Category Archives: Mysteries

2023, home, Media, Mysteries, Uncategorized

Scram, Scam!

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Over the past couple of weeks I have received emails purportedly from our internet and landline provider warning me over a variety of false circumstances like having too many emails in storage, and our automated payment not going through. Yesterday I got one warning me that our internet would be disconnected if I didn’t pay our over due bill of $689. I knew in my head that this was a scam, but just to make sure I contacted our provider and found that we owed no money at all.

I also received voice mail messages recently from a law firm in Minnesota and a Disability advocate firm in Minnesota for “Charlotte” asking me to phone them back regarding my disability claim. I looked the numbers up on Google and they are definite scams. Husband has been getting messages on his phone from some bogus dentist office about a missed appointment. I know that they hope we phone them to tell them they have mead a mistake so that they can further ensnare us and get our SS numbers and bank account numbers. We just delete them and block the numbers. Their attempts seem to be getting more sophisticated, though. I wonder how less tech savvy folks manage to not get fooled.

Have you ever been scammed or know of anyone who has? What do you think a fitting punishment would be for these people?

2023, Fantasy, Media, Mysteries, Travel

You Gotta Be Kidding Me…

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I don’t spend much time looking at “the best things to buy” kinds of online ads, but yesterday afternoon, while lazing around watching re-runs of Columbo, I clicked on a “Unusual Items that Everybody Wants” lists.  Not sure what I was thinking.

The first item that made my jaw drop was a wristband that you use when you wash your face… to catch any water drips before they run down your arm.  Not sure why this is needed in life unless everybody washes their face differently than I do.

The next items that stopped me in my track was the “purse organizer” (above).  My very first thought was “who has 8 purses”?  Silly question since I sleep in a room next to someone who most likely have more than 8.  I’m sure she’s not alone.  Me?  One purse for everyday use and one fabric “State Fair” bag with a turtle on it that is the perfect size for what we need to take to the fair (money holder, coupon booklet, collapsible cookie holder, aspirin, address labels…).   If we weren’t State Fair aficionados, I would just have one purse.

My second thought was how in heaven’s name would you explain either of these items to someone living in the Middle Ages?  This was followed by a huge number of things that I can’t imagine trying to explain.  If you are suddenly transported to the year 1435, you probably shouldn’t mention ANYTHING about the times in which we live.  It’s a perfect way to end up on the 1435 version of the loony bin.  It never goes well in any time travel book I’ve ever read.

What would be the hardest thing to explain about our world to King Henry VI?

2023, Gatherings, Mysteries, Uncategorized

Pickup Mystery

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My daily drive to work takes me past our local college. I noticed yesterday that the normally empty college parking lot on my route was completely filled with white pickups. So were the parking spaces going up to the main campus. They were pickups with special things on the back for various welding and other work activities. I also noticed a campus food service employee pushing a grill to the alumni house across the street from the parking lot.

School starts next week, and I couldn’t figure out why there were so many non-collegiate vehicles in the parking lot. I challenge the Baboons to come up with a hypothesis and story for this.

What do you think all these white pickups were doing here? Ever read the Red Headed League? Can you make any connections between the story and the book? What are your favorite mysteries?

Family, Fantasy, Kids, Mysteries, Travel

Apple of My Eye

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I know I’ve talked about this topic before, but it’s fascinating when I see glimpses of myself in YA.  She is in Dublin for two+ weeks for work and the morning of her flight, I found the clipboard (in the photo above) sitting on the counter downstairs.  In an interesting twist on the apple-not-falling-far-from-the-tree, I note that she has used three colors of highlighters.  I am a one-highlighter gal when it comes to my lists; it looks like the yellow highlighter is for her backpack but I’m not sure about the fuchsia or even the dots. 

My list-making has evolved in the past couple of months.  My weekly spreadsheet went by the wayside around the holidays last year; it was a gradual decline but I realized it wasn’t doing it for me any longer.  I actually went “list-less” for several months with the occasional list of errands on a post-it or groceries on my phone’s note app. 

