Category Archives: Mysteries

2025, animals, Farming Update, Music, Mysteries, Nature, Uncategorized

Who???

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The weekend Farm Report comes to us from Ben.

I heard on the radio the band ‘The Who’ is beginning their farewell tour. I thought back in 2016 they were on their farewell tour. Which isn’t anything new, the Rolling Stones are still out there and how many farewell tours have they had. Anyone seen the Stones? 

I saw The Who in 1982. I think it was my second big rock concert and as an 18-year-old, driving with a State Farm atlas in my lap from Rochester up to the big city of St Paul and the St Paul Civic Center, it was a pretty big deal. I’m sure my folks were concerned sending me out into the world like that, even if it was just two hours away. I know I’ve told the story before but I like to brag about it so I’m gonna say it again: My first rock concert was Queen 1982, when Freddie Mercury was still strutting around the stage. My brother says Queen was the warm-up act when he saw the band Chicago right after Bohemian Rhapsody had come out.

So I set the bar quite high to have Queen and The Who as my first rock concerts. I know I have programs from them both, might even have tickets stubs in a drawer somewhere. And that’s when you had to go to a ticket office on the second floor of Dayton‘s department store. I feel like I found out about both of these fairly late so it’s not like I was waiting at the doors the first day tickets went on sale and a bunch of us rushed to the window. And then I found out you could call in to get tickets, so you called, getting the busy signal, hung up, and called again. In 1986 when tickets for Pink Floyd went on sale at the old Metrodome, I was home sick in bed and Kelly, while at work, was able to call and get tickets for us.

I digress.

The Who on a farewell tour.

They were well past their prime in 2016 and I decided I was not gonna remember that concert, I was gonna remember the 1982 concert.

You probably all remember the rock opera Tommy, and a really bad movie that was made after that. I always liked the Quadrophenia album better. Pete Townshend, the arm-windmilling guitarist, is married to Rachel Fuller. A singer-songwriter, musician, and composer. Together they created an  orchestral version of Quadrophenia and I recently saw it’s a ballet in England. I enjoy the sound of an orchestra behind a rock band. And the climactic final song of Quadrophenia called “Love Reign O’er Me“ sung by a full throated, powerful opera singer like Alfie Boe, is really something.

How long should you keep doing something?

I am sure they don’t need the money, and if you love it, and you are able to do it, I guess you should keep doing it, right? I mean should I quit farming because I’m “too old“? But I’m not farming in front of tens of thousands and charging an obscene amount of money for people to come see me struggle to climb up into the tractor and make crooked rows across the field.

But I’ll be skipping this tour.

Farming.

I’ve finished all my spring work. Although I am remembering now I’m supposed to plow up a couple fields and plant some corn as deer food plots for a neighbor. I kind of forgot about that. But the important fields, the ones that I’m trying to make money and survive on, they’re done.

I was hoping to finish soybeans last Tuesday, which is still two weeks later than all the neighbors, but… life.

It rained just enough on Tuesday that I had to quit. Once the dirt starts getting sticky, which only takes a couple of hundreds, it sticks to the gauge wheels on the planter. The gauge wheels control the depth of the seed, and sticking an extra half inch of dirt on the wheels changes the planting depth, and you’ve heard me say before, the depth is pretty critical. I  quit for a little while.

I spent most of Monday out working up all the ground, me and Bailey, and was a little bit sad to be done. Only because I enjoy my time in the tractor. The next morning I realized I had forgotten a field. So while it was a little bit too sticky to plant, it wasn’t too muddy to do fieldwork. Bailey and I got another hour of tractor time.

And then later on Tuesday I was able to go out again and I planted until 9:30 PM when it was again raining lightly and I was out of seed. I finished planting Friday afternoon. I started going over the fields with the drag, just like I did with the Oats, but the point of this is to smooth it out so that the combine header, when harvesting the soybeans, can ride as low as possible. Because soybeans pods will grow very low to the ground.

I had my last event at the college on Thursday evening. Tuesday will be my last day and I can haul out the garbage, and lock up cabinets, and take the rest of the summer off. So to speak.

The question was asked why my eggs are different colors. It’s different breeds. Some breeds of chickens lay white eggs, some brown eggs, and then there’s a couple breeds that lay the green eggs. I have Araucana’s.

Got the chicks outside and they’re enjoying that.

ORCHESTRAL ROCK MUSIC? DO THE STONES HAVE MOSS?

