Echoes From the Loafers’ Club Meeting

"You look good. How old are you?"

"I don't know."

"You don't know how old you are?"

"I used to, but I think I'm older than that now."

Driving by the Bruces

I have two wonderful neighbors — both named Bruce — who live across the road from each other. Whenever I pass their driveways, thoughts occur to me, such as: patience is evident in each car going the speed limit.

I’ve learned

• If I want time alone, I should be punctual.

• Cameras in cellphones keep UFOs away.

• Cross country is a sport that is punishment for athletes in other sports.

I fall for it every year

The Christmas catalogs begin piling up. I can't turn around without a gardener showing me tomatoes, eggplants, or zucchini that they claim looks just like Richard Nixon. I rejoice in a time of the year that is too late to mow and too early to rake.

I need to summon my minions

My wife, The Queen B, and I ate at Dino’s Pizza in North Mankato. The pizza was good and the server friendly. I noticed a menu item for pizza for 300 offering 75 18-inch pizzas plus 75 pitchers of soda for only $1999.

I call it work

"So, what work do you do, then?" asked the man from Nebraska.

"I’m a writer and a storyteller," I said as proudly as a Minnesotan can say anything about himself.

"I worked in the blistering hot foundry. I mixed sand with clay and water to make sand molds. It was backbreaking work. So, what work do you do then?"

Customer comments

• Mark Christenson of Minneapolis sends this, "Never hold a grudge. If you do, you are allowing someone you don't like to live in your head rent free."

• We were talking about such things as the fair’s deep-fried butter on a stick and the habit many have of salting everything. Jack Moon of Kiester said that he has gotten to the point where he puts salt only on his food.

• I spoke at a reunion for the Albert Lea High School class of 1948. Wonderful people. They talked a bit about future reunions. One member of the class asked, "Is there money in the budget to get bigger nametags with larger print?"

• Andy Offutt Irwin of Covington, Ga. was on his way to a speaking engagement in Arkansas. He set his GPS for the city of Russell. The GPS took him there without a hitch. There was only one problem. His speaking engagement was in Russellville, not Russell. The two cities are 110 miles apart.

• Dan Bagley of Nevada, Iowa went to high school in Nebraska. After the graduation ceremony, the graduates were told that they had two hours to vacate the premises or be arrested.

• Ric McArthur of Morpeth, Ontario wrote, "Met up with a friend who I hadn't seen in several months. He gave me the best compliment I've had in years. He said: 'If I didn't know you already, I would look forward to meeting you.'"

• Bob Johnson of almost everywhere sent this, "I changed the voice on my GPS to a British man’s, because the lady giving directions sounded too much like my ex-wife."

• Alice Zacherle of Napa, Calif. said that there are so many fat-free foods available today, that she wonders where all the fat went.

• Grant Olson from Seed Savers in Decorah told me that he and his bride honeymooned in Quebec. There they enjoyed maple syrup pie and poutine. Poutine is a Canadian dish, made with french fries topped with brown gravy and cheese curds. It’s health food, but it might not be good health food.

• Anne McArthur of Morpeth, Ontario asked why pirates are called pirates. Her answer was, "They just arrrr!"

Nature notes

Janice Van Wilgen of Hollandale sent me a photo of a baldheaded cardinal and wondered what was going on. I see cardinals and blue jays in this condition each summer. Having a bad feather day makes the birds look like tiny vultures or reptiles. As a boy, I was told that mites--possibly disease or diet, caused such a condition. Nobody ever mentioned stress. I believe there is another reason for the odd look. An abnormal molt occurs on some birds that causes them to lose their head feathers simultaneously. Most examinations of the birds in this circumstance show no mites or disease, but there will be more research. The feathers grow back so there is no need to start a Hair Club for Cardinals. I can't address what impact baldness might have on a bird’s self-esteem.

Meeting adjourned

Kind acts improve with practice.

‘FAR AWAY’ – Continued from last week’s column (after we found this page stuck to the back of a Post-it®)

The Three Wyoming Brothers were there (the Big Horn Lodge near Sheridan, Wyo.) as usual. They fly a skunk(ed) flag until getting an elk. Dan, Frank and Fred all say the same thing at the end of each season: “One year closer to getting an elk!”

