it doesn’t surprise me that I didn’t know that Brueggers and Einstein Brothers were siblings.  It does surprise me that they launched the same sandwich on the same day and from the looks of it, probably used photos from the same photo shoot.  It doesn’t seem a good way to differentiate the two chains.  Of course, my idea of what corporate America should do and what corporate America does are clearly not in sync.  At all!

Tell me about how you like your bagel sandwiches!

2024, animals, Food, History, Travel, Uncategorized

Where In The World Are Renee And Chris Heading?

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Greetings from somewhere that I hope is not North Dakota. Despite all of us, including the dog, being under the weather, we got the dog to the boarding kennel yesterday and managed to get ourselves and our bad colds to Bismarck last night. If everything works out, we will be in the air winging our way to a somewhat far off destination when this posts.

I have to attend the world’s most boring psychology conference again, (all about licensure and professional regulation) and Husband tagged along to take in the sights.

We will be in the home town of an actor noted for the portrayal of an iconic alien. The first chocolate factory in this country was here, as was the first subway. A city park is famous for its role in a beloved children’s book about ducks, and the city is noted for its legumes. The header photo is a clue regarding the main ingredient of a famous confection named after a nearby suburb.

This should give you all some research to do.

Have you ever had to travel when you were ill? Who are your favorite Sci-Fi alien characters? Chocolate?

2024, Food, Uncategorized

A Little Too Much Salt

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I was home on Monday due to catching Husband’s cold. The Postie came and delivered a package of kosher salt I had ordered from Amazon. If laughter is the best medicine, I should be cured by now.

I think I wrote a while back about ordering more fresh yeast than I intended, getting one case of 24 lbs instead of the 1 lb block I thought I was ordering. I am happy to report that the yeast is holding up well in the freezer. On the down side, I seem to have made a similar mistake with the salt.

Many of the recipes I see on-line or on the NYT cooking app call for Diamond Crystal kosher salt. We read up on it, and found that it is preferred by professional cooks and food writers because it has 53% less sodium than other kosher salt due to the manufacturing process. We can’t get it here, so I ordered what I thought was two boxes with 1.5 lbs of salt in each box. Instead, I ordered four boxes, each containing 3 lbs of salt. We now have 12 lbs of kosher salt.

In my defense, I think that some of the ordering information on Amazon is hard to decipher. As I looked back at the page I ordered the salt from I saw where my mistake was, but it is really not clear at first glance. I think our son and daughter will be receiving some salt in the mail soon.

What have you laughed at yourself about lately? Any creative ideas for using up all this salt?

2024, education, gardening, Gatherings, holidays, Uncategorized

Puff

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Well, our bell choir played for the PEO sisterhood on Saturday. It all went fine, although dragging the tables, bell cases, and all the equipment we need from church was a lot of work. We played in a huge facility the public school district purchased from the Haliburton Oil company for middle school and high school technical education. Culinary arts students prepared the meal. They also teach building trades, health sciences, all sorts of practical technology training, large equipment operating, business methods and marketing, and agriculture training. The complex is almost brand new and is enormous, with multiple buildings. The facility and the training are amazing. It is located on the outskirts of town on the major road north to the oil fields.

We played in the lunchroom. Everyone was very appreciative, and we played well. I couldn’t help thinking, though, how silly Puff The Magic Dragon is. I thought it was silly when I was a child, too. To make the situation even sillier, Saturday was 4/20, National Marijuana day. Here we were, middle aged and older people playing a song long associated with marijuana use for a bunch of very prim and proper middle aged and older women. No one else in the bell choir realized the symbolism or association of the song with the day, and we all got a good laugh out of it when I reminded them after the performance. There is a push to legalize recreational cannabis use in our state. Who knows, maybe they will add training at the technical institute on how to grow and market recreational pot!

What was technical training like when you were in high school? What is the most ludicrous performance or presentation you ever were involved in?

