Category Archives: education

2025, education, Family, Fantasy, Media, Mysteries, Science, Stories, Technology, The Future, Theatre, Uncategorized, Weather, work

Artificial What?

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(Header photo by Word Press’ Artificial Intelligence, version 3 !)

My summer Padawan is always telling me “I asked Chat GPT about…”

I just can’t get over that. He’s asking a computer for relationship advice. I guess it’s faster than asking Ann Landers… And then he tells me he likes it because it’s giving him the answers he wants to hear. Well of course it is! I am just so astounded that he’s taking relationship advice from this thing…and because he’s asking it ‘why doesn’t she love me’ questions, of course it gives him reasons she’ll come back. I told him to ask it ‘Why won’t this girl leave me alone’ and see what it says? I get the typical teenage “Yeah, but!” answers from him. 

Man, am I glad I’m not 19 anymore! Mostly.  

So I asked Chat GPT to write a blog and I gave it some pretty general guidelines; farming, theater, and teenage love. 

It did pretty good! I had to laugh, it wasn’t at all like I write, because why would it be, but it was a very nice short story of “…slipping into a classroom still smelling faintly of hay and diesel that makes you feel both out of place and perfectly rooted at the same time.” 

Then boy meets girl, they go to a show, and, “ We slipped into seats near the front, shoulders brushing, her laughter lighting up the dim room like a sparkler. I couldn’t tell you much about the plot of the play—something about family, love, mistakes—but I remember how she leaned in during the quiet moments and how the stage lights reflected in her eyes.” 

Oh my gosh. I’m gonna start asking this for sweet nothings to whisper in Kelly’s ears! 

So I refined the request a few more times. I asked for more humor and less metaphors. I hate metaphors like a hole in my head. 

It gave me this: 

Being nineteen and in a relationship during winter in Southeast Minnesota is a test that should earn college credit. The farm turns into a frozen obstacle course, the wind rearranges your face, and every chore takes twice as long because everything metal turns into a hand-freezing punishment device. Romance does not thrive in these conditions.

My girlfriend says we need to “communicate more,” which is hard to do when the chickens start yelling at dawn and demand full attention. She thinks the chickens respond better to her voice, which is true only because she gives them treats and I hand them feed like a government-issued ration. She insists this is evidence of my lack of warmth. I insist it is evidence that chickens are extortionists.

The grain farm does not help our relationship. Every time we plan a date, something breaks. This week it was the old tractor. The tractor has the personality of a stubborn old man who refuses to stand up without complaining first. I spent three hours crawling under it, dropping tools, and discovering new ways to swear. She sat nearby on a bale of straw, scrolling through her phone, occasionally offering advice that made sense only if the tractor responded to positive energy.

The real villain of December is Christmas music. The month starts, and suddenly every speaker in existence blasts nonstop jingles. She says it “puts her in the spirit.” It puts me in a state of irritation that could power the whole farm. The worst part is that she sings along. She sings loudly. She sings off-key. She claims my dislike of holiday music is a sign of emotional instability. I claim her playlist is a threat to public safety. This topic has caused more arguments than the chickens, the tractor, and the weather combined.

But we’re nineteen, so we keep trying. Some evenings we sit in the shop, surrounded by tools, feathers drifting around, both of us exhausted. She talks about her day. I talk about which piece of machinery betrayed me. Sometimes she laughs at my tractor stories. Sometimes I almost tolerate her humming.

Our relationship may not be smooth, but we are still standing, even in January temperatures, even with demanding chickens, even with that cursed playlist. And honestly, surviving December together might be proof we’re tougher than we thought.

Not bad. But I want to know why there are feathers in the shop?? Are the chickens living in the shop or did I drag that many feathers in there on my clothing?? Sometimes walking around the college and I’ll find a dry chunk of “dirt” in the hallway with a chicken feather sticking out of it. Yeah, that’s probably mine. But how did the computer know that?

THINK ABOUT AUTOMATION IN YOUR LIFE. WHAT WOULD YOU HAVE NEVER EXPECTED? 

ASK AI (OR ANN LANDERS), TO WRITE SOMETHING. 

2025, crops, education, Family, Farming Update, Kids, Nature, Technology, Uncategorized, Weather

Concrete Herring! or What Color is Your Herring?