Thanks, Clay, for letting Genie and I enjoy a fire at your fire ring with Tiki torches. It must really be enjoyable in the winter with the three six-foot surrounding snowbanks.

After Labor Day until the end of October, there are two kinds of tourist travelers: newlwyeds and nearly deads.

Remember, readers, this article is either fact or fiction – you decide!

And now, this week’s column.

09-11-13: Back late from the mountains.

09-12-13: Catch up on mail, e-mail and phone calls.

09-13-13: Catch up on mail, e-mail and phone calls.

09-14-13: Thrivent Financial luncheon meeting at the Fairlane Building in Albert Lea.

09-15-13: Church – rest.

09-16-13: : Catch up on mail, e-mail and phone calls.

09-16-13: Do “Fact or Fiction” column.

09-17-13: Teeth cleaned.

09-17-13: Jim Martin funeral at Central Freeborn Lutheran Church.

09-18-13: Skin cancer burned off.

09-19-13: Steve Dulitz funeral at Central Freeborn Lutheran Church.

09-19-13: To Mason City to purchase 50th Anniversary items for our 50th party on 9-28-13.

09-20-13: Set up L.A.M.P. (Lutheran Association of Missionaries and Pilots) display that I’m manning at Grace Lutheran Church in Albert Lea for the ELCA Ladies of Southeastern Minnesota convention. Genie is the outgoing Vice President of all those great Lutheran ladies.

09-21-13: Manned above display at Grace Lutheran Church.

09-21-13: To Naeve Health Care Foundation 50th Anniversary Gala Ball at Wedgewood Cove in Albert Lea. As Naeve Hospital Auxiliary members Genie and I danced the night away.

09-22-13: Church – rest.

09-23-13: Complete setting up arrangements for “Christmas By the Lake” bus trip Saturday, Dec. 7, 2013. Complete setting up arrangements for bus trip to “Church Basement Ladies” Sunday, June 22, 2014.

09-24-13: Retired Senior Volunteer Program Appreciation Picnic at Edgewater Park in Albert Lea.

09-24-13: Finish “Fact or Fiction” column you’re now reading.

In reviewing the above hectic two-week schedule, the words of Katie (Genie’s Danish grandmother) ring very true: “No rest for the wicked, and the righteous don’t need it.”

Just before leaving on our annual one-week stay in the Big Horn Mountains, the staph infection came back. A quick visit to Dr. Kelley and I think it has cleared up. Dr. Kelley prescribed a stronger medication – plus a shot of moral support. Just as I was leaving, she told me to stand up to get my shot of moral medication. She held her arms out and gave me a big hug from a little lady. Dr. Lynn Kelley, I don’t know where God got the mold for you from, but I do know the result is divine.

If you attend an event where there are names drawn for prizes, you listen really close and you will hear the last name of Spooner called if either Kathy or Duane are present. How do I know this to be true? I’ve been present at three consecutive events where the name drawn has been Spooner.

Did you know Bev Janke is a faithful reader of this column?

Thanks to Jim Martin for all the conversations we’ve had over the years. You always had a no-hurry way about you – thus it was always more than, “Hi, how are you?”

Thanks, Steve Dulitz, for the many conversations about hunting and fishing. You helped me prove that two Navy veterans can carry on a clean conversation. Yes, Steve, you were, and as you said, “I’ll be fine.”

The Lutheran Ladies are very nice – their outgoing Vice President gave me a hug and even invited me to go dancing with her –so I did!

———

Bob is a retired AAL (Aid Association for Lutherans) agent, currently working on his master’s degree in Volunteering. His wife, Genie, is a retired RN, currently working on her doctor’s degree in Volunteering. They have two children, Deb in North Carolina, and Dan in Vermont. Bob says if you enjoy his column, let him know. If you don’t enjoy it, keep on reading, it can get worse. Words of wisdom: There is always room for God.