2024, Family, Farming Update, gardening, home, Kids, Uncategorized

Almost Farming

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Today’s Farming Update comes from Ben.

We’ve had some nice rainfall, and I’ve got the show open, and I’m trying to stay home and get ready to farm. Yet, every day seems to be interrupted by minutiae and farming has not become the priority it should be. Yet.

My brain cleared enough I found the three things I couldn’t find last week. Kelly pointed out to me the extra chicken waterers behind the house. Yep, that’s exactly where I put them last fall when that chicken hatched those eggs under the deck. And I found the rain gauge in the garage right where I thought it should have been last week. And it turns out the dog’s tick medication is good for 12 weeks, not four, so I had only bought one dose. And that’s why I couldn’t find more. There’s usually a rational explanation, isn’t there.

Over the weekend Kelly and I got 2/3 of the seed wagon cleaned off. (The “shed remodeling tool storage wagon”) so at least I have room for oats and corn seed and the oats will be gone before I pick up the soybean seed and then that can go on there. Daughter and all three dogs and I picked up oat seed on Monday. I also picked up another ton of the layer ration for the chickens. One ton, in 50 pound bags, equals 40 bags, so they are good for about eight months.

On Friday I got the tractor hooked to the soil finisher. If you park something in a field over winter, you need to put a board under the jackstand, otherwise it will sink into the dirt and the hitch of the implement will not line up with the tractor drawbar. I had a board under the jackstand when I unhooked it back in October, but the implement shifted and the jackstand slipped off the board. And then Friday it was 8” down in the dirt. I took a regular jack out to lift up the tongue to get it hooked to the tractor and that jack pushed down into the dirt as well. I had a board to put under the jack, but it was stuck under the hitch at first. Eventually I got that out and under the jack, and was able to raise it up, get the hydraulic lines hooked to the tractor, and attach the tractor and implement. See? I’m making progress!

I moved the chicks out of their first, smaller tank, and into the larger pen. They are about robin sized now.

The spring play at the college will close this Saturday afternoon and next week is a band and choir concert. We need to be out of the theater by about 5:30PM on Saturday, so we don’t have much time to dismantle the set. I hope to get things off the bookshelves on the set, and the small grand piano (it’s an electronic keyboard) off the stage. I’m hoping to get three or four strong young kids to carry it up the steps rather than tipping it on its side, taking off two legs, and trying to get it through a doorway sideways, like it came in. Goals.

I started delivering some straw this week.

Speaking of Straw, I was talking with a family friend about the hayrides that we used to do with 4-H or church groups. It used to be a very popular thing to take a tractor and wagon, make a pile of loose straw on the wagon, and then at night, in the dark, 15 or 20 kids would pile on the wagon and you’d go out in a field and drive around and push each other off, and by the time you got home again there was no straw left on the wagon. We don’t do that anymore. Can you imagine? What could go wrong?

I don’t know how come nobody got seriously hurt. My folks did it for the church youth groups for a lot of years. The only accident I remember is when one kid jumped off a wagon early and was going to cut across a corner of the driveway to catch a second wagon, and he ran into a barbwire fence. After that, the kids were told to stay on the wagon until they got to the field.

There is a story in my grandmother’s diaries of a 4-H hayride mid 1950’s, when the tractor slipped into a ditch. The wagon tipped over and several kids were hurt – none seriously by some miracle, but my uncle, who was driving the tractor, had several cracked ribs.

When our kids were young, the daycare would visit the farm and we used a hayrack with the tall sides, and they sat on bales, and we went in the daytime, and it was just a wagon ride. Not a hayride in my sense of the word.

I googled “hayride” to see if I could find examples of our type of hayride. Wikipedia says it’s a traditional activity consisting of a recreation ride which has been loaded with hay or straw for “comfortable seating”. They say it harkens back to farmhands or kids riding the load of hay back to the barn for unloading. And has since become a tourism gimmick to generate income for the farmer. I guess that’s one way to do it.