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This weeks farming update from Ben

My schedule has been a little crazy lately. Next week will be better.  🙂

I hear there are places in the country where the weather on the evening news doesn’t take ten minutes. I don’t need the full ten minutes, I just want to know the 12-48 hour forecast, and the 7 or 10 day forecast, Which I know is just a guideline. Especially this time of year, when the forecast has some pretty drastic changes coming.

No, the corn still isn’t out and I don’t want to talk about it. The grain elevators are closed on the weekends now, because 99.8% of the harvest is complete. So I don’t expect anything this weekend unless they finish everything at their place and they just come in and fill up the trucks on Sunday. 

I wrote a long story about the thermostat in my shop and I threw all that away and tried to make this a shorter story. A red herring was involved and suffice it to say human error played a part. Because of course it did.  

I use a wifi thermostat so I can monitor it from the house. It worked last year. This year, it worked while I’m out there, but it didn’t work when I came to the house. 

One day it died completely so I bought a new one.  Installing that and I blew a fuse up in the heater itself. Another trip to town for an ‘E’ fuse. An E fuse? Never heard of an E fuse. Oh, it’s a ‘3’ not an ‘E’. Thank goodness I figured that out on my own and didn’t say that to the guy at the auto parts store. Then of course there was a new app and all of that rigamarole. And that night in the house and it wouldn’t connect again. 

The day we poured the concrete, including the slab outside the front door, I used a side door, and a different light switch. Turns out, the outlet I have the heater plugged in to is tied into the 3 way switch for the lights. And I hooked that up myself, this wasn’t the electricians fault. Other than they didn’t know I wanted an outlet for the heater, which is why I did it myself. But how come it worked last year?? Because the heater was plugged into a wall outlet and because the electricians weren’t here until March, and I didn’t get the heater outlet installed until April.  So now, when I come into the shop and turn the lights on, the thermostat works. When I leave and turn off the lights, the thermostat turns off. Well, don’t I feel like a dunce. How could I tell the thermostat was off once I left the shop?? I thought the problem was the wifi. Nope, that was the red herring. The problem was the thermostat wasn’t even ON.

I have it plugged into a regular outlet again and I can tell you, by the app, it’s 46 degree’s out there at 56% humidity. 

We did get the concrete done on Tuesday. Yay! Check that off the list! A big job, and I had the easy job in the tractor hauling the cement from the truck outside, to the pad inside. 

(Two reasons; the truck wouldn’t fit inside the shed, and I didn’t want him backing onto the existing concrete slab). When they poured the inside slab a couple years ago, they used a little “buggy” to haul the concrete. This was the same thing, only different.) The truck driver was great! Randy. 65 yrs old, been driving a concrete truck for 38 years. We joked before he got there, would he know we were amateurs? I told him right up front, feel to offer advice. He just picked up the bull float and got right in there helping. 

Took about 2 hours to get it all dumped and leveled. I was a little bit short of product and left a bit of a gap on one end of the walkway pad. I expect to finish that with 10 bags of concrete mix I picked up.  

About 6:00 PM I was able to start smoothing off the concrete with the hand trowels. (I Learned the difference between magnesium floats and steel floats. You use magnesium when you’re first leveling, and steel to do the final finish.) 

It was about 8PM when I was trying to finish the big slab and smooth around the drain. The concrete was getting too firm by that point and it was a little too late to be working it. All in all, it’s not bad for the first time for a bunch of newbies. It will look better when it gets some dirt on it to cover the imperfections.

I spread out tarps and covered the outside ones with straw. 

A few days later I pulled off the tarp and moved the dumpster over there. This right here was the original point of all this. 

I wonder how much snow will blow in here?
My brother using the bull float on the first piece.
Working on the big slab inside the shed.

Our son helped, my brother helped, Padawan’s girlfriend helped, (Padawan was at work) and Kelly helped. They all admitted this was harder work than they imagined.  And we all learned a lot. Next summer’s plan is to do another slab inside. My brother isn’t sure he’ll help again next summer. Son says he will find more younger helpers.

I’m just glad it’s done. I had a beer that night. I’ve been waiting to finish the concrete to have that beer. 

We thought for sure we’d have a dog footprints in it somewhere. Or Luna was gonna drop a ball into it. We locked them in the shop at one point.

