Whitney McCamish, above right, and Wyatt Fitterer, below center, were crowned NRHEG High School Snow Week queen and king Monday, Feb. 1 in the high school gymnasium in New Richland. (Star Eagle photos by Jessica Lutgens)

Lady Panthers improve to 14-4 overall, 5-2 in conference

OFF AND RUNNING — Maddie Wagner (1) leads a fast break as teammates Marnie Wagner, Kayley Camerer Besty Schoenrock and several Bethlehem Academy defenders trail the play at New Richland Friday, Jan. 22. (Star Eagle photo by Chris Schlaak)

By JIM LUTGENS

Editor/Publisher

When the NRHEG girls’ basketball team is able to open up the game and run, opponents have problems.

Just ask Blue Earth Area and Bethlehem Academy.

They were the latest to go down last week as the Panthers improved to 14-4 overall and 5-2 in the Gopher Conference.

NRHEG 53, Blue Earth Area 40

“We were able to get out and run on them in the first half,” said NRHEG coach Onika Peterson, whose team sprinted to a 26-15 halftime advantage at Blue Earth Tuesday, Jan. 19. “We crashed well on the defensive boards, looking up the floor to advance the ball.

After a slow start to the second half, allowing the Bucs to cut the lead to two, the Panthers took control.

By JIM LUTGENS

Editor/Publisher

The competition was tough and the NRHEG wrestlers were a bit off their game Saturday in the Bob Swalla Duals at Kasson-Mantorville.

It resulted in a bit of a long day.

The Panthers dropped two of three dual meets and finished 10th among 11 teams.

“We wrestled a little inconsistently,” said NRHEG coach Shawn Larson.

The Panthers lost the opener 52-18 to Caledonia, bouncing back in the second round to defeat Menomonie, Wis., 49-23. They then fell 52-18 to Lewiston-Altura/Rushford-Peterson.

By JIM LUTGENS

Editor/Publisher

The NRHEG boys’ basketball team faced a few foes it was supposed to beat last week.

Everything went as planned.

The Panthers improved to 13-6 in toppling JWP 69-57 at New Richland Monday, Jan. 18, downing Blue Earth Area at home Tuesday, and prevailing 75-54 at Bethlehem Academy Friday. They stretched their winning streak to five straight.

NRHEG 69, JWP 57

It was close for the first 12 minutes, but the Panthers broke a 21-all tie with a 10-point run and went into halftime leading 40-27.

There are times in the winter when I look back to my youth and remember the little things that used to fascinate me; things as simple as rabbit tracks in the snow or watching the birds of winter foraging for food. My yard today is full of tracks from rabbits, squirrels and even birds which can be seen pecking away at the fallen snow in search of food.

All of these signs are made even more nostalgic when I am seeing them on a clear, calm, moonlit night. As a kid I always found something magical about playing outside in the moonlight, especially in the winter. Sledding at night on my neighbor Roger’s hill was always fun and it usually seemed to turn into another great adventure of some kind. As kids, our houses never had much for outside lights, except for a small yard light we used as a way of finding our way home. We didn’t really need a lot of light because the moonlight shining on the snow lit up the whole outdoors and gave a real meaning to the phrase “winter wonderland.”

To this day I still find a sort of tranquility when outside on a winter’s night with the moonlight reflecting off the snow. I guess there will always be a part of me that refuses to give up that feeling I had as a kid. There are certain things I see or hear, like an old song, that bring me back to those carefree days of youth.

At times it seems like only yesterday when as a kid I never seemed to have a care in the world and about all a kid thought about was what kind of fun adventure he could come up with next. We neighborhood kids were pretty creative, especially when it came to sledding. There was one time when one of us must have seen one of those RKO newsreels at the movies that showed bobsledding at the Olympics. We decided to make our own sled run at Roger’s hill and we worked feverishly for the next week or so watering and grooming this run for our Radio Flyer sleds to zoom down.

Once finished, that sled course was almost totally glare ice and a real thing of beauty in our eyes. The speeds we could get up to were almost scary, but alas, all good things must come to an end. On one of those bright moonlit nights when we were sledding down that course, Kenny, one of our friends, wiped out and another sled was too close behind him and smashed into him putting a deep gash in his cheek that required stitches. This is when the neighborhood moms declared the course unsafe and made us destroy it. Looking back, it seems like most of the fun stuff we did was always a little dangerous, but what was wrong with speeding down a sled run made of glare ice with only moonlight to guide us?