Then a few weeks ago, after I re-retired, I wrote out a list of things for the next day.  Just on a pad of paper I had laying around and only a few items, nothing that is part of my regular routine.  It felt nice to take a highlighter to the list at the end of the day so I did another list for the next day.  Again – just written by hand and just a few items.  It’s become my new routine — for the most part.  There have been a few days with no list and I survived!

YA doesn’t do daily lists (that I ever see anyway) but it’s nice to have evidence that every now and then she’s takes a page from my playbook.

Would you rather have a pet dragon or a pet unicorn?

home, Mysteries, pets, Seasons

The Single Life….

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The last couple of weeks Guinevere and I have repeatedly passed by a house on the parkway with one toddler’s pink shoe sitting on the front post of someone’s house.   It is still in good shape (despite a couple of storms) but it does look a little forlorn.  If YA had lost this shoe as a toddler, I might have re-traced our steps to find it but there are probably several good reasons why the shoe remains all by itself.

It makes me think about the socks that go missing in life.  This time of year I spend more time thinking about socks; winter socks are bigger and harder to mis-placed.  I mostly wear little no-show socks (if I’m wearing shoes) and I often find one of the missing when I fold up my weekly laundry.  I’ve developed a short process when this happens.

As I sort and fold laundry, I tend to shake it out a bit.  If a sock is missing, I may unfold, shake and refold any likely suspects who might be holding onto a sock, especially the fitted sheet.  If that doesn’t turn up the missing footwear, then I head down to the basement to check the dryer and the washing machine.  If I am still single-socked, then I put the lonely sock into a little box that I keep in my closet.  Then when its mate shows up, I put them together and replace them in the sock drawer. 

Eventually I go through the single sock box and get rid of any inmates who have been there for a long long time.  Right now there are four socks in the box and none of them are likely to get paired up again.

How to you deal with lost socks, shoes, gloves?  Do you have a process?  How long to you keep single items before despairing of finding their mates?

2023, animals, Fantasy, home, Medicine, Mysteries, Uncategorized

Mysteries

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There have been some strange happenings here in usually dull ND that could be the basis of some interesting mytery or science fiction stories.

The first event was in Fargo. A couple of weeks ago there was a story in the Fargo Forum about a spat between a local hospital system and a medical waste disposal company It seems that a human torso showed up in a bin at the medical waste company, and the company blamed the hospital and the hospital blamed the medical waste company.

https://apnews.com/article/human-remains-medical-waste-fargo-9d5434b46441ec5e03275186a3de2887

No one has indicated the identity of the body, or where the rest of the body is. Hmm.

The second mystery is closer to home, in our driveway. About two weeks ago, Husband found the decapitated, eviscerated corpse of a small cottontail rabbit. The head was lying right by the body. All the entrails were gone. Our dog is never in the front yard. We have no roaming cats or dogs in the neighborhood. Who (or what) could have done this? We live in the middle of town. Hmm.

Come up with some hypotheses for these strange events. Could they be linked?

2023, animals, home, Mysteries, pets

Doggy Dilemma

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You all know that one of my favorite parts of summer is going barefoot, or wearing zorries, which is pretty much the same as going barefoot.  If I’m dressing up I might put on one of my pairs of Birkenstocks, but that’s as much as I like to encase my feet at this time of year.

The exception is when I’m walking the dog.  I should say that I CAN walk the dog wearing zorries – my feet can handle it, but I sometimes worry that if Guinevere takes off after a squirrel or rabbit and surprises me, zorries might not be the best footwear in an emergency.  So I wear tennies. And socks.

