Things that Slither In the Night

Posted on 12/04/2023 by Grumpa Joe

For the past week I have tried to post everyday, but yesterday I missed. The goal is blown. Instead of writing I spent the day in my shop cutting feathers. My latest Intarsia project is a large bird with his wings spread. The feathers become the bird. The goal for this project was to finish by May ’23. It is still possible but only if I never sleep, never eat, spent zero time with Lovely, and grind wood the whole time. It’s not gong to happen. I like to sleep, and eat, and spend time with Lovely that’s why.

A new challenge has arrived to make my Intarsia project a dream, Spring! Yesterday we had a genuine beautiful day, sunny, warm, and breezy. The girls are wearing shorts again, and some guys too, but I don’t lear at guys like I do at girls!

Spring is when “. . . Birds do it, bees do it, even educated fleas do it . . .

Then last night as I was retiring my step grandson came to me as white as a sheet to explain that as he opened the garage door to get some night air, he saw a long skinny thing (snake) about 2 cm in diameter slithering past. I looked at him and said “he’s probably horny from being in hibernation since last September. Did he come after you?”

“But, but, but, is he dangerous?”

“Of course not, most likely it is a garter snake, and even though he looks ominous like all snakes do, he is harmless.” The conversation shifted to a discussion on why I should fix all the cracks and crevices between the garage door and the floor to keep him out of the garage. I went to bed.

Today, I’ll search the area and see if I can locate his den. I don’t know what I’ll do if I find him except to greet him with a cheery “happy spring,” and chase him off to the wetlands behind the house. Of course if I happen to come upon him while in the garage he’ll scare the shit out of me and cause me to run to the hardware store to buy a new weather strip for the door.

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730 Days and Counting

Posted on 10/04/2023 by Grumpa Joe

Two years ago today, I tied the knot for the third time. After burying two wives, I decided to give it another try. Some one has to out last me. I can’t say that these days have been all bliss, but I can’t complain too much either. Lovely keeps me fed, and gives me company, and God knows she needs a driver. Lucky for her that I can still drive and enjoy doing so. In two months I’ll have to return to the Secretary of State’s office to get retested for my vision and driving ability. My Dad was two years younger than I am now when he gave up the keys. In his case, his knees and hips were so shot he was dangerous to be behind the wheel. We humored him for as long as we could, never telling him he shouldn’t drive. When it was time, he knew what to do. My brother is seven years older than me and the same age as my Dad was when he died, but at 92 he still leaves town to go to his cottage in Michigan a hundred miles away.

Yesterday, I drove Lovely to Pilcher Park to visit the Bird Haven Green House. They have a lovely display of white lilies every spring. We were very disappointed when we found the place locked up. They actually celebrate Easter. Instead we saved the trip by walking a trail into the woods. We were not disappointed as the forest floor was covered in tiny white blossoms. The trees are just beginning to show a hint of green at the tips. I was reminded of all the times I was disappointed in Illinois weather when I finally returned from spending a warm winter in Arizona. The last time was the worst. Peggy and I left on May 5 to return. I wanted to see the saguaro cactus bloom before we left. The temperature finally topped 100 and the cactus showed it’s flowers as we were leaving town. Since these towering cacti grow to be 66 feet tall, all we saw were tiny white dots at their tops. Later, I learned that some desert cacti require intense heat in order to bloom, and the saguaro is one of them.

On the way home I chose to go straight north into Utah to find Interstate 70 where we would head east to see the the Rocky Mountains one more time. It was a great drive until we reached Vail, Colorado. The road was closed with snow and we had to seek a place to stay until they were cleared. We enjoyed touring Vail at a time of year when it is literally a ghost town. We left while the roads were still being plowed but the snow on the road was mostly deep slush. We arrived in Frankfort fully intending to see lush green leaves filling the trees and the spring shrubs in full bloom, but they were still sleeping and it wasn’t until nearly June when I saw what I expected to see in May.

From Bird Haven we drove the back roads west to Morris, IL for lunch-supper at R-Place restaurant at the TA Truck stop. It was open and fully staffed. I like this place because it is decorated with antique toys, and they have a salad bar, and a four pound hamburger, which I take full advantage of. On the return trip we ventured east on route six toward Joliet, and finally Frankfort. Although it is still very cool for us the temperature was enjoyable, and we loved the bright sun filling the car with heat.

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What Is Hope?

Posted on 07/04/2023 by Grumpa Joe

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PSA-230406-Book Report

Posted on 06/04/2023 by Grumpa Joe

Reading Main Street by Sinclair Lewis is another line ticked off my bucket list. I scored it four stars. Lewis was an accomplished writer and told a good story in Main Street, but I thought it was a little too slow. Of course that is exactly what he was writing about. His story takes place in a small town in Minnesota called Gopher Prairie. That name struck me as being a funny. I had to look it up. Gopher Prairie is a fictional town patterned after the author’s home town of Sauk Centre, Minnesota.

The main character in this story is Carol a native Minnesotan who gets the idea that she wants to change the world one town at a time. The problem is that she can only see that a town is not to her liking. She really doesn’t know, nor can she describe what an ideal town looks like, only that Gopher Prairie is not to her vision. She meets and marries a local man Will Kennicott a local country doctor who is several years her senior.

Although she agreed to live in Gopher Prairie with he husband Will, she never finds a single thing she likes about the town, or the people who live there. At best she tolerates the people and endures the simplicity of the town of three thousand people. As she described the town I got an image of a place I would like to live.

Carol and Will have a baby, a son. One would think that the child would change the mother’s attitude. Even though she loves the child she he does not change her idea about the town. In the mean time her husband being a country doctor is on the go and out of the house long and often. Carol is not satisfied with keeping a house and raising a baby, she wants more.

My personal opinion is that Carol needed a therapist, but therapists didn’t exist in Gopher Prairie in the early 1900’s. After suffering for several years with this dilemma she decides that the best thing for her to do is to move away to a big city where her vision of perfection would be satisfied. She reminded me of actress Cher in the movie Moonstruck when her fiancee is hopelessly complaining, and Cher hauls off and slaps him across the head, and shouts “snap out of it.”

I did enjoy reading this story, but I couldn’t give it more than four stars. It was slow at times and the author tried to get into the heads of his characters a little too much for my comfort.

Sinclair Lewis is a renowned author having won a Pulitzer Prize for his work, and Main Street was his most successful book. Regardless of Carol’s opinion about Gopher Prairie, I would have loved to grow up there. At the time the town population was 3000. That is very similar to the population of Frankfort, IL when I moved here. I thought the town was idyllic, quiet, pastoral and close to rural. Over the past thirty years it has grown, as has the entire surrounding area, and the charm is now replaced with excessive vehicle traffic, huge schools, oodles of franchises, and too many policemen. The historic district is where all newcomers want to live because it most closely resembles small town America. My ideal town is featured in an old movie titled “It’s A Wonderful Life” with Jimmy Stewart and Donna Reed. This type of town still exists in the USA, but they are far away from big cities and are dying out.

With the current population influx of immigrants from everywhere, our small towns are all bound to grow as poor people look for places that are affordable, and free from too much regulation. Eventually, our cities will resemble those in China where cities like Shanghai exceed twenty millions souls. During the COVID 19 shutdown I researched Wuhan to learn that it is not a single city, but a cluster of several cities blending into one another for a whopping population of sixty million. They sure as hell can’t relate to the story of Main Street at all.

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