I still have my old sled hanging on the wall in the garage along with my Red Ryder BB gun with the broken stock that no longer shoots. You might wonder why I still keep those things around, and I really have no practical answer other than the fact I can look at them, hold them once in a while and go back, if only for a fleeting moment, to those carefree days of youth.

I have a small tree in my front yard that needs to be pruned and I was curious as to when the best time is to do that. Well, lo and behold, I was looking at the DNR Web site the other day and found an answer to all my pruning questions.

Winter is the best time to prune trees to keep them healthy and protect them from disease, according to the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources. 

“Pruning trees when they are dormant is a way to protect them from diseases such as oak wilt or Dutch elm disease that are active during the growing season,” said Jennifer Teegarden, DNR forestry outreach specialist. “Also, it is easier to see which branches to remove when there are no leaves on a tree.”

Additionally, pruning in winter allows the tree to begin sealing the wound immediately at the start of the growing season. This decreases the amount of sap flow and provides a longer healing period.

Trees should be pruned when they are young because: Small branches create small wounds that will heal quickly. Defective branches are easier to spot on smaller trees. Most branches can be reached while keeping both feet on the ground.

Visit the Web site  www.mndnr.gov/treecare/caring-pruning.html for information on best pruning practices, step-by-step instructions and to watch videos on how to prune trees.

Common pruning mistakes include cutting branches flush to the trunk, leaving a branch stub and nicking and ripping the tree’s bark.

All of these situations lead to rot inside the tree and are likely to create a hazardous tree that is costly to remove.

Teegarden recommends hiring a certified arborist to prune trees for both safety and a tree’s health. Professional tree experts are trained to use best pruning practices that will keep trees healthy and looking good. Arborists can identify branches that have problems and ones that could be a future hazard.

A little investment into trees when they’re young can lead to beautiful trees that help cool homes in the summer, block them from winter winds and add character and property value.

Until next time, enjoy the outdoor rinks, sledding and fishing our area lakes but always be careful when you do decide to venture out because no ice is ever 100 percent safe.  

Please remember to keep our troops in your thoughts and prayers, n not only during the holiday season but for the rest of the year. They are the reason that we are able to enjoy all the freedoms that we have today.

As the door greeter at the Central Freeborn Lutheran Church on Sundays, some mornings are really cold. On one of those negative-temperature Sunday mornings, I decided to conduct a survey of the males over 20 years of age as they entered the church. My survey question was, “What do you like about long johns?”

Many times, the answer was, “They are really good with a hot cup of coffee and a donut, especially those with a filling like those you can get at Nancy Jane’s Bakery in New Richland.” Other answers were, “They’re for wimps,” or “Only at a home Vikings football game are they O.K.”

Of all the males surveyed, only two were presently wearing the full-body long johns undergarment (I was one of the two).

You can purchase a full or half (up to the waist) pair of long johns. The reason they are called long johns (plural) – because of two legs (per Webster’s Dictionary). The long johns’ usual colors are red, white, gray, blaze orange or camouflage.

I have a pair of camouflage for bow or blaze orange for rifle to wear if it is very cold during deer hunting. At the same time, I carry two red corncobs and one white one. The white one is to see if I need another red one or not.

When it is very cold, and I’m not deer hunting, I have a red pair with a flap on the backside that I unbutton if needed. The red one is of the old design of about 50 years ago with a hero sewn on the front chest. Mine has Superman.

To get a visual of the old design, I suggest you stop in at Dad’s Good Stuff in New Richland. Wayne has a pair of old red long johns with Roy Rogers sewn on the front. Stop in only on a warm day, as otherwise he might be wearing them.

Trivia question: How many buttons on the flap in the back of an old pair of red long johns? (Answer at the end of this column.)

Things you should know this time of the year:

1. A continuous small stream of water will help keep your inside water pipes from freezing.

2. A wet tongue needs no glue to attach itself to an outdoor piece of metal.

3. The year is 2016.

4. The groundhog will decide the rest of winter on February 2.

5. February has 29 days this year.

6. As of January 23, I’m in practice for a year to become a full-fledged octogenarian.

7. The answer is none. The flap has only button holes.

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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.