When we become parents, we sign a letter of intent to embarrass our children every opportunity that arises. I’ve been fulfilling that agreement to an extreme.

See, I get distraught when I see a sign in a business that has a grammatical mistake. I can’t help it; I’m an English major! It doesn’t help that I read a book called The Great Typo Hunt about two friends who crossed the country, correcting mistakes on signs, sometimes whether the store owner wanted them to or not!

Inspired by that, I’ve taken it upon myself to point out these mistakes to businesses whenever I see them, even if my wife or kids are with me. One of my pet peeves is the misuse of words on bathrooms. Okay, if you have one man, it’s man. If you have more than one, it’s men. The same goes for woman: one is a woman; more than one is women.

Thus, if you want to show possession of the bathroom, you need an apostrophe. If women possess the bathroom, it’s the women’s room. If men possess the bathroom, it’s the men’s room. Yet over and over, I see womens and mens rooms.

Naturally, I take it on myself to tell the proprietors or managers that there are no such words as womens or mens. Half of them look at me quizzically; the other half give me the same look your average teenager does when you suggest they change a bad habit.

If you visit the Target dressing rooms in Owatonna, the Kohl’s bathrooms in Owatonna, or the Perkins restrooms in Austin, you will find these mistakes. I even saw it at Crazy Horse National Monument when we visited South Dakota a couple of years ago! At least there when I mentioned it to an employee, she said, “I know. I used to be a college professor, but they won’t even listen to me!”

Michelle works at a sign company. She’s very good with grammar (one of the many reasons I was attracted to her!), but occasionally she will send me the wording of a sign to make sure it’s correct. I remember at least one time when she told the owner who wanted the sign that she had to change the punctuation, and he demanded she leave it as it was. She tried to explain why it was wrong, but you know the saying: the customer is always right! Except when they’re really, really wrong!

I’m being really careful as I type this since I’ve noticed many apostrophes in my writing, especially in the use of “it’s.” Here’s another mistake I see all over. It’s really pretty simple. If you can insert “it is,” you use an apostrophe. If it’s possessive, you do not use an apostrophe.

It’s ironic that as I started typing this column, I also started a chat with my old colleague, Heather Carlson. She knows one of my teeth-gritting apostrophe items well. It has to do with Christmas cards. If you’re reading this in October, there is plenty of advance warning to make sure you get it right this year! (If you don’t, don’t worry. We’ll still hang up your card!)

When people sign their Christmas cards, they like to include the family name. Since there is usually more than one person in the family, they will write the plural version. For instance, we will sign ours “The Domeiers.”

And here’s the rub. People sometimes get crazy with their apostrophes. Perish forbid they use them in “it’s” or “women’s,” but you’ll see more often than not a Christmas card signed with an apostrophe in the last name. Here’s something you will never see: “The Domeier’s.” That would indicate there’s only one Domeier, and that this person owns something that hasn’t been named.  Plus, this person thinks so highly of him/herself that the article “The” is used, as if this person is the only one!

Don’t feel like you have to put an apostrophe after your plural last name either. You’re still not owning anything. You’re simply a plural entity. “The Domeiers” is just fine (unless you’re not a Domeier, in which case you should put your own last name!).

Wow, can you tell I’ve been correcting essays and papers? I’ve got punctuation on the brain. Enough for now; class is dismissed!

Word of the Week: This week’s word is orthography, which means the practice of spelling correctly, as in, “The teacher demanded his students use orthography, meaning they had to spell the pronoun you as more than one letter.” Impress your friends and confuse your enemies!

The scurs pegged the rainfall about right as well as the nice days following. Will our good fortune continue or are we destined for a wet October? Starting Wednesday, mostly sunny becoming mostly cloudy with a moderate chance of an evening shower or thunderstorm. Highs in the upper 70s and lows in the upper 50s. Thursday, mostly cloudy with a good chance of showers or a passing thunderstorm. Highs in the mid 60s and lows in the low 50s. Mostly cloudy for Friday with a good chance of continued showers. Highs in the low 60s and lows in the lower 40s. Saturday, partly cloudy with a slight chance of a lingering morning shower. Cooler with highs in the upper 50s with a low around 40. Mostly sunny on Sunday with highs in the low 60s and a low near 35. Mostly sunny on Monday with highs in the mid 60s and lows in the low 40s. Partly cloudy for Tuesday with highs in the upper 60s and lows in the low 40s. The normal high for October 5th is 65 and the normal low is 41, about the same as we see in late April or early May. We continue losing daylight at nearly 3 minutes per day, however. The scurs will be readying their Hobo Stew recipe for the chilly evenings ahead.