Inside slab done. Won’t drive on it for a week yet, and will get it backfilled shortly.
You haven’t seen the chickens lately. Here’s the chickens eating some left overs.

I have a new appreciation for the people doing concrete work and making it look easy.

HAVE YOU STOPPED MISLEADING PEOPLE?

2025, education, Family, Gatherings, sports, Uncategorized

Bowl

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I see that today in 1520 is the anniversary of Henry VIII ordering that a bowling alley be installed in his palace at Whitehall. I imagine it was an outdoor lane for lawn bowling, but even so it reminded me of my bowling experiences.

I noticed last week as we were driving around Luverne that the bowling alley was still a going concern, although it is only open Thursday through Saturday these days. I never belonged to a youth bowling league, but the bowling alley was a place to go to have fun when I was in high school. I don’t remember it serving anything but snacks and simple beverages. My mother belonged to a bowling league, and I remember how heavy her bowling ball seemed to me when I was a child when I would take it out of its bag in her closet.

The bowling alley in Dickinson is a really busy place that doubles as a bar and restaurant. There are very active bowling leagues for adults and children. It also is the stop for the buses that run east and west across the state. The police have their hands full there. A work colleague’s husband was attacked and robbed in the parking lot by a couple of Montana guys recently who he met bat the bar and had a couple of drinks with.

One of my high school classmates had a dad who was a professional bowler who seemed to earn a living bowling competitively. I remember seeing him on TV in bowling matches. I don’t think that is a thing anymore. What a way to make a living!

When I started as a freshman at Concordia College in Moorhead. MN, we had to take two semesters of physical education. I opted for bowling for my first gym class. It was taught by Sonny Gullsvig, the college basketball coach, at a local bowling alley. I will never forget Coach Gullsvig instructing us in his coaching voice as though he was in the Concordia gym ” FIRST YOU TAKE THE BALL AND TOSS IT DOWN THE ALLEY….” I skipped class a lot and ended up with a “C,” in the class.

What are your bowing memories? Ever hang out at a bowling alley?

2025, education, History, Music

Opera Epic

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It was on this day in 1869 that the opera “Das Rheingold” by Richard Wagner premiered on the stage at the National Theatre Munich, Germany.   It is 150 minutes long and is the first of an epic four-part drama known as Der Ring des Nibelungen.   Rheingold, although it is the beginning of Wagner’s famous cycle, Rheingold was the last of the texts to be written.  Wagner didn’t want any of the Ring to be performed until all the parts were complete.  King Ludwig II of Bavaria thought otherwise and ordered the staging of Rheingold in 1869.  It wasn’t until 1876 that the entirety of Ring was performed at the Bayreuth Festspielhaus in Bavaria.  These days, Bayreuth still stages the entire Ring epic each year, a total of four operas that add up to about 18 hours of stage time.  Other opera houses tend to stage the Ring over the course of a few years. 

Although I recognize some of the music instantly,

I didn’t have a clue what The Ring is all about.  The plot is EXTREMELY complex and begins with the theft of gold that is then made into a magic ring  Lots and lots of Norse gods and goddesses; truly I didn’t even know there were that many.  In the end, Brunhilde (who had been a goddess but was stripped of her immortality) returns the ring but not before Valhalla and the gods are destroyed. 

Now that I know more about The Rheingold and The Ring, it doesn’t increase my desire to ever see it.  Certainly not 18 hours of it.  I’m not a particularly big fan of opera to start with but that much plot to keep track of might make my head explode?

Do you like opera?  Have a favorite? 

2025, education, Health, State Fair

Summer Learning

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Nobody said “don’t go to the fair”.  Nobody said “it will be very rough on your knee”.  Not the urgent care doctor, not the orthopedist, not the physical therapist.  To be fair, none of these people knew me.  None of them heard “will I be able to go to the fair” and translated that to “will I be able to go to the fair six times, 8-9 hours each time and go from one end to the other and back”. 

So technically you could say it’s my fault.  If I had been clear what “go to the fair” really meant, maybe they would have given me different advice.  But if they had, I wouldn’t be able to tell you how excellent the emergency service of the Minnesota State Fair truly are.