We always look forward to seeing what new little girl or boy is the one to welcome in a new year. Sad that we can’t offer a better atmosphere and environment for them to grow up in.

In Dakota this year a pair of twins were born. One was born on each side of the clock, so one has a 2015 birth date and the other a 2016 birth date. How nice that each one has their own birthday. I wonder how many times they’ll argue that one is older, or younger than the other. Or that they should respect their elders.

Not to be outdone, January 1 is the birthday of my nephew, Kade’s, triplets. Yes, his love bird’s eggs hatched on the first day of the new year. It was almost as exciting as the real thing. What a miracle of birth they are.

How can all that bird come out of a little egg? We talk about how fast our children and grandchildren grow. These new little ones are far from beautiful with their naked little bodies, but it is beautiful how the parents take care of them. One parent will take up food to feed the little ones. First they chew it, then deposit it in the mouth of the other parent, who then feeds those hungry little baby birds.

Thank God for parents who love their children and care for them with tender loving kindness. I won’t say, but only pray for those who mistreat their young. How can they do that? Because they are bigger or stronger and can take advantage of these precious children? I wish there were an answer.

On to another topic. My mother and I finished the puzzle. It was a doozy. When we looked at the difficulty it would entail we had a strong thought to put it all back in the box.  But we didn’t. It sat there for a long time with some days only a piece or two added to the total picture.

Isn’t that a little like our commitment to the cancer cure? Looking at it, it seems impossible, but when we take one piece at a time, bit by bit, it comes together.

We can’t give up no matter how hard and hopeless it may look.  Some days there is little or no progress, just like the puzzle, and some days there is a lot. Hopefully some day we will see a great picture.

Now if I could just tackle my computer problems the same way. When it works for me it is wonderful, but when it doesn’t it is complete frustration. Try writing a story for the paper and losing it three times. Yes, three times. But I kept working on it. Sorry to say, it never comes out the same way the second, or even the third time around.

We need to keep working at it and never give up.

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Some of our Star Eagle readers have commented that they like to read about events such as family and school reunions, birthdays and anniversaries, and birth and wedding announcements. In order to read about these important things we need our faithful readers to pass along the information to us.

Also, if you have an idea for a story that you think would be of interest to our readers, please contact me.

If you have birthdays and anniversaries you would like to include, or news to share, please contact me via  e-mail, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it., by postal mail, P.O. Box 192, Geneva, MN 56035; or telephone, 507-256-4405.

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Birthdays and anniversaries:

• Thursday, January 28th: Brian Brekke, Kevin Stieglbauer, Kalei Wilson, Caleb Brocker, Ruth Paulson, Denise McGowan, Rachel Schei, Lona Berg

• Friday, January 29th: Molly Jo Wayne, her 8th, Jalen Aaseth, Rick Seath, Andrea (Hanson) Carter, George Dettman, his 86th, Kim (Harpel) Johnson, Zenobia Haberman, Stephanie Jensen

• Saturday, January 30th: Allison Grunwald, Renae Wallace, Trudy Nelson, Cody Boverhuis, Dennis Jensen, Jeanette Fetterly, Michael Robinson, Scott Morreim, Wally Wobschall, Missy (Wayne) & Sean Engel, their 7th, Paul & Diane Stollard

• Sunday, January 31st: Ethan River Thompson, his 11th; Avery Routh, her 11th; Dana Jensen, Jim Worrell, Keith Hagen, Sue Richards, David Skroch, Jim & Lois Plunkett

• Monday, February 1st: Madeline Anne Marlin (2012), Grayson Joseph Bickler, his 8th; Richard Grunwald, Brad Hagen, Tom Olson, Shelly Wencl, Sam & Sharon Peterson, Darrin & Michelle Hanson

• Tuesday, February 2nd: Kia Jayann Buendorf, her 8th; Matt Davis, Addie Farr, Joey Farr, Michael Farr, Butch Otteson, John Fornberg, Robert Hanson, Jim Motz, Karri Bangert, Lillie Fenney

• Wednesday, February 3rd: Avery Jean Blouin, 2014; Bowen Gregory Jensen, his 10th; Lily Neitzel, Julie Hanson, David Johnson, Sherry Misgen, Tara (Stollard) Richards, Francene Pittman, Jeremy Hanson