Crops made some major changes as warm temperatures and sunshine prevailed for much of this past week. Much of the corn planted in mid-May has black layered and even some of that planted the third week in June will make corn of one sort or another. Soybeans also made tremendous strides towards getting away from frost danger, although in some cases the maturity was brought on prematurely by lack of treatment for soybean aphids. This week should see some harvest activity in both crops, barring an off the wall weather event. Rainfall for the month of September totaled 1.69” at the ranch and about 1.45” in town at the Mall for Men. While it hasn’t recharged the soils as of this writing, several forecasts point to more rain and generally cooler temps. Along with the shortening days it should help replace some of what we used up in the upper several feet. The pastures and lawns are definitely showing the effects.

Alas it appears we may have seen the last of the hummingbirds at the ranch over the weekend. That’s O.K.; we saw our first one on the 13th of May. In 2012 our last sighting was September 21st. A former pygmy goat farmer claimed he still had hummingbirds as of Tuesday morning.  During the cold rain on Saturday the 28th, I spied one still working over the nectar feeder that hadn’t been emptied by the wind so I refilled the other one just in case. Sunday they were not in evidence so that may or may not have been a waste of time. There still may be a straggler or two and, contrary to some folklore, leaving the feeders out won’t keep them here until they starve or freeze to death. Just looking at the flowers around the yard one can tell they’re starting to wane a little and the hummers can tell that too. One look at the little hand grenade shaped seeds littering the ground under the 4 o’clocks is a clue. There are still some white-lined sphinx moths working the remaining blooms over though. Unfortunately for them, they can’t hitch a ride on the hummingbirds riding on the Canada geese’s backs. Would I lie to you?

Millipedes have been common in the garage at the ranch thus far this fall. While they really don’t hurt anything they crawl all over the place and have an unpleasant odor to them when they’re crushed. Household fly spray is largely ineffective and some of the insecticides tend to be more toxic than what I want to spray in an attached garage. Eliminating leaves around the building as well as sealing up areas where they can get in is probably the best option.  Also noted while working in the garden over the weekend was the appearance of numerous ladybugs. With much of their food source largely gone in both the corn and soybeans, they’re looking for alternatives to survive on before looking for a place to hole up for the winter. There may be more than what we saw last year due to the number of soybean fields not sprayed mentioned above. Like rats and carp, they are survivors.

The garden has continued to bless us with an abundance of produce not only to eat but to share. The tomatoes perhaps could’ve done better as they have had a tendency to develop blossom end rot. We are not alone in that department. Probably the most gratifying surprise has been the fall snap pea crop. The vines are as healthy as any we’ve ever had and while not yielding perhaps as well as a spring crop, have produced more than we could eat hence the sharing. The emergence of the last seeding of lettuce was spotty but with the warm temps and a little more rain, it’ll be ready for consumption soon. The spring-type radishes are starting to produce just as we’re about to finish the last of the late summer planting. And the winter radishes have been a good. A little like playing Russian roulette perhaps as some are displaying firepower but tasty nonetheless.

Ruby and Fudgie displayed some of their athletic prowess the other night. Seems a stray kitty had decided it was a good time to perch on the gas grill outside the garage. Before bedtime, it’s routine to let the doggies out for their last potty of the night. No sooner was the door open and the chase was on. The panic from the cat upon seeing two red and white rockets in hot pursuit made for a good laugh. Canines and felines behaving normally as they disappeared around the corner into the night. Had to be impressed with Fudgie’s wheels for a 10-year-old Border Collie. Like me, for an old-timer she’s still got it.