That’s where my doggy dilemma comes into play.  Guinevere, whatever issues she may have, is pretty smart and has definitely figured out that my putting on tennis shoes almost always means she is going for a walk.  Like all dogs, she loves the walk and from the minute the shoes go on, she begins to prance around, whine and bark until her halter is on and we are out the door.  This is very annoying and it’s not something I’ve ever had to deal with in all my life with dogs.

I’ve tried putting on the shoes 15 minutes ahead of time and spending time picking up or doing dishes, but so far this hasn’t fooled her.  The minute there is a whiff of walk, she starts her impatient song and dance.   I wonder if I have to just bite the bullet and occasionally put on the shoes, hang out at home and then take them off and not involve a walk at all.  I’m pretty sure she’ll figure this out as well.

When have your pets trained you?

2023, books, Gatherings, Media, Mysteries, Stories

Six Degrees of Separation

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Today’s post comes to us from Cynthia!

“Six Degrees of Separation” is the idea that all people are six or fewer social connections away from each other. As a result, a chain of “friend of a friend” statements can be made to connect any two people in a maximum of six steps.

 I recently listened to Garrison Keiller’s “Writer’s Almanac” after many years of just reading at the printed version.  Maybe I haven’t listened since it went off the air. While listening I remember 1975 when I first discovered and loved Garrison’s radio show. We went to several of his live versions before and after it went national. But before it went national, I was visiting with a school friend and our English teacher in Cloquet. In the middle of the conversation my friend mentioned Garrison. She knew him! She had been the editor of the University of Minnesota’s monthly literary magazine, Ivory Tower in 1963 and 1964, and Garrison was her assistant editor. I was so happily astounded that I knew someone who knew him…Six Degrees of Separation!  When I finally met Garrison while working at MPR in Duluth, I asked him if he remembered her. Of course, he did. They reconnected again not too long ago. And she and I are still close friends.

 Another “Six Degree” tale to tell:

One of my favorite MPR classical music hosts was Australian Stephanie Wendt. I met her in person when she was the host of an event in Duluth and I was her “assistant.” She is also a classical pianist. She married a choral director and they moved to Sweden. We were Facebook friends and then I joined her blog where she posted beautiful photographs of where she lives. I recently asked a friend, Gunilla, who lives on the farm in Mahtowa she inherited from her uncle. She also lives and is a pastor in Sweden: “Is the town where my online friend, Stephanie, lives close to where you live?” Gunilla said, “Yes! I know Stephanie! She and her husband were just at and often are at my church!”

Do you have any “Six Degree of Separation” tales to tell?

animals, Mysteries, Nature, Poems

Translation is Everything

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Last week I was looking for something online and happened upon Basho’s famous frog haiku.  I’ve seen it before but didn’t realize that this is considered on of the most famous haiku.  This is the most common translation (thanks to Harry Behn):

An old silent pond…

A frog jumps into the pond,

Splash!  Silence again.

I couldn’t’ quite think this was the best haiku ever so I dub a little deeper.  Here is actual Japanese:

Furu ike ya

kawazu tobikomu

mizu no oto

This translates literally to this:

Old pond…

a frog jumps in

water’s sound

The translation doesn’t match the 5-7-5 syllable convention, which probably explains why there are so many versions in English.  But I still couldn’t figure out why it was so popular; then I found it narrated in Japanese:

Much prettier sounding – makes more sense why it is one of his best-remembered haikus.  Too bad it isn’t as pretty sounding in English as it is in Japanese.

Do you have form over function anywhere in your life?

100 Words, 2023, Automotive, Family, Mysteries

Nun Fun!

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On the way home from Fawn-Doe-Rosa last week, YA and I decided to take a detour to go to the Dairy Queen in Osceola.  While we were waiting to have our order handed to us, an SUV full of nuns turned into the parking lot.  They pulled to the other side of the building so we didn’t get to see if they all got out of the car, but it was a funny sight.

Of course nuns can go to Dairy Queen if they wish, you just don’t think of soft-serve as a religious habit. 

Have you seen anything that struck you as funny recently?