• Thursday, February 4th: Aaron Duane Bauers, Tyler Cerney, Tyler Sorenson (1994), Waylen Busho Jr., Billy Glynn, David Newgard, Roy Jensen, John Lent

• Friday, February 5th: Crystal Simonson, Blanche Kasper, Darrell Howell, Randy Reese, Ericka Johnson, Kylee Jace Wilson, Wesley Schoenrock

• Saturday, February 6th: Jean Klocek, Carolyn Hanson, Dean Jensen, David Kelly, Martin Bartness, Colleen Borchert, Troy Haddy, Jean Clausen, Sonja Thompson, Megan Stephoni, Todd Nelson, Brooke Burns, Kay Swenson

May your special day be a happy memory and tomorrow a bright new promise.

Echoes From the Loafers’ Club Meeting

This year, I’ve resolved to be kinder and to stop lying.

What do you lie about?

About being kinder.

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: What does this mean? YYUR YYUB ICUR YY4Me. Too wise you are. Too wise you be. I see you are too wise for me. What do you call a Chihuahua in the winter? A chili dog. People who refuse to drive in a roundabout are out of the loop.

The cafe chronicles

Everything is followed by a cold spell. It’s winter, but my appetite refuses to adopt winter hours.

The waitress asked if I wanted a table or a booth.

I asked in return, "A chair or a sofa?"

I chose a sofa, a place where I could nap until the food arrived.

A scene from a marriage

"We need to go to town."

I tried to ignore what she was saying.

"I need to go to the store."

I wondered which store?

"I need to do some grocery shopping."

Food? My ears went on alert.

"We’re out of bacon."

Suddenly, I was in the car, honking the horn.

Nothing is what we expect it to be, especially winter

My wife and I were standing outdoors collecting donations for a charity. The accelerator stuck on an SUV about to go by. It rammed into a car containing five young children pushing it into a mini-van. The saving grace was that no one was hurt.

Due to the accident, many people got to spend time outside in winter weather that they hadn’t planned on. I thought of all the people in the world who don’t get any snow or frigid temperatures. The poor things are deprived.

We winter well here. Some neighbors winter well in Texas, but even they’ve practiced winter survival. We’re used to winter. When a glacier returns, schools are two hours late. Because they were riding in warm cars, not everyone involved in the accident was dressed for winter. Winter is when we need to expect the unexpected. It’s a hard thing to do, but we must respect the cold. I enjoy winter, but it’s out to get us.

Another recent winter day was wind-assisted and the blasts of frigid air turned my car into a whistler as I traveled some distance on rural roads. I was dressed for winter —ong pants socks and thermal wedding ring. There was a hat with earflaps resting in the backseat because there had been an ear quality advisory issued by whoever it is that issues ear quality advisories. What is an ear quality advisory? It means that we’d be wise to wear earflaps if we want to continue to be able to wear eyeglasses or sunglasses and/or have a place to hang an earring.

A friend told me that she’d just gotten a new car. It wasn’t a brand spanking new car, but it was new to her. The car was equipped with seat warmers. They warmed the seat upon which she sat. They are just the things for those who enjoy having toasted buns.

I had a rental car once that was equipped with seat warmers. They were too hot for me. I needed seat potholders.

I’m proud to serve with those who are proud to serve

I sit on a fire committee. The committee works with fire departments, cities and townships. Two of the fellows that serve with me are Carl Anderson and Greg Bartsch. They are the perfect guys for the job. Carl was the fire chief of the Clarks Grove Volunteer Fire Department for 29 years and Greg was chief of the Geneva Volunteer Fire Department for 32 years. That’s a long time to do anything.

A conversation while crossing a county by car in the company of a spousal unit

"The weatherman said it was going to snow, but what does he know?"

"I see some flakes falling. The ground is turning white."

"This city has a population of 753," I said, attempting to change the subject.

"Wow, 753, huh? That and you are both incredible."

Nature notes

"What’s a chicken hawk?" It’s a common name for any hawk believed to prey upon domestic fowl. It’s called chicken hawk because that’s much easier to say than domestic fowl hawk. Some call them hen hawks. The term probably fits the Cooper’s hawk best, but the red-tailed hawk is most likely to be called the epithet. Small mammals make up the bulk of its diet. The Cooper’s hawk is an accipiter (a sharp-shinned hawk is another) and has short wings and a long tail that enable the skilled flier to dart through vegetation in pursuit of birds. A Cooper’s hawk’s diet is mainly birds.

