A Pictorial Review of My Big Adventure

I spent the greater part of my great escape at H's. This is one of the first sights / sounds I experienced there. I didn't think I'd be able to sleep at night but my brain must have treated the planes overhead like the trains that rumble by our place. They didn't bother me at all.

I spent much of time at H's on her elevated deck, spying on the neighbors and looking into the trees.

And I got to spend time with my grandkitties. In this picture it is my precious Trixie who is being naughty and naughty Bella who is being shy.

On my second night we ventured into St. Paul. H drove, of course. Until we drove by this, I had no idea that the Republican National Convention was being held there. Now that I know where it is being held, I know where I am NOT going to be until the red dust settles.

This had no interest for me either. Star Wars stopped being fun for me after they started making prequels.

We eventually parked and went to Garrison Keillor's book store, Common Good Books. This is a backdrop for some scenes from Chasing Windmills in which Hulles is a star. Follow the Hulles link to find CW.

I loved this part of St. Paul. I want H to make tons and tons of money and buy a mansion here with room for me. H in the city:

One night we took the light rail to to Minneapolis. I wish I would have been braver with my camera and taken pictures of the Viking freaks fans. But alas and alack, I have no pictures of the trains, station, riders, or people waiting to board.

We walked to the heart of Minneapolis. This has to be the heart, because here is Mary Tyler Moore. Only I don't think it looks a thing like her.

As we passed this sculpture in front of a church, a kid whispered to his parents, "They're naked!"

There are other things I wish I would have photographed. Like the swallows nesting in the liquor store sign (for Captain Crab), the brat at the light rail station shoving paper into the credit card slot of the automatic ticket machine, the sign at the station about holding on to your children and keeping them away from the edge of the platform, the same brat hanging her toes over the edge of the platform, and the woman in the liquor store wearing a tube top made from a pair of men's jockey shorts. And to think I was worried about what to wear in the city.

Lovely Veggies

It was sweet corn time this week and I went to my folks to get some corn to freeze. It was not a great year for corn with the sporadic rains not arriving at the best time. Still, I got plenty of corn to freeze.

Every year when I get corn my mom recalls my dad's mom at corn freezing time. Grandma would work away at shucking, silking, cutting and freezing corn and say, "What lovely corn!"

Before I left Mom asked if I wanted green beans. I told her I'd picked some up the day before at the farmer's market in Jeremy Freese's home town. She asked how the beans were and I said, "lovely".

"As lovely as these?" Mom asked as she showed me a 5 gallon bucket of huge green beans.

So compare:

I took some of Mom's beans and the day after I froze corn, I froze beans. Mom also cut a tomato off the vine for me to take home:

I tipped the scales some holding the measuring tape. The tomato weighed just under 3 pounds. But it really was 18 ⅝ inches around.

One of these days I need to make a trip out to my own tomatoes and do something with them. I love the abundance of fresh vegetables. I get tired quickly of putting food by.

I'm Alive!

Holy cow. My last post was July 22? Really? What can I say, I've been busy.

I was involved in a small town celebration (tiny K town) that was held the first Saturday in August. It was our 2nd annual and it was awesome. H came and ran the kid's games. There was softball for bigger "kids". The food was great. Weather wise, it was the best day Iowa has ever seen.

Preparations leading up to K Daze were brutal. And when it was over, I still had stuff to do. Stuff I haven't finished yet because.....

Then it was my birthday! And I did something I haven't done in a long, long time. I ran away from home leaving Captain Crab home alone to take care of the critters. I went to visit H in the big, bad Twin Cities. It was great to hang with her in her environment and spy on her neighbors when she was at work. H, I'm telling you, the nurse across the street IS having an affair with a married man.

We did some touristy stuff (I think it's obligatory) like visit Garrison Keillor's bookstore in downtown St. Paul and ride the light rail to downtown Minneapolis (along with the purple tide of Viking's fans on the way to a pre-season game).