2025, gardening, home, Mysteries, Uncategorized

Take My Stuff…. Please

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The house next door has sold and my neighbors are moving out this weekend.  Just by chance, I was out front gardening on both the days that there was an open house, so I actually got to talk to quite a few folks who had walked through.  The question that almost everyone asked was how it was to live on my street, which is a busy thoroughfare – in fact, it’s a county road as opposed to a city street.

Everybody got the same answer.  I love living on my busy street – it’s easy to get to, easy to get out and around.  During the winter, my street is always clear; the plows start early and are consistent.  Even when side streets are still snowed in, we can always get out. 

The other great thing is that you can get rid of anything by just putting it down on the boulevard.  You don’t even have to put a “free” sign on it – if it’s on the boulevard, it’s fair game.  Two summers ago, the house across the street was almost gutted and their boulevard was like a second-hand store for three or four weeks.  I thought maybe there might be a traffic accident one day because so many people were pulling over to look and grab.  Over the years I’ve put out a lot of items and the only thing that never got taken was a mattress (which makes sense) – but the city took it on trash day anyway.

The surprise this week is that someone stopped during the day yesterday and took all the little logs and all but two of the bundles of sticks that YA and I had put on the boulevard after the first day of our “tree adventure”.   We didn’t put them out because we thought anybody would want them, but because that’s where they need to be for the city pick-up.  But, what the heck – if these little logs and bundles will make somebody’s life better – whoopee. 

Of course, I wonder why they didn’t take ALL the bundles.  Maybe they didn’t have room in the car?  Maybe they have just so much room back home to store the bundles?  Maybe there were two of them and they weren’t aligned on whether to take any of them?  Hopefully it didn’t start a fight.  I also wonder if they’ll come back at some point for the last two.  Or will somebody else take them?  Maybe I should just put out a table instead of schlepping things to Value Village and GoodWill?  I could call it Boulevard Freecycle?

Do you live on a busy or quiet street? Have you ever had a great garage sale?

2025, Baboon Achievers, Mysteries, Stories, Uncategorized, Words

To Be or Not To Be…

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We’re coming up on the 10th anniversary of the baboons taking over the Trail.  The math is pretty straightforward.  6 posts a week times 52 weeks a year times 10 years.  3120.  That’s not exact but close enough for horseshoes.

I think Renee and Ben would agree with me that the QUESTION is the hardest part of writing so many posts.  What question relates to what you just wrote?  How many times have we asked a similar question.  Will the question lead to some good discussion during the day?  Will it be too hard to answer?  Too personal to answer?  Too inane to answer?

Richard Feynman once said “I would rather have questions that can’t be answered than answers that can’t be questioned.”  That’s all fine and good for a world-renown physicist but he never had to come up with a good question every day!

So here’s your chance to beat Richard Feynman at his own game.

What question would YOU like to answer today?

2025, Business, Food, Mysteries

Postage-Less

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Yesterday I had to send off a package to my friend in Nashville.  She broke her ankle in two places while traveling in Italy and had surgery today (she came home for this).  Post-surgery she’s staying with her son who lives just a few miles from her.

I, of course, sent off a card immediately but wanted to do a bit more.  My friend has a soft spot for the Little Debbie Swiss Rolls and I’m sure her son won’t think to toss them into the shopping cart when he gets groceries.  So I got a couple of boxes, boxed them up and headed for the post office.

It was a little busy when I was there and it was surprising that there was a supervisor who kept coming out to say “thanks for your patience, we’ll be with you….”   I’ve never experienced that before.  Then I heard the postal worker next to mine say that they didn’t have any stamps.  I was sure I had heard that wrong, but my postal worker confirmed… no stamps.  She said that the manager who “unlocks” the stamps hadn’t come in yet.  I couldn’t help laughing, although I did try to suppress my giggles in case anybody else in line needed stamps. 

I couldn’t stop thinking about it and it reminded me of the gas shortage in the 1973 with the long lines.  And of course, it made me remember the toilet paper “crisis” at the beginning of covid.  But for some reason, the post office not having stamps strikes me as the weirdest.  Why does only one manager have the key?  Why hadn’t that manager come in; if not able, why hasn’t someone driven to his/her place to get the key?  I suppose I’ll never know.

What other shortages have you survived?  What strategies did you use?  Did snack cakes help?

2025, History, Mysteries, Technology, Uncategorized

Flying High

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Today is an aviation milestone day.  In 1927 Charles Lindbergh landed his Spirit of St. Louis plane in Paris after his 33½ hour solo flight across the Atlantic.  Then five years later on this day, Amelia Earhart landed near Londonderry, Northern Ireland after the first trans-Atlantic solo flight by a woman.  The combination of a little shorter route and five years of advancing technology, it only took her 17 hours. 