Thursday was fine – although I got blisters, probably from walking funny due to the big brace on one knee.  Saturday was ok; I wore sneakers to avoid the funny walking blisters.  I was slow but at a crowded fair, that’s not actually a handicap.  On Monday I did half a day and then went back for the grandstand show.  17,000 steps.  Sore city.  On Wednesday, I was really sore but it was Golden Retriever Day so I soldiered on.  On Friday, both knees were sore, so I wore the brace AND a compression sleeve on the other knee.  Then about noon, over near the Caribe Café, my “good knee” gave out suddenly.  No fall, no trip, no getting knocked around by the crowds; just suddenly there was absolutely no walking on that leg. 

First the police came, parked on the street near where I had managed to get to a bench.  He ran the lights so the EMTs would know where to find me.  EMTs came, took my blood pressure (yowzer…), asked me a ton of questions and then made me sign a form, telling me it was to verify that they weren’t kidnapping me (his exact words).  Then another set of guys got me into a “gator” and we headed, extremely slowly due to the crowds, to the Emergency Room.

It was kind of quiet when I was there – in addition to an intake area, they actually have a little hospital in the back.  YA mentioned that it looked like all the beds, table and chairs were donated by a bunch of different medical centers – nothing matched.  But it was clean and I was the only patient.  Oscar was my “attending” EMT.  More blood pressure (much lower), more questions.  Another form.  Then they found a very nice volunteer who drove us to the Park `n Ride so that YA could get me home. 

I’m much better now, although not exactly super mobile yet.  I believe the orthopedist is a little sorry he didn’t suggest I take it a little easier or maybe try a wheelchair a couple of the days, but he won’t admit that; he’s “glad I’m out living my life”.  And now I know all about how the emergency services at the fair works!

Have you learned anything new this summer?

2025, animals, Automotive, Business, education, Farming Update, gardening, History, Mysteries, Nature, pets, Technology, Weather, work

TIRED

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This week’s farm report from XDFBen

Going to work early one morning and there was the football team, under the stadium lights, all in uniform, having practice. Whew, I think early morning practices would be tough. Like getting up to exercise.

We saw a “V” of geese flying over one day. 

Later I listened to about 2 dozen barn swallows gathered on an electric line chittering and chattering and having quite the discussion about when and where to go. Although the ‘where’ is pretty well defined, at least in general. South. Everybody. Just head south. 

Kelly got one of those hotel sales calls that would take us someplace south if we just listened to a sales pitch. We don’t like to make hasty decisions, and I didn’t realize the salesperson was on hold while Kelly and I talked a few times. Then the salesperson’s manager came on and tried to shame Kelly for keeping the person on the phone for so long and not immediately just saying ‘Yes’. Snort. Give her attitude, will you? Click.

We will not be going south.  

I had my first day of class. Forensic Chemistry. It’s a hybrid class, meaning a lot of it is done online, then we meet Wednesdays for lab. My friend Paul is taking a writing class. Here’s our first day of class photo.

FIRST DAY OF CLASS

I got the front end off the wagon where the wheels went wonky.

It’s not supposed to look like this. I have a nephew, Matt, who is a welder. He’ll be coming to look at it and see if it’s salvageable. A lot of cracks and old welds where the axle attaches to the frame. Old welds must be mine, but I don’t remember fixing this. 

Mid-September there will be another online auction in Plainview. Last week when I dragged all the old machinery out of the trees, I pulled out a pretty nice disc. I had used it for several years until I got something bigger and better. I cleaned the disc up, greased it, and towed it to the auction. 

WIDE LOAD COMING THROUGH

It is 20’ wide so I took up most of the road and part of the shoulder. I try to take the back roads when I do this sort of thing, but I have to get to the back roads first. Most traffic was pretty respectful. I had the SMV sign on the back, and I bought two magnetic flashing lights, one for the front corner, and one for the back corner. I travelled about 25 MPH. When able, I’d pull over and let traffic pass me. 

Then I got to the road where they were painting new lines on the road. And putting cones down. I knocked over the first two cones before I figured out how far I needed to move over. And I scared a couple garbage cans. But I got it there in one piece. 

The next day I took in a 24’ bale elevator, but that was on a trailer and wasn’t any big deal. 

