Garbage Disposal Placement

One would think it would be easy to decide which side of a double sink should have the garbage disposal. Well I am here to tell it is not easy.
For most of this spring, I have been planning ahead to the day that I tear out the last parts of my kitchen before I reassemble everything. Well, on Saturday, I tore everything out. Now I must wash dishes in the bathroom sink. I cooked breakfast on my camp stove outside. It was pretty good, if I say so myself.
But now that I am getting ready to put the wires and plumbing back into the wall, I have to place everything just so. I want it to be perfect. The problem is, I want it to be perfect in the eyes of any eventual wife. I know some of you married guys are confused. You probably think it would be great to slap everything together without harassment from the little old lady. Sure you do, uh huh? I bet if you think this all the way through though, you will see the quandary. It might be okay for the short term to put a light switch on the wrong side of a sink, but not for the long term.
If you choose the wrong side, that sweet little bride will get more upset every time she uses the misplaced switch. Pretty soon the sweet little bride is no longer as sweet as you would like. "What ever made you think to put that switch there?" "That is the dumbest place to put a switch!" "It will cost twenty thousand dollars to hire a contractor to fix your stupid mistake, and I ain't payin' for it, you are!"
Enough about that. Suffice it to say, I want to get it right in case I trick some pretty thing into marrying me. Here is the debate. My dishwasher is to the right of the sink. My stove is on the left. I am buying a double sink that has the faucets to the right of center, with the larger sink on the left. With the faucets to the right, it seems your right hand will be busy with the sprayer. That only leaves one choice in my mind for which side to install the garbage disposer switch. You guessed it, the left. That solves today's question.
I am headed off to install the switch on the left. The debate is over on that, but the debate will begin anew when it is time to actually install the disposer. So, go to my poll and help me choose the right way to install the disposer.
Kayak Bandit

Blueberries & Grandma's Chicken

One of my favorite memories is going picking blueberries with my grandparents. Grandpa knew all the right places to find the blueberries and grandma could pack the best picnic lunch in the whole wide world.
We would hike across the field from our home to Grandpa Hess' home. When we got there, grandma would be busy setting out all the things she knew we would need. She would pack a bunch of jars of water and arrange them in a cardboard box with towels between each of them. And then there was the big tin box that had all sorts of yummy stuff crammed into it. The house always smelled of fried chicken. It is likely because she always brought chicken for the picnic.
Grandpa would likely have already backed the car out near the gate. He would keep asking if he could start putting things into the car, but no, not until it was all lined up on the cupboard. Then when grandma was sure she had remembered everything, we all were assigned to carry something to the car. She would take the thing that needed to go in the bottom of the trunk herself. We would bring our burden to her to stack just so. Then we would all get into the car, but wait, she had forgotten her sun bonnet. Her bonnet was very wide with a pretty band around the outside. The band went through the hat on both sides with long tails to tie under her chin. She would come a runnin through the gate and into the car. We were off!
When we got to the blueberry picking spot, Grandpa would take off without any of us. He did not even take a bucket to pick his berries. He was too impatient to wait until grandma fashioned a belt for each of us. the belt went around us with the bail of a lard pail inside the belt. She would always show us to keep it slightly to one side so it did not slosh the berries so badly when we walked. Shortly grandpa would return to advise us which direction to head to find the best berries. Grandma would rig him up with a larger lard pail and we set off to the berry patch.
I can still remember how good those first berries always tasted. I bet we each ate a cup of berries before the first one hit the lard pail. Can you picture little Stevie all smeared up with blue berry juice. It is too bad we did not get a picture of that.
After we had picked all we wanted, we would return to the car. Grandma would spread out this giant tablecloth under a shady tree. We would all sit in a circle and enjoy chicken, date roll ups, and fresh bread. Grandma would mix up a drink that I would always call Kool-Ade. Grandma would be very insulted and correct me and say it was not some cheap Kool-Ade. This was real nectar. The difference was lost on me, but I can still remember how much of a big deal it was for me to understand that grandma did not serve that lousy Kool-Ade.
It did not take much to fill us up with all the berries we had eaten. Grandpa would likely want to take a short nap in the shade before we headed home. Grandma would leave us with grandpa and go for another bucket of berries. Good times.
Kayak Bandit

Bare Walls

It is still the 4th of July, 2008, as I sit here to write this blog. It will post in the morning.
I began my holiday by doing my yard work. I edged the lawn before mowing. Bandit gets so excited as I get the lawn tools out. He knows that I will throw the ball for him while I work. Today was no exception. I threw it to the worst spots I could imagine. He could always find the ball though. I did wear him out. As I came into the back yard, he was laying next to his water dish panting. His ball was floating in the water. He was tuckered out.
Once the lawn work was done, I attacked the kitchen. I had gone as far as I could with the kitchen sink still in place, so today I tore that out too. Boy, was it a lot of work. When they built stuff back in 1952, they wanted it to last forever. Everything was nailed with big nails and the metal parts were all rusted. I now have it all stripped to the bare walls. So the next step is to reroute some wires and replace the galvanized pipes with copper.
I was going to buy a new sink, but looking the old one over, convinced me to reuse it. I am going to get a new disposer. I have most of the other materials I need to continue.
With no kitchen, I plan to eat on paper plates and cook most of my food on the bar-b-que. Tonight I had a nice steak and corn-on-the-cob. Yum yum!
Enjoy the rest of your weekend.
Kayak Bandit

Independence

What does it really mean to be independent? You can succeed or fail. Your success or failure is no longer dependent on someone else. You are independent.
As a nation, our independence relieved us having to pay huge tariffs to our parent countries. Our independence meant we had to protect ourselves.
Our nation as a whole has been the best force for good ever known to mankind. Once we became independent, we set on a course of helping other peoples become independent too. Most countries seek to control the countries they help militarily. We rarely if ever get compensated for our efforts to free other people.
And, even though we once were subject to Europe, we do not hold grudges. Look how much we helped out all of Europe during the World Wars. There is no place on this planet that has improved itself without some help from the US. Look who is always first to show up with search and rescue after a disaster. Always for free.
I thank God that this country is founded in the belief of a Supreme Being. I especially appreciate that I can say my religious thoughts in a group without consequence. Why, anyone can believe what they want. You can even not believe.
So, what does this have to do with the