My first thought when I saw these two feats on the same day was that it was a concidence, but it was only a fleeting thought.  I’d bet money that Amelia planned her flight very carefully to arrive in Europe on May 21. 

It does make me think about explorers and adventurers who put their lives on the line because I don’t care how talented Lindbergh and Earhart were, they were absolutely taking their lives in their hands when they took off.  Aviation was still a relatively young science, machines broke down at an alarming rate and then there’s the whole “across the ocean” thing. 

Personally I’m not a daredevil.  The scariest things I’ve ever done were hot-air ballooning in Africa and zip lining in Costa Rica.  The balloon experience came available on a Fam trip (which is a trip that hotels/suppliers pay for in the hopes that travel industry folks will then sell their products); I just had a feeling that this would be a once-in-a-lifetime thing and I should get over my fears and do it.  It was fabulous.  The zipline was another matter.  It was done with a client, more or less under duress and I was terrified the whole time.  When we got to the part of the course where you didn’t zip, but swung on a rope from one platform to the next, the two guides had to come back for me and basically force me to swing by reminding me that there was no other way to get down than to finish the course.  Bungee jumping is not on my list, nor is sky-diving.  I simply cannot imagine myself stepping out into nothing.  Nope.

So congratulations today to the memories of Charles Lindbergh and Amelia Earhart for heading out across the Atlantic and taking that big step for aeronautics!

What’s the scariest thing you’ve ever done?  And did you do it on purpose?

2025, Family, home, Mysteries, Seasons, Technology

Mystery Theme

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In the past Renee has mentioned that she has post-it notes stuck around with ideas for the Trail.  This doesn’t work for me because if I’m out and about, by the time I get home to the post-it notes (of which I have many….), I’ve forgotten what I wanted to note.  Yep – seriously sad.  I remember that I thought of something but for the life of me, I can’t conjure it up when it’s time to write. 

To make up for this I use a post-it note app on my phone.  I have a bunch of separate notes and one of them is my Trail note.  You’d think this would solve my problem but….

Looked at the app three days ago and one of the entries is “first fire”.  That’s it.  Nothing else.  It took me the last three days to figure out it must have to do with YA making the first fire of the season in our fire pit last week.  Of course, it doesn’t explain WHY I put this note in the app.  There really wasn’t anything different about this fire except that it was the first one this year.  YA is still in charge of the fire.  She has a stash of newspaper and different piles of wood in the back corners of the yard – one for kindling sticks, one for larger sticks and one for logs.  She makes the fire, feeds the fire, pokes the fire with her special fire-poking stick. 

I’ve searched my memory and I can’t think of one single reason why you all have to read about our first fire.  So maybe it was something else?  A metaphor for our current world situation? 

What do you think I should be writing about with the theme of “first fire”?  How do you remind yourself of stuff?

2025, Business, Family, gardening, Mysteries

Weekend Dress Code

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Last week YA and I headed off to Bachmans for our veggies and flowers for hanging baskets.  This is an annual ritual and this year we needed flowers for 15 baskets and six bales (although I was pretty sure I would need a trip to Gertens for my favorite dragon wing begonias.

YA was ready sooner than I expected so I had to rush to get ready.  I grabbed a pair of khaki shorts that were sitting on my dresser and then my Pi Day shirt, which was at the top of the drawer. 

I hadn’t thought about this combination until a Bachman’s employee stopped me almost immediately upon entering the store, commenting that I looked like a staff person.  For those of you who weren’t there (or more likely just don’t remember), my Pi Day shirt is purple.  I laughed it off, but she wasn’t kidding.  Person after person tried to ask me a staff question. 

It wasn’t a big deal until the end of our trip.  As we were checking out, it turned out that my bright white petunias didn’t have a code to scan.  Telling the cashier they were bright white petunias didn’t help. She didn’t have a binder full of codes, she didn’t ask anyone else, she certainly didn’t believe YA and I when we said it was the same price as the royal purple petunias.  No – she sent me back to the flower barn to find one with a tag and code.  This week is NOT a good time to hold u p the line at Bachmans, so I was almost running when I headed back to the barn.  Two more people stopped me.  One woman realized immediately that it wasn’t a Bachman’s shirt and backed off.  The second woman felt the need to talk about my purple shirt and how she had mistaken me for staff.  It took me much longer than you would think to extricate myself from her and get back to the cashier.  The lines were pretty long and it was clear some folks weren’t happy.