See you next week…real good then.

Ellendale City Council

By SCOTT GROTH

Contributing Writer

The Ellendale City Council met Thursday, September 26, with Mayor Swearingen and all Council members present. Also at the meeting were LeeAnn Hojberg, assistant city clerk; Pete Paulson, Municipal Liquor Store Manager; and Dan Nelson, Mid-Continent Cable.

During the assistant clerk’s report, Hojberg proposed to Council members the new office hours for the city. These hours would be temporary for now. Starting October 2, 2013, office hours would be Wednesdays from 5:30-6:30 p.m. and Saturdays from 9-10:30 a.m. Residents may also call and leave a message at (507) 684-2681. Also posted on the office door are some emergency numbers. The office hours will be temporary until the city clerk position is filled.

For the second day in a row, NRHEG High School was in a hard lockdown Wednesday. The measures were taken in response to a threatening message written on the wall of a girls’ bathroom. The lockdown began at approximately 11:15 a.m. and was still in effect as of 1:30.

At approximately 1:45, the school went into a soft lockdown, which was lifted before school dismissed at the usual time. Buses were to run as scheduled.

NRHEG Superintendent Dr. Dennis Goodwin issued the following statement on the school’s Web site Wednesday afternoon: “The NRHEG Secondary Building is responding to a comment that was written on a bathroom wall. Law enforcement is at the school interviewing individuals. The students are currently safe and secured in classrooms.”

New Richland Police Chief Scott Eads issued the following press release Tuesday afternoon:

On this date at approximately 1:30 p.m. a patrolman with the New Richland Police Department stopped a vehicle approximately 1/2 mile south of New Richland on State Highway 13. Immediately after the stop the party fled on foot into a cornfield to the west of the stop location. It was learned afterwards that the party had a felony warrant for failure to appear for sentencing for possession of burglary tools. Members of the New Richland Police Department were assisted by deputies from the Waseca County Sheriff’s Office and troopers from the Minnesota State Patrol setting up a perimeter of thearea.  The Minnesota State Patrol also provided a helicopter to assist with the search.

Celebrating the life of Winn Ann Simser, age 73 of Fairmont, MN, formerly of New Richland, MN.  Winn Ann passed away at home surrounded by her family after a long and courageous battle with cancer on Monday, September 30, 2013. 

Services will be held Thursday October 3, 2013, at 10:30 a.m. at St. John Vianney Catholic Church in Fairmont. Visitation will be from 4-7:30 p.m. Wednesday October 2, 2013, at Lakeview Funeral Home in Fairmont and will continue one hour prior to the service Thursday at St. John Vianney Church. Interment will be at Ft. Snelling National Cemetery.

Remembering the life of Leone Peterson…

Funeral Services for Leone Peterson, of Otisco, MN, will be held at 2 p.m. on Friday, October 4, 2013 at St. Peter Lutheran Church, Otisco. Pastor Scott Williams will officiate.

Interment will be in St. Peter’s Cemetery. There will be no visitation. Friedrich Funeral Home, New Richland is assisting the family with arrangements.

Leone died on Saturday, September 28, 2013 at St. Mary’s Hospital in Rochester. She was 85.

Leone was born on January 8, 1928, in Nishnabotny Township, Iowa, the daughter of William and Meta (Schroeder) Hein. Her family moved to the Otisco area when she was a young girl.

Leone married Arthur J. Byrne on August 28, 1946 at the Meriden Lutheran Church.

NR Council turns down offer for old library

By JIM LUTGENS

Editor/Publisher

After opting to close the meeting and discuss the issue among themselves, the New Richland City Council came back with a unanimous decision on what to do with the old NR Library building.

They're going to wait.

Near the end of Monday's regular meeting at NR City Hall, a full council and Mayor Christine Gislason met for approximately 10 minutes in closed session to consider an offer made to purchase the building, which many community members hoped would be donated to the NR Area Food Shelf.

"At this time, we're going to wait for further offers," said Gislason as the meeting was reconvened and then adjourned.

It was the final item of the evening in what turned out to be a rather lively agenda.