I learned my way around her neighborhood and, most importantly, got over my fear of driving in Minneapolis. It was a wonderful vacation and I am so glad I went. Cities are nice to visit but I'm glad I'm home in the land of not having to drive 70 mph to keep from getting run over.

But now I'm behind in everything, it seems. I have still have work to do for K Daze, a client's website to update and a new client I really, really, REALLY need to make website headway on. And I am without my computer.

I took it in to my geek before I left for the cities to have it tuned up and more RAM installed. (Sorry, Mush, I know you are cringing but I am not that friggin smart!) It would be done by now had I not asked for more RAM, which comes from the RAM store in Timbuktu and is shipped to Iowa by camel.

Crab is gone and so I have access to a computer, but not my programs. I am so jonesing for my machine. It is all I can do to keep from installing Firefox on Crab's computer, installing programs that will suck up his hard drive and configuring it like mine. I am trying to be a good guest and leave things just as I found them, so I will refrain from fucking up his computer.

Storm

One night last week the radar told me a storm was very, very close to me. I went out to see for myself and discovered the radar was right.

I high tailed it back to the house and a few minutes later shot the rain from the shelter of the porch (Captain Crab's swallow nest in the corner).

It rained hard.

Hulles Lives

Once prolific blogger Hulles has been missing in action for some time. I feared for his life. But last Saturday I saw the living, breathing Hulles with my own eyes.

Hulles Lives

He promised to start writing again soon.

Family Jewels

My mother is a ruby and my aunt (her sister) is a pearl. Mom has honed her gardening skills to producing enough fruit and vegetables to feed half the county. Aunt Pearl has taken her little yard and turned it into a showcase of day lilies. Pearl has been sending me pictures of her flowers. Here are some of them. I didn't save all the pictures she sent me because, well, my computer is already filled with pictures.

Whazzup II

I'm still spinning my wheels and getting nowhere.

I went to a wedding last weekend. The setting for the reception was idyllic. The weather was perfect, though I am beginning to feel like a vampire who needs to hide from the sun. I am going to invest in some hats so I can take shade with me where ever I go.

In other news -- H is back! She said to tell my friends and this is the best way.

Busy With Stuff

I have been busy. I spin my wheels a lot. Sometimes I get somewhere, most times I don't.

Last weekend I was busy with taking pictures of a small town celebration for their website. After 2 days I had hundreds of photos that I had to sort through, optimize, build slide shows for and add to the website. The highlight of the two days was talking to these guys about Mush, who used to sing with the band before she moved back home to the left coast.

Jefferson County Green Band / Message for Mush

On Monday when I was still up to my elbows in trying to make crappy photos web worthy, I got a call that there was going to be an impromptu birthday gathering for my mom's birthday. I had to go and eat my favorite pizza.

Pizza

My mother has always had a garden. When they moved to the place they live now, she started having a really large garden. I tell her every year when she tries to give me food that I do not need that she should sell her stuff at the farmer's market. Oh, she couldn't charge people for food! She said that this year's garden was the best ever, though I have never, ever noticed a lack of produce or produce of sub-par quality. So before I went home to get back to work, I drove out to visit her "best garden ever".

Most things at Mom's start out in her little green house. Right now there are just giant tomato plants in there.

Tomatoes in the green house

Mom knows I love petunias. Last fall she harvested petunia seeds from a planter in town and this spring, started the little seeds in her green house. She gave me dozens of pretty petunias which are planted around my farm (getting lost in weeds now). She still has a few plants left.

Petunias

The sweet corn patch is smaller this year. I think my dad finally realized he did not need acres of sweet corn to fill his freezer. Part of the patch has rye in it this year as a cover crop. Dad wishes he had a little combine to harvest the rye instead of plowing it under.

Sweet Corn

Rye

Potatoes

On the other side of the house is the actual garden. I will let you stroll through it with this comment -- yes, celery. My mother is the only person I know who grows celery. This tastes nothing like the stuff in the store, this has flavor.

Celery

Peas

Cabbage

Onions

Carrots

NOT yams, sweet potatoes

Apples

Strawberries

Raspberries

Don't you wish you could munch your way through Mom's garden?