Buster's Day

I always assumed Buster spent his day sleeping. But I have found evidence of late, that I am wrong about that. I should have known, though, from other mischief he gets himself into! Some days when I get home he is outside anxiously waiting for me. He's not fond of the heat or the cold, so the day has to be about perfect for him to be outside for any amount of time. We have him boxed into our kitchen, so he can't go too far anymore when he is indoors. It is, of course, too late for our couch. He totally destroyed the one in the front room before we got the baby gate to keep him inside the kitchen. If I leave a waste basket out anywhere he will tip it over and tear apart anything in that. All garbage is kept in cupboards or up on a ledge or in a tub where he can't reach it. I'm sure that the AdVisor paper delivery boy teases him when he delivers the paper. Buster goes nuts when anyone comes to the dooor. My can he jump HIGH! So I'm sure the boy enjoys seeing how high he jumps while he stands there with paper in hand. Even the sound of the postman at the door will send Buster into hysterics. So. It isn't sleeping that he does all day that's for sure. He is always glad to see me and shows that joy by chewing his bone cheerfully on my shoe and curling up next to me while I nap. What a dog.

Surprise!

How long has it been since your husband really surprised you? We've been married for more than 35 years so mine is fairly predictable! He has been known to surprise me though. Saturday afternoon's was a pretty good one. Here's how it went: We've been planning a trip to the boundary waters for nearly 6 mos. You have to have your permits in place before you go in and those can sometimes be hard to get at the last minute. Boundary waters canoeing is fabulously beautiful and is the premier wilderness experience. We haven't gone for a couple of years and Ron has been longing for the quiet, the fishing and the beauty of it all. I have been secretly dreading it. Though I do indeed love to canoe, I wasn't looking forward to the 'roughing' it that this sort of trip requires. It's sleeping in the tent, on the ground; cooking over the fire or campstove, bathing in the lake and digging your own latrine for a week. (not to mention the physical endurance it takes to haul packs and traipse over mosquito infested portages) We are also going with another couple and they have been planning on this for as long as we have.

So when I got home from work on Saturday evening, he tells me to come sit down. He has news. I'm thinking 'oh my goodness. Did someone die?' But instead he tells me that he's cancelled our boundary waters trip and made reservations on the edge of the boundary waters instead. We will be staying in a cabin (with a stove and a refigerator no less) for the week. I am stunned. It means beds instead of the ground. No portaging but still the chance to canoe and fish as much as we want. It means no electricity, but we can haul in as many books as our heart's desire. I was truly surprised! And our friends, it seems, were just as eager to do this as they were to do a regular boundary waters trip. It's all set. I am actually looking forward to going and enjoying the seclusion of it all. I plan to read and write more than I've had a chance to in a very long time. What a guy! He is worth my effort.

A Boring life these days!

By now you must realize that not much goes on in my life. Exciting posts for me are when I've been up to see the grandkids and can tell you about the wonderful, smart things they've been doing lately! Sorry about that for all you out there hunting for intelligent, thoughtful conversations. Maybe next post. Anyway. The grandkids. The youngest has started to crawl and get to exactly where he wants to go and put in his mouth whatever he comes up with from the floor. He really is a pretty smart kid! He even started on the sippy cup this week according to his parents. Wow. Then the oldest is the busiest boy I've ever met. He makes me exhausted just to watch him. He's learned how the garage door opens, he waters the plants, digs in the dirt, helps with the dishes, and does general 'help' work for his parents. He's learning how politeness gets him a lot further than whining ever does. Now they know why they were 'slaves' to their parents when they were that age! The best thing that came from his mouth though, was, as we were eating salad 'this is good'. Everything he ate was good, and he could have put any teenager to shame. That boy loves to eat!

My day off started with all the right things...fruits, vegetables, sunflowers, carmel rolls and coffee! I went on another biking adventure-this time at the Iowa Great Lakes. In a sort of spur of the moment plan, a friend and I headed to 'the lakes' on Thursday evening so we'd be ready early to try out all the bike trails at Okiboji. We planned to bike from Spirit Lake to Milford (20 m. round trip) in the morning. We fortified ourselves with the carmel rolls and coffee in the morning. It was a wonderfully cool morning and the bike trail up there is great. Lots of other people must have thought the same thing because there were plenty of people out and about-jogging, riding, walking, skating! They've planted wildflowers along the way and we aren't the only ones who enjoyed it-plenty of birds were singing to beat the band. At noon we enjoyed apples and a piece of chocolate, then more biking, some swimming, and a visit with friends. Then to top off the whole day we finished it off with a Bananas Napolean at Minerva's. Wow! It was a sweet sandwich of a day! I'll take a day off like that anytime.

Die Hard and Onstar

Well, this was some excitement-I locked my keys in the car. On the 4th of July no less. I was pondering my fate, and what I was going to do about it when my husband reminded me that we have 'Onstar' in our vehicle. How fun is that! It almost made it worth it to have done such a stupid thing in the first place. And sure enough they unlocked my doors in a swift jiffy. It was really easy and the only pain involved was my initial dismay at discovering the keys inside the locked car. Anyway on to...Die Hard. They have a scene in the new movie where Onstar starts a car after the young man says his father( really Bruce Willis) is having a heart attack, "please please please help him" cry cry sob. That looked pretty easy too, and was pretty funny in the movie. But After using the service, and having to give name, address, phone # pin and the last time I'd run the vehicle, I think the movie got it wrong. Not to mention the fact that the whole country had been shut down because the bad guy had turned off all our computers. How did this kid think Onstar was going to work, too? Oh well. That's the nature of the movies. Too bad we don't keep realize that the fiction of movies is just that... It seems every nation in the world knows what America and Americans are like because they've watched our movies.

Fourth Fun

Happy 4th to all: this weird, middle of the week 4th will bring no fireworks for us, no outdoor grilling, not even a family time. I will get in some shopping and a flying trip to Omaha but with work butting up against both ends of the holiday there won't be much else...including relaxing. Oh well.

Fireworks remembered: at the Pickeral Lake in Wisconsin when I was 14
In Chicago during the summer of 1969
At Ft.Riley Kansas in 1970 setting off forbidden cherry bombs.
Multitudes of fireworks with my brothers setting off bottle rockets
and firecrackers.

Hope you get to enjoy a great firework display this 4th and lots of time with family

Tour de minnesota

I've always thought riding in RAGBRAI would be such fun (the Iowa 400 mile trek from river to river). After this weekend I know I would never survive. (or I would have to do one heck of a lot of training for it!!) We did a biking/camping weekend in a campground on the Sakatah Bike trail near Mankato, Mn. What a beautiful area. What a wonderful campground we were in! But we were in the middle of two small towns and biking either way was going to be a distance. At 10 in the morning it didn't look so bad, but by the end of the day I was wiped out. I peddled slower and slower and slower. It got hotter and hotter. We biked 16 miles. We took a picnic lunch and then were able to explore the small town of Elysian. We checked out their ice cream and the new Elysian Queen was serving. That always helps the taste- it was pretty good. They were having a bean bag throwing contest while we were there and, darn, we were going to miss the 4th of July turtle races. (bring your own turtle) I brought back some great pictures, sore muscles and lots of dirty laundry. i have to say, too, that I love our camper.