Wonderful Wisconsin Weather!

8/12/06, 12:10 pm.
67º F, Bright Sunshine, SSE wind 6 mph.

Good afternoon,

The weather has been exceptional since arriving home. The sun is out and it is in the temperature range we really like - mid to low 70's for highs. The overnight low did surprise us some, especially in the north and west of here where it almost touched the 30's overnight. Sounds as if we will be getting some rain Sunday night through Monday at least.

I went uptown yesterday to get the mail and refill may medications. While we did get a couple of bills, nothing to really worry about. The phone company still insists that we have a credit, but we cannot find how or where, so are taking no chances and paying the current usage amount. As soon as we don’t pay it, they probably will find it though. Don’t want to lose phone service. I also noticed the price of gasoline was all over the place, at least for the only four stations we have in town. One had a price of $3.059/gallon, two had a price of $3.129/gallon, and the fourth had $3.149/gallon shown. Not sure what the reason is, but we paid $3.129/gallon when we put some in at Green Bay. We didn’t fill it, betting on the price going down, but enough to get around for a couple of weeks.

After leaving the Holy Spirit Conference, we more or less made a bee-line for North Dakota. Out of the Twin Cities, we followed State highway 55 rather than the Interstate system. It meant a few less miles, but probably a bit more time, although I was surprised how fast we did make the journey. The road was in excellent shape and a very nice drive. It was interesting to see the smaller towns along the way and to watch as the terrain changes as we drive west - from a very tree covered and occasionally hilly landscape to one of being very open and reasonably flat. We could see the edge of the earth and didn’t want to get there only to fall off of the edge! I really was surprised to see how many acres are planted in soybeans this time, rather than the corn and grain of the past. Times are changing and so are the profit centers I guess.

When lunch time came, we were at Breckenridge, Minnesota at the North Dakota border and time to look for a park. I spied a sign directing us to a city park, which turned out to also be the county fair grounds. In many respects, it is an old-fashioned style fair grounds. It still offers folks a place to camp or picnic during the rest of the year! It was a very pleasant stop for us, right along the banks of the Red River, also the headwaters. I think it probably is the only fair grounds I have ever seen which has a church on the grounds! A little old-fashioned, white, Little House on the Prairie style church.

The reason for the city park was the celebration of the first permanent settlement that far west in the 1850's. The settlers arrived in January and built the first cabin in February of the same year. I can’t imagine, building a cabin at that time of year, let alone traveling by horse/oxen pulled wagon at that time of year. They must have had a lot more Norwegian blood in their systems then I do! Logs are hard to cut into building materials when they are frozen, with axes and hand saws. I have found it nearly impossible to use a drawknife on a wet/green frozen log here! Wonder how "tight" the cabin was. Must have been fun to mix mud with straw and water and keep it from freezing before using it for chinking!

We did make it to LaMour in good shape and Sue had a beef roast and a buffalo roast in the oven for supper, along with the promise of sending some "wild meat" along home with us. We never say no to that kind of an offer. Sue must have thought we brought our tape worms along with us as there was way too much very good food. We had our fill and then some. It really was good to "chew the fat" with her again. We arrived Sunday afternoon and left Tuesday morning. Monday afternoon/evening we drove to Fargo to pick up Don. A nice ride and a good meal too.

I noticed a some tire tracks on the lawn yesterday while starting to cut the lawn. I think it was a crew from the power company, trimming trees around the power lines. This morning I noticed there was a smallish birch tree log next to the driveway, left for me to use for firewood. I sure will! They didn’t cut any trees on our property, stopping at the property line. Expect I will see them in the near future to trim ours, but there really isn’t that much to do. They just might wait until the next time they come through. Hope so.

I did get some of the lawn cut yesterday and Margriet got a bunch of laundry done. The environmentally friendly solar dryer worked extremely well with the added breeze and low humidity. I also got out my asbestos paper and wrote a long letter to the corporate headquarters of the motel we stayed at in the Twin Cities, complaining about the motel. Not sure if it will do any good, but at least they know our feelings.

Time to get a-going.

In Christ My Saviour,

Chris <><