Loons in Stony Brook

After a night of heavy rainfall, there was a pair of loons in the flooded stream by our house this morning. I crossed the bridge in the truck, looked to the left, and saw a large gray bird awkwardly waddling from Mrs. Sicotte's field and into the water. Then I saw her mate, an impressively large loon, dark black on the back and shocking white on his breast and underside.

Realizing I didn't have my camera, I pulled the not-so-advisable trick of backing over the bridge to run inside and get my camera. When I came back out with Weather Lad in tow, the loons had swum into the woods, and were bouncing around on the rapids. They seemed to be rafting through the rough spots, then paddling to the slower moving water to make their ways back upstream and do it all over again. My one concern is that the high water will make them think Mrs. Sicotte's field is a good place to nest, and it really isn't. I would love to hear a loon call, just once, tonight. Then they can fly off to a more appropriate place...if they have enough runway.

***Note: after looking up some information on loons, it is likely the gray one is either non-breeding, or juvenile, due to the gray color. Maybe we don't have to worry about little loon chicks being brought up in Mrs. Sicotte's field, though it would sure be cute.

Signs of Home

Herkimer Area

Back in New England

Our backs to the setting sun...

we see signs of home.

"Hey it's good to be back home again..."


We woke up at a service area on the New York State Thruway, somewhere west of Rochester. Despite the big rigs whizzing by at 80 mph all night, we both managed to get a full night's sleep. After refreshing ourselves in the rest rooms, some breakfast (Ben got two donuts at Tim Horton's, while I opted for a breakfast sandwich from Fuddrucker's), and use of the WiFi to post yesterday's entry, we hit the road. Our only other stops on the Thruway were for fuel for Aunt Beast and fuel for me, in the form of Starbuck's. The greatest improvement to interstate travel in the past 25 years has not been automated payment or rumble strips. The single greatest improvement has come in the quality of coffee available on the interstates. Though Starbuck's, in my mind, is little better than Mall Wart, their coffee is quite good and it made my life on the interstate much better.

Though the distance is long and the toll hefty, the Thruway isn't a bad drive. It's mostly pretty, with enough points of interest to keep one awake. The road surface is great ("Your Tolls at Work") and the drivers weren't too crazy. Some pretty good hills, though. Our little Toyota 4-cylinder was whining through the Herkimer area.

New York ended up nicely, with the lovely village of Whitehall. If someone forced me to live in New York, that is where I'd want to be. Whitehall finally gives way to Vermont, and Weather Lad was so overcome with happiness that he was inspired to write another sign. We didn't want to dally, so we did the obligatory "we're in New England" phone call at the same time we stretched and took pictures. Forty miles east lay Rutland, a fuel stop, and McDonald's. There would be no sit down meal on this afternoon, as we pushed eastward.

With the sun, and the rest of the country, at our backs, we were inspired to shoot some pictures out of the front of Aunt Beast. Our shadows reached toward home.

It's always nice to see familiar signs on the way home, and to know the way without looking at a map.

Our entry to Maine came as the sun sank behind us. We'd seen a couple of moose in Vermont and New Hampshire, but they kindly stayed out of the roads as Aunt Beast took us home, where Nanny, Cheer Chick, the Digital Backpacker, Katie, Lea and Neil awaited our arrival. I was still full from McDonald's but I grabbed some homemade stirfry and rice because it was homemade. It's good to be home.

Recap: Minnesota to New York

As I blogged here on Thursday morning, we awoke to rain in Albert Lea. We’d had some thoughts of trying to get to Milwaukee for a baseball game at 12:05, but I had a number of labs due for my online class, and the last day they could be handed in was Friday (I only figured all of this out on Monday--I somehow thought the class ended in mid-May...silly me!) So the first order of the day was to find a wireless connection so I could hand in the work I’d done. In our phone call Wednesday night, Nanny gave me the address of a Starbucks in town, and after a few false starts, we found it. Did you know wireless at Starbucks is not always free? Me neither! I had to buy it from T-Mobile (GOUGERS!) for $10 a day! But it had to be done to ease my mind, so it was done, and most of my work was passed in.

The Beast, as we’ve come to call it, didn’t seem to mind the rain any more than it minded the wind--which was still present, mind you--and we steered south into Iowa. Guess what? Iowa is very flat. There are many farms in Iowa. I kept singing “Coming Up Close” by ‘Til Tuesday, both out loud and in my head, all the way through the state. I wanted to get a picture of “...a farmhouse that had long since been deserted...” There were a couple of good prospects, but stopping the Beast doesn’t happen on a dime, and there were few good places to stop.