So my lesson for the week?  Don’t wear purple to Bachmans!

Any businesses where you could make a credible staff person?

2025, books, Family, Mysteries, Travel, Uncategorized, work

Packing

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When I packed for the book festival, I went about it like usual.  I printed out my packing list (that I keep on the computer), filled it out and started to pack.  I was gone two and a half days (six hours of which was driving) and two nights.  Since I was wearing jeans and t-shirt to drive down, all I really needed was two t-shirts, two undies, two pairs of socks, pjs, a pair of zorries for relaxing at David’s and assorted personal hygiene stuff.

Obviously I didn’t need a big bag for this so I pulled a small bag from the attic and threw everything in.  15 minutes from beginning to end.  Except then the conversation started:

YA: Are you taking that bag?
VS:  Yep.
YA:  What are  you taking (picking up the packing list and perusing it).
YA:  No extra socks or underwear?
VS:  Nope.
YA:  What two t-shirts?
VS:  The coral t-shirt with books on it and the black rocket sheep for breakfast with the boys
YA:  Nothing else?
VS:  Nope.
YA:  What if you decide you want a different shirt?
VS:  Then I’ll suffer from my poor choices.l
YA:  What about shoes?
VS:  My blue tennies.
YA:  No other shoes?
VS:  Not for 48 hours.
YA:  (sighs and walks away)

When I was traveling for work, I packed a little more robustly.  Having an extra shirt or pair of socks can’t hurt when you’re on a business trip, but I’ve always been a fairly minimal packer.  YA is completely opposite.  She packs her work uniforms then at least one full non-work outfit for each day.  Multiple pairs of shoes.   For a couple of years she used that cube system, in which you packed all your stuff into individual cube/cases and then put the cube/cases into your bigger suitcase.  Personally I never thought this was a big help to the packing process, but to each their own.  She got the cases free from work; they were popular as pre-travel gifts a few  years ago and there were always extras laying around.  I haven’t seen her using those the last year.

My packing strategy worked out perfectly.  When I got home from the festival, all I had to do was dump the contents of the bag straight into the clothes hamper.  Hygiene stuff all lives in one zipper pouch together so that’s easy to put away as well.  Two minutes to unpack.

I’m pretty sure I packed and unpacked in less time than it took to talk to YA about it!

What about you?  Over-pack or under-pack?  Do you have a “process”?

2025, books, Business, History, Mysteries, Uncategorized

Where in the World Was VS?

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Turns out that Renee and I were both out of town last weekend.   Any ideas where I was?

  • This town was established in 1848 and was initially named Bad Axe. (There is still a Bad Axe Music Store in town.)
  • A Masonic lodge and theatre was rebuilt in 1922 (after a fire) and was a hub of the community for decades. In 1995, after being shut for several years, it was purchased and the theatre was subsequently remodeled with monies raised by the Historical Society and the surrounding community.
  • 40 years ago, a one-room Waldorf schoolhouse was established in town. It is still operating with 125 students, grades kindergarten to 8th
  • This is the home of one of the earliest organic dairy companies, cooperatively owned and managed, opened in 1988.
  • In 2012 a guy named Randy moved to the area, built himself a cabin and then built himself a wood burning stove. Folks started asking him to build stoves for them and within a couple of years he founded a company for wood heating solutions which has been a runaway success.
  • This is the smallest town in America that hosts a book festival.

Any thoughts?

 

2025, home, Mysteries, Uncategorized, Weather

Warm & Fuzzy

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Three weeks ago while I was folding up clean laundry I discovered that one of my green fuzzy socks was missing.  I’m pretty thorough about shaking out clothing to make sure socks are hiding but even after checking the usual suspects, I didn’t find it.  The remaining green sock went to live in the “single sock box”; it was the only inhabitant. 

On Saturday as I was getting ready for the day, I noticed the poor lonely green sock – usually if I don’t find a sock within three weeks, I never do and I was lamenting the loss the green sock.  I love all my various fuzzy socks.

Five minutes later, as I pulled clean sheets out of the closet, the errant green sock cascaded out of the fitted sheet.  I hadn’t found it because I cycle through my flannel sheets and had not pulled this set out since the sock had gone missing.  As I was happily re-joining the fuzzy pair I pondered the coincidence that I hadn’t thought about the missing sock for three weeks until just a few minutes before it returned to me.  Part of brain says “coincidence”.  Another part of my insists (fairly adamantly) that it has to be some weird confluence of the universe.  I can’t imagine why the universe would care about my socks.

How long do you keep a solo item that is missing its mate?  Where do you keep them?