READERS CHOICE!

2024, animals, Family, Health, Medicine, pets, Uncategorized

As Sick As A Dog

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Husband and I are pretty anxious right now to find out how our dog is doing at the vet. We had to take him there Thursday after three days of constant hurling after meals. The vet did x-rays and found him to be constipated and dehydrated. There is the possibility that he has an upper intestinal blockage of some sort, perhaps from the shards of an Icelandic lamb horn, or the Kong Wubba he chewed and destroyed over the weekend, or a mixture of both. He hasn’t had anything different to eat for the past couple of weeks. He has been drinking water like crazy, though. He typically doesn’t swallow what he destroys, so we can’t think what would have plugged him up.

It is hard to tell when a terrier is under the weather, as they typically don’t let you know they aren’t feeling well until they are half dead. Even before we took him to the vet he wanted to tug, steal things, and go for walks. They are giving him special IV’s to hydrate him and get his digestive system flowing, as it were. They will do surgery if that doesn’t work. I refuse to take as on omen that the flock of vultures on the local butte were circling our home as I wrote this.

What health issues have your pets had? How can you tell your pets or human companions aren’t feeling well?

2024, Fantasy, holidays, Mysteries

David Shepardson Day

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I like to think that I’m a fairly normal person but every now and then something comes up that makes me wonder if I’m just a few steps off the path.

When I was in the sixth grade, our school had a presentation by a troupe of presumably college students; they did some music and read some poetry – fairly classic late 60s kinds of stuff.  After the show, the students hung around so we could meet them.  I was with my two best friends that day – Linda and Kathleen – and we waited patiently for our turn.  The student that we met was named David Shepardson and he was gorgeous-looking to three sixth-graders, longish brown hair, little goatee, tie-dye t-shirt, sandals.  The full package.  I happened to be wearing a beaded necklace that day and David admired it; he held his beaded necklace up so we could compare and…. our fingers touched.  My girlfriends and I were all giddy.  I didn’t wash my hand for a day and a half and both Linda and Kathleen checked in with me about it.  They were both pea-green.

OK, so you’re saying to yourself, how is this unusual?  Lots of pre-teen girls are a little wack-a-doodle.  Here’s the difference.  56 years later I still have “David Shepardson Day” noted on my calendar on April 16.  

And since, by coincidence, I met my BFF on April 16, 41 years ago, I do often celebrate a bit.  This year I found a nice bunch of dark purplish flowers and took them up to her house, had tea and chatted for a bit.  I usually send her a card as well to commemorate.  During the visit on Wednesday, Sara and I realized that we’ve been celebrating David Shepardson Day a year longer than she and he husband have been married.

I often wonder how David Shepardson’s life turned out.  Did he end up pursuing music or literature?  Did he marry?  Have kids?  Travel?  Does he have “Sherri Carter Day” listed on his calendar every April 16?

Do you celebrate any holidays that yours alone?

2024, Media, Poems, Uncategorized, Words, work

National Haiku Poetry Day

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The other day Husband and I made a quick trip to Bismarck-Mandan to Costco. We also went to a favorite butcher shop in Mandan. Down the street from the butcher shop is the office for the National Day company. They are the ones who post all the “National Day” declarations. I assume that they make it all up, It was fun to see where it actually takes place. It is a pretty unassuming building right there on the Mandan “strip”, the main drag in town.

I noted that today is National Haiku Poetry Day, and that yesterday was National Wear Your Pajamas To Work Day. That is interesting, as our clinical director declared that anyone who wants to wear pajamas all day this Friday can do so, as long as they pay $5.00 to the social committee. This is my pajama day haiku:

If I pay five bucks

Friday I will work in PJ’s

I will wear my sweats

I don’t have any clients on Friday, just meetings, so I won’t feel too unprofessional in my sweats.

What did you consider “professional attire” at work? Make up a haiku about your clothes. What kind of pajamas do you prefer?