Weather Lad and I played a couple of fun car games, one alphabetical and one finding objects. It was cool, and it kept my mind occupied. By the time we hit Davenport, the landscape was a little more rolling, and we came over a hill to see a big ‘ol bridge spanning the Mighty Mississippi. About that time, the sun peeked through, and after getting gas (did I mention the Beast really likes her gas, to the tune of about 15 mpg, and she has a really small gas tank, so fill-ups come about once every 1.5 to 2 hours: my back thanks her, since at least I get to stretch fairly frequently) we took some pictures at the scenic turnout over the river, and headed on into Illinois. The Beast is also not the fleetest of vehicles: imagine one of your Tonka trucks driving around with your toy box on top of it. You get the idea.

So Weather Lad said: “One good thing about this camper: you won’t get caught speeding.”

I replied “Not on the freeway, anyway.”

He said: “Hey, was I just being half-full?”

“Yes, you were”, I replied.

I had to chuckle when he said “I’m getting pretty good at this”

We had dinner at the Peru Mall. You go away for a few days, and look what happens!

Gas prices were the highest yet in Joliet, Illinois (Joliet Jake says hi) at $3.94.

We then crossed into Indiana and stopped for the night at a Day’s Inn, mostly for the free wireless. The room was altogether pretty nasty, as was that entire section of Indiana.

We woke to hear of the possibility of severe thundershowers in the Tri-State area, along with damaging winds and hail. Also a possibility of 9-12 inches of snow in Sioux Falls, S.D. Wow. I decided we should put as much distance between us and that line of weather as possible in as short a time as possible. So we bugged out of Portage at 9 am, and the nastiness of far-western Indiana soon gave way to land that looked just as flat and agricultural as Southern Minnesota, Eastern Iowa, and Southern Illinois. Amazingly enough, Ohio looked the same until we hit Cleveland, where we wished we’d had time to check out the Rock ‘n Roll Hall of Fame and maybe an Indians game. Some other time, I guess, but Weather Lad did get a couple of glimpses of Lake Erie, and of Euclid, Ohio, home town of the main character in Walk Two Moons, one of his favorite books. East of Cleveland the terrain turned much hillier, but far less windy. The Beast approved. She likes the hills, but not the wind.

When we were crossing the border into Pennsylvania, I realized we never took any pictures of Weather Lad in Ohio. The only loss here is that there is one less picture of him. The only thing I would likely go back to Ohio for is the Rock ‘n Roll Hall of Fame.

Pennsylvania was a refreshingly short jaunt, where we stopped at a place called Boston’s in Erie. It was a very good sports bar. Weather Lad had the mac ‘n cheese, while I had Jambalaya Linguini. Mmmm.

We called home right after dinner, and the phone call took us all the way into New York. Weather Lad watched Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, downloaded from iTunes last night at the hotel.

He was so intent watching that he never really noticed we’d gone through Buffalo and headed east on the Thruway. Tonight we are in a rest area on the Thruway as I type this, and I’ll go post it in the morning right before we leave. We are less than 250 miles from Albany, which puts us in striking distance of Peru by tomorrow night. I feel like a trucker.

Miscellanea

I left the camera in the camper overnight, and we're trying to get off quickly this morning so no pictures for now. We'll try to find a free internet spot tonight to get off the pictures.

We're in Portage, Indiana right now, east of Chicago, east of the Mississippi (good pictures from there, but alas, not now.) Weather on the t.v. (Day's Inn--we're such wimps!) says humid this morning, then some possibly severe thunderstorms this afternoon. We need to get out ahead of it. The worst part? Possibly 9-12 inches of snow in Sioux Falls, where this whole ridiculousness started.

We hope to be hunkered down in Upstate N.Y. tonight, and home to Peru late tomorrow. We'll see how that goes.

Time to go beat the weather.

Ain't No Cure for the Summertime Blues

Weather Lad and I spent our first night in the camper last night. We pulled into a parking lot outside a 24-hour grocery store in Albert Lea, MN at about 9pm Central, and pretty much collapsed after a quick call home.

Albert Lea is the home of Eddie Cochran, whose most enduring contribution to American culture was "Summertime Blues". I'm sure we can all relate, right about now. Locals were raving about the great weather (70˚, with tornado force winds) while I was pining for home, where I hear it's been near 80˚.
Weather Lad caught a sweet sunset on the camera just west of here, but we woke up to rain this morning.

Popped into a Starbucks for internet connection (downside to online classes: handing in work online) this morning, and soon to be on our way east. We hope to reach Ohio by tonight, but at 55mph with a tailwind, it's hard to say.