Several times, Kelly and I would go outside planning to do “this” and we’d go off and do “that” instead. And we’d laugh, “This isn’t what I came out to do…” Yep, but it needed doing anyway. 

I picked an ear of corn.

THAT is a nice ear of corn

It’s filled to the tip, which means it had ideal growing conditions. Any stress and the plant aborts the kernels at the top. This one was 40 kernels long, and 16 around. (It’s always an even number around). So 40 x16 = 640 kernels x 30,000 (plants / acre) = 19,200,00 kernels in an acre / 90,000 (kernels in a bushel) = 213 bushel / acre. Never in my life have I had a crop that good. This won’t be either. Factor in the deer, the raccoons, the clay or rocky spots, the trees on the edges… and I might actually make 180 bu / acre. We shall remain cautiously optimistic. 

The soybeans are looking great.

BELLY BUTTON HIGH!
TOP EXTRA TENDER LEAVES

Notice these extra leaves and pods on the top? Again, terrific growing season. The deer just haven’t found this plant yet… that’s what they’re eating off is all the tender bonus growth on the top. 

One evening I burned a brush pile. Later, Kelly and I sat in the gator and enjoyed the fire.

BON FIRE DATE!

I removed the tires from the rims on the old junk wagons. I watched some YouTube videos how to do this quick and easy. They were using car tires that didn’t have innertubes, and they hadn’t been sitting in the trees for 30 years. But I figured it out. Cut it open with a Sawzall, then use a grinder to cut the bead cable. Removed 16 tires.

One didn’t have a tube! Just about every farm tire has an innertube in it. And most of the tubes had patches on them. It made me smile, and feel a little nostalgic. Dad or I had these tires apart before and patched a hole. If you don’t know, getting a tire off the rim is difficult if you don’t have the fancy tire machines. The bead, that inner ring of the tire, has a steel cable in it, and that’s what holds the tire on the rim. And it seals tight and it’s a pain to get off with hand tools. Dad took off a lot of tires, patched the tube, and put the tire back on. You have to get the bead to seal. I have done a lot of tires, too. But now days, with the tire goop stuff you can just pour inside, I don’t take so many apart; I’m not subjecting the wagons and tires to the wear I did when milking cows and making hay. And, like I mentioned last week, I’ll often just go get a new tire before replacing the tube. Working smarter, not harder. 

Some of the junk was two old flare boxes. Wagons we used for hauling ear corn or oats. I haven’t used them in a lot of years. The floors are rotted out and frames are too small and lightweight to be reused. It’s just scrap. 

WHAT IS THE FURTHEST SOUTH YOU’VE BEEN? 

STORIES ON CHANGING TIRES?

2025, education, Family, Kids, Uncategorized

Welcome Back!

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Today is the first day of school here in our town’s public schools, the parochial schools, and all the schools in the neighboring smaller communities. It is, if course, one of the hottest days we will have all summer.

I believe that all the school buildings in our public schools here have air conditioning. We certainly didn’t have it when I was in elementary school or high school. The public schools here didn’t have it until after our children started school in the 1990’s. I don’t remember being really hot in my unairconditioned classrooms. Perhaps we were just more accustomed to functioning in hot buildings.

What I do remember about the first day of school is the excitement I felt the night before and being unable to sleep. My favorite elementary teacher was Mrs. Remme, Grade 3, who was a really energetic woman who loved bringing exciting things like butterfly cocoons into the classroom and having us watch them hatch. She also could have cared less about neat handwriting, which was a good thing for me since no matter how hard I tried, I could never write neatly in cursive.

My least favorite elementary teacher was Mrs. Peterson, Grade 4, a bitter woman who complained how she was bilked by door to door bible salesmen after her husband died. She also talked a lot about cooking lentils, and how it was a sad thing that we didn’t have more lentils in our diets. She went on to be an elementary principal in Iowa somewhere.

Who were your favorite/least favorite elementary teachers? How is your handwriting these days? Memories of first days of school?

2025, Art, education, Kids, sports, Uncategorized

A New Logo

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The big local news here lately is that the public high school mascot/logo is being retired. We are known as the Dickinson Midgets. We have apparently been Midgets for 100 years.

What is even bigger news is that virtually no one is protesting the change. The school board tried to change the name in 1996, and the whole board was recalled in a special election by disgruntled citizens who wouldn’t stand for a new mascot. This time, things are different, and students talk openly about how embarrassing the mascot is. Another good reason for a new mascot now is that they are renovating the gymnasium, and they can incorporate the new mascot logo into the gym floor. It will save money in the long run, you see. It will be good to have this little guy put to rest.

The superintendent asked for ideas for a new mascot and had 850 entries. A committee of students and faculty settled on two: The Defenders or The Mavericks. Both ideas seem pretty palatable to me, and seem to go well with our Old West ethos out here.

What was your school mascot? What are some of the sillier mascots you have heard of? Make up some new school mascot names.

2025, education, Farming Update, Food, Uncategorized

Maple-ing. The Work

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I spent a few days down at the farm of my godson last week; he invited me down to see his process for making maple syrup.  The past few years I’ve been the recipient of his syrup and have asked quite a few questions.   He thought I would like to see you it’s done – he was correct.

We started at 6:45 a.m. by getting the fire pit going.  He does his boiling out in the open – no hut or roof or anything.  You have to watch the weather forecast carefully when you do it this way.  The three pans fit right over the edges and we filled them about 2/3 full of sap.  With the 10 gallons that we harvested that day, we were working with 60 gallons total.

After about 5 hours, the farthest two pans started to darken as the water in the sap boiled off; the closest pan, due to being near the opening for adding wood, didn’t boil quite as vigorously.  We spent a far amount of time transferring from this pan into the darker pans.  That way we only added cold sap to the closest pan.  It takes quite some time to boil down 60 gallons of sap so we were still at it into the night.  The fire kept us warm as the temperature started to drop and it rained (lightly) for about 40 minutes.

When we had it all boiled down to about 3 gallons, we closed up shop and moved the syrup into the kitchen, where it sat overnight.  There was about an hour more of boiling on the stovetop the next morning.  There was quite a bit of fiddling with it, using a hydrometer to make sure it was the right density.  Not dense enough and the syrup can develop mold, too dense and the syrup crystallizes.  At that point we had about 2½ gallons and we filtered it through a very heavy duty filter that was hung from a camera tripod; why purchase something when the camera tripod works wonders?

Then all that was left was to get the syrup into bottles.  Although I had worked hard the day before, the bottling was the only thing I really helped with all morning.  It was really a one-person operation once it moved inside. 

Seems like a LOT of work (16 hours on Friday and 4 hours on Saturday) for the amount of syrup we got but I will say that the ½ cup that was left over after bottling, that we all ate with spoons was probably the best syrup I’ve had in my life.  See the bottle with the green cap in the photo above, that is a little larger than the other bottles?  That’s the one I claimed. 

What do you like to pour maple syrup on?

2025, education, Gatherings, Music, Songs, Uncategorized

School Dance

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Our community of 28,000 people has four Catholic churches and a very large parochial school system. The churches were originally started for and attended by the various immigrant groups who settled here. The Germans from Russia and the German Hungarians attended St. Joseph’s Church on the south side (less affluent section) of town by the railroad tracks and stockyards. The more affluent Czech immigrants attended St. Wenceslaus, north of the tracks, and the most affluent attended St. Patrick’s Church in the downtown area. The 1970’s oil boom led to a need for another church, Queen of Peace, built in the area of new houses near the interstate.

The Catholic School system has a big Mardi Gras celebration/fundraiser every your during the first weekend of February, ostensibly close to when Mardi Gras happens, although this year it was way earlier than Mardi Gras since Easter is so late this year. The festivities take place at the Catholic High School, just a block from our house. We have never attended, but I understand that every year it is the same with games of chance, big dinners, cakewalks, and fun activities for children. This year, however, they added something quite surprising-dance lessons.

Local dance teachers came to teach Line dancing and Swing dancing, and most surprising, Salsa dancing. We have a fair number of immigrants from Central and South America, and a group of them started a Salsa dance company that is apparently very popular and booked way out for for engagements. They also perform every December 12 at Queen of Peace in honor of Our Lady of Guadalupe. I found a video of Salsa dancing, and it just doesn’t fit the conservative stereotype of our Catholic community.

Can you imagine this happening at a Mass? It sounds like everyone at Mardi Gras had fun learning the moves. What next?

What are your memories of school dances? What is your favorite way to dance?