Meeting adjourned

"When I was young, I admired clever people. Now that I am old, I admire kind people."—Abraham Joshua Heschel

The anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) is the most well-known of ligaments in the human body these days. Hardly a week goes by without hearing about some athlete at some level of sports who has torn his or her ACL. It’s an extremely important ligament because it connects your femur to your tibia (in layman’s terms, your thighbone to your shinbone).

The knee is also comprised of the medial collateral ligament (MCL), the posterior cruciate ligament (PCL), and the lateral collateral ligament (LCL). That’s not counting the lateral meniscus and medial meniscus, which are not quite as crucial, but still oft injured. Take a look at your knee and think about all the alphabet soup which makes up the parts of that joint that we take for granted.

Anyone with knee pain does not take it for granted though. I had some issues about a decade ago where I would be in pain for 2-3 days following any umpiring or officiating. That wasn’t going to work well in an active lifestyle, and I was concerned that one of those many components of my knee had a tear. After an MRI, it was determined that I had a lot of fluid build-up, likely from years of activity and diving around on ballfields and basketball courts. The solution? Wear a knee brace when I’m active, and it’s worked pretty well.

Michelle tore her lateral meniscus a year ago and had surgery to have it removed. Sometimes that tear is not a big deal, but hers was flipped around and causing extreme pain. Doctors cannot fix a torn meniscus, and my wife has managed just fine without it. Another reason the knee is so complicated: why have it if you don’t need it?

Here’s a larger question: why do there seem to be so many more knee injuries these days, especially in our youth? Growing up, can any of you remember someone who tore their ACL? I’m sure it happened, but not anywhere near the frequency of today.

There are plenty of injuries that are considered acute injuries, meaning some trauma has occurred, whether it’s another player landing on you, a sudden awkward fall, or another happening that was unexpected and not routine. When Jayna broke her arm, it was from falling off her bike. When I broke my elbow, I landed directly on it falling down after a shot in basketball. These are unavoidable.

However, there are also overuse injuries, and I think this is where so many tears and sprains come into play today. I haven’t found any conclusive studies done on this, but when you look at some of the history of youth sports, overuse would be a common theme.

I’ve written before about the importance of not just focusing on one sport, but we also have the overabundance of year-round opportunities for kids who not only play 2-3 sports, but play them far outside their seasons. Volleyball and basketball can become 12-month sports if one so desires. Soccer and gymnastics also can be run most months. There are even winter baseball and softball leagues indoors.

Why is this bad? Isn’t it good for kids to have more chances to get better at the sports they love? Maybe not. When I see kids run from school to sports practice after school to a different sports practice somewhere else, that’s concerning. We certainly want to keep kids active; it’s better than sitting in front of a screen incessantly. But kids also need downtime. If they go, go, go, something has to give, and it’s often parts of those precious joints that hold us together.

Really major knee injuries should really only occur in young people because of acute trauma. But so many are tearing ligaments with a wrong step or turn, and one can’t help but wonder if those ligaments have been so overused already that they’re easier to tear. Again, there’s no conclusive evidence yet about that, but it makes me go hmmm.

One problem is there is more and more pressure on coaches and kids to keep improving and get to a high level of competition. Coaches have access to their players for much of the summer, a time that used to be off-limits. Whether they want to or not, if a coach does not have summer-long activities, he or she will be questioned if the team does not succeed. Again, there’s a point where kids can be too active.

In addition, we’re making active time too organized. Remember when we just would run around and organize our own games and activities? When things are too structured all the time, that too can lead to overuse; the kids are often being very repetitive instead of being creative and changing things up.

I did have someone remind me that sports today, especially for girls, are much more physical and competitive. Still, I wonder if we scaled back just a bit, if we might keep our kids more healthy. Either way, it’s unfortunate that we have to worry about the ABCs of our bodies so much and not just those in books.

Word of the Week: This week’s word is macrology, which means long and tiresome talk, as in, “The coach was sick of the macrology she was hearing about her players participating in too many games year-round.” Impress your friends and confuse your enemies!

The scurs’ persistence paid off. Getting the Weather Eye out of its funk was no easy task, but over the weekend it happened. Will it stay warm now or are there more long underwear days in our future? Starting Wednesday, partly sunny with highs in the upper 20’s and lows also in the upper 20’s. Thursday, partly sunny with highs in the low 30’s and lows in the low 20’s. Partly sunny Friday with highs in the mid-30’s and lows in the upper 20’s. Saturday, mostly cloudy with a modest chance of snow. Highs in the mid-30’s and lows in the mid-20’s. Partly sunny on Sunday with a slight chance of snow. Highs in the mid-20’s with lows in the mid-teens. Monday, mostly cloudy and slightly cooler with a modest chance of snow. Highs in the upper 20’s with lows in the upper teens. Mostly cloudy skies and cooler for Ground Hog’s Day with a continued chance of snow. Highs in the low 20’s with lows in the low teens, all above zero. The normal high for February 2nd is 24 and the normal low is 5. On the 2nd the sun will rise at 7:30 a.m. The scurs will still be looking at their alarm clock and wondering why a groundhog would want to get out of bed that early.

We’ve flown through a month of 2016 and there’s no sign of it slowing down anytime soon. So far we’ve been pretty fortunate except for a couple stretches of cold weather to be expected in January. The frost in the soil as measured under bare soil at the SROC stood at 14” on January 25th. There are exceptions as one moves to an area that has had continuous snow cover. I found that Sunday firsthand when backing the tractor through a snowbank in the feedlot. Suddenly one side dropped and the mud underneath in the tracks provided a clue. Reports of ice thickness on area lakes are consistently 12 to 14 inches. It was almost overnight once it warmed up that small fish house villages sprang up. Fishing reports have been less than stellar for most. As one wise man once told me, there’s no law that says you have to fish.

The backyard continues to be overtaken by pheasants and squirrels as they feast on some of the corn gleaned this last fall while soil sampling. The female cardinal continues to have little luck in attracting a mate. Maybe she has B.O. which I rather doubt since most birds don’t have much of a sense of smell. She does like picking up the cracked corn generated by the chubby squirrels that eat the heart out of a kernel of corn then grab another one. The sharp shinned hawk continues to patrol the yard as well in pursuit of house sparrows. While it scares the other birds away from the feeders, the hawk seems intent on making a meal of these pests; something that’s a good thing in my book. 

The ewes are getting plumper as we edge nearer to shearing time. They too have benefitted from a warmer-than-normal winter after coming off the pasture looking like someone had been feeding them shell corn. Their lambing barn was finally cleaned out on Sunday and it was a battle. The last cold snap had frozen the manure pack down about 4 to 6 inches, making it a challenge to tear loose with the skid loader borrowed from our local sheep shearer. Some of the hunks were huge, 3 feet across and up to 5 feet long. Was a little hesitant dumping that into the spreader as growing up, it usually meant shearing a pin or breaking something, typically the longest possible distance from the house. Somehow my present spreader ground up those chunks or just flung them out if it caught them right. Oh well, by spring they should be thawed and we can grind them up again.

While it was a tough battle, it was nothing like what we did growing up sometimes. That sometimes involved the use of a pick axe to break through the frozen pack, then using a pitchfork to flop the hunks into a wheelbarrow. Then the wheelbarrow was wheeled up a ramp and the contents dumped into the spreader. Then the process repeated itself. No wonder I was so ornery sometimes. It actually made cleaning the chicken coop seem like a piece of cake even though it had to be pitched through a roughly 3x3-foot window. Since the chicken coop was between two other buildings the spreader had to be backed up to the window. This made it necessary to toss the first part of the load all the way to the front of the spreader. If you didn’t let the manure accumulate too long between cleanings it went easier. It was always “less worse” though than cleaning the sheep barn, partially because there was only one load. And I had tunes on my little tan 9-volt RCA transistor radio to help keep me company. 

It was in those years I gained an appreciation for some of the rock and roll artists and bands of the day, including the Eagles. Their songs had a particular relevance to many a young man growing up in rural America in the early to mid-1970s. Songs about dreams, travelling the country, mysterious women, loves found, loves lost, stars in the sky, pickup trucks, and being laid back, unpretentious. Somewhere in our attic I still have the Eagles Greatest Hits LP, one of the first albums I purchased. Seeing Glenn Frey several weeks ago on a rerun of Miami Vice and his recent passing made me reflect on some of those days working in the dead of winter when the music would take me away, if only for a while. Thanks, dude, for helping make it tolerable.

See you next week…real good then.