Live From the Other Home of Paul Bunyan

Greetings from a Twin City. It could be St. Paul, but it’s not. You guessed it, it’s Minneapolis! Ben and I pulled in at about 3pm after USAir (not as good as Southwest, in Weather Lad’s book...or mine*) deposited us without incident at the Hubert H. Humphrey Airport. I don’t really think it’s the Hubert H. Humphrey airport, but since everything else around here is named after him, I kinda like my odds.

From HHH, we took a white-knuckle ride in a cab to the downtown Holiday Inn Express, which is really a lot nicer than it sounds. About two streets up from here there is a street shut down for pedestrian traffic, and lots of cool looking restaurants. Unfortunately, there is still motor traffic cutting across that street every block, so it kind of defeats the purpose. At any rate, there are street musicians, homeless people, and lots of young well-dressed professional types. Clinton and Stacy would feel right at home.

Many of the buildings in downtown Minneapolis are linked by walkways over the streets. We entered an urban Target store through a revolving door, went up the escalator, and found a Quizno’s, where we had our dinner. We could have taken an indoor tour of the city but decided not to since we were pretty tired (can you tell from this disjointed post?) We finally found a place where our crappy-and-soon-to-be-history T-Mobile plan could contact home, and we chatted with Nanny and CheerChick for a little while. Upon returning to the hotel, Weather Lad and I threw all caution to the wind, deciding to take a dip in the hot tub and pool in the shorts we brought along. They’ll dry eventually, I guess.

Tomorrow it’s an early wake-up call (5:15 am) to catch the bus to Sioux Falls, where we will pick up the white eleph...er...gracious gift from Rach’s parents. Yep, the 1986 Toyota Crossman RV will be heading home to where it belongs. The snowbanks and woodpile receded just in time to give us a good place to park it!

*Why is Southwest better than USAir? Let me count the ways: first, in Weather Lad’s words, Southwest is “funny”. “Remember when they put the snacks in the aisle while we were taking off, so they slid down the plane to us? That was cool.” USAir’s employees treat their jobs like, well, jobs. Some of the unhappiest flight attendants I’ve ever seen. Second, USAir didn’t make a second run for drinks, and on the first leg, from Portland to Philly (don’t get me started) we didn’t even get a snack! As soon as we boarded the plane in Philly, Weather Lad looked in the crack between his seat and the wall and said “Well, at least we know there are snacks on this flight.” I asked why, and he said “Because they’re between the seat and the wall.” He said “It’s kind of like trail mix”, to which I replied “More like flight mix.” Later on I realized we could call it contrail mix.

I’m off to the lobby to post this, while Weather Lad watches the Chris Farley SNL special. I’ll post again when I get a chance.

P.S.-Wish we’d had a chance to do some campaigning for Barack today, but our presence in Philadelphia wasn’t quite enough. Looks like he had his tookus handed to him.

Definitely Cooler Than Me

A couple of Dirigo's finest have entered a film contest at the Great Minds Foundation. Brandon Doyen and Josh White posted a public service announcement called "Talk". Check it out, and compare it to the other entries, and I think you'll agree that it is superior work. The message is a good one, and powerfully delivered. The editing is impressive. These two have done Dirigo proud. I got their permission to embed the video on my blog, but you should drop in at the website to give them some words of encouragement and a four or five star vote.

Edit: I've removed the video from my blog, but feel free to click the link and check it out.

Well done, guys!

From Milking Shed to Greenhouse/Sugar Shack

When we moved into our 150 year old farmhouse, there was one other building on the property. It was a small shed-like structure with a 2x6 front porch and a back deck made of 2x4s and plywood. It stood--actually it still stands--on a 3 foot tall concrete foundation, and in the middle of the concrete floor was a square hole about eight inches by eight inches. An iron pipe is centered in that hole, presumably leading out through the foundation, to the east side, where a pipe of the same size an material protrudes.

For a long time, we wondered about the origins and uses of this shed, and came up with all sorts of ideas. We're pretty sure that in recent years it was used as a play house for the previous owners' grandchildren, because its inside walls have been adorned with lovely wooden paneling, and because of the nifty and now close-to-rotten deck.

We began to refer this structure "the milking shed" since that's what it most closely resembled. It's quite possible it was a hen house, too, but since we moved in, it's been storage for old broken crap: our kids' wading pool, a flamingo that could be hooked up to a garden hose to spray the kids, and a plastic slide called the milking shed home for the past few years.

Recently I've toyed with the idea of turning the space into a greenhouse. It has a nice southeastern exposure, and it seems this would be a pretty good use of space.

So one day on the way home from school I was driving by "Tommy Gump's Master Bait Shop" (yes, it really exists, for those of you outside the River Valley). To date their contributions to the community have been witticisms on their board ("Three things to fear: Osama, Obama, Your Momma"), and tributes to fallen Maine soldiers. Truly a wide range of civic value. But from a purely selfish standpoint, the contribution they made to me that day was of the highest value: a 5'x6' picture window that adorned Nash's Store, Hoppy's Place, and everything the building was in between. It was sitting out by the road, with a "FREE" sign affixed, and after sizing it up a little bit, I began to load it on the truck. Mark Dupuis and his son, who were working on the bait shop, came out and helped me load it.

Once I got it home, it slid quite nicely out to the milking shed, since we still had ample snow cover. I levered it up the deck and in the door, and began to imagine the window in place.

Shortly thereafter, I made a trip to Lowe's to pick up some plexiglas: the 5'x6' window takes up almost the entire wall, but the roof needs to let light in, too.

This week I got aggressive, and with chainsaw and reciprocating saws in hand (not simultaneously, mind you) I began ripping out the wall and roof. Earlier this week, after some framing, the picture window went in place. Today, Weather Lad was out of school sick so I got to do some more work on the greenhouse. Note the subtle shift of terminology here: no longer the milking shed. The first panel of plexiglas was put in place on the roof, and though it still needs some tying down, the greenhouse is taking shape. I even got a little bit of a sunburn!

Before long, all our seedlings for this year's garden will be out there, getting ready for a long, productive summer. Over the summer I'll be looking for a small woodstove for boiling sap. This stands to be the coolest upgrade to our property since we moved in. Pictures forthcoming when the job is finished.

(Edit: in retrospect, there have been two other cool upgrades: our outdoor wood boiler (19 gallons of oil delivered in January? are you nuts?) and the third zone of heat added to the upstairs, which makes it so we can sleep with fewer than five comforters during the winter.

And the Award Goes To...

Listening to "Wait, Wait..." yesterday, host Peter Sagal announced that the show has been nominated for a Webby Award in the comedy category. He, of course, suggested that it would be somewhat gauche to beg for votes, but that we should go check out the website.

Well, I did, and what an eye-opening experience! It takes a few minutes to sign in, but once you do there are numerous choices to make. I skipped a few categories since I had no interest or no background, but there were some old, familiar faces as well. There were a number of new (to me) websites that I bookmarked, and you can be sure I will be visiting regularly. One is dedicated to those passive aggressive notes that people leave for others. Who thinks of these things? Then there is the World Without Oil homepage. I wish I'd known about the game when it started, but there is some good reading to be had nonetheless. Then there's this thing, which I can't even begin to explain but it's pretty cool. It's easy to spend lots of time there, and it's not mind numbing. They got my vote. The final one I'll show you is Kiva, where people like you and me can provide loans to entrepreneurs worldwide to help fight poverty (why not get pickpocketed and cut out the middle man?) But seriously, I love this kind of initiative.

Once I got over my initial shock that the RVB was unrepresented in the Webby Award nominations, I found lots of cool and interesting things. Maybe one of these years one of us will show up, but in the mean time, go to the Webby Awards site and vote. This website was successful in pushing MPBN's pledge drive over the top (and I've got the counter to prove it!) so maybe our voices can help determine internet excellence. And while we're at it, maybe we could think up some categories for our own little RVB Webbies...

Pledge Break

1-800-866-1475. That's the number to call...1-800-866-1475. We're taking a short pledge break from your regular programming because we know this service is valuable to you. 1-800-866-1475. If you check in on this blog from time to time, or if you've come to depend on it for irrelevant diatribes and offbeat meandierings, you know how valuable this service is to you. 1-800-866-1475, and you can make your pledge to support this valuable service. How many times have you been sitting on your couch, food warming in the microwave, and you continue reading even after the bell goes off just because you couldn't stop reading? And by the time you're done reading, your noodles are cold again? Here at TASCTY we call that a "sofa moment". No one's experienced that, huh? Oh. Still, you're here, so you must hold some value for this blog, and it's become a part of your life, right? 1-800-866-1475, and you can put your money where your cursor is. The funding for 65% of our programming comes from you, the listener, and believe me, the cost of putting out quality programming such as this is...free? Really? That last.fm thing on the right doesn't cost anything? Even the cool dancing Bridesmaid logo from the last post was free on the net? Surely it must cost something to ridicule George Bush via YouTube? (If the administration has their way, I'll pay, alright...)
Okay, so it's becoming exceedingly clear that making a pledge to this blog is not going to improve the quality of what you get, but I do implore you to call the number on your screen, or log in to mpbn.net, and get the money scroungers out of my ears so I can continue listening to Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me in peace, minus the begging. 1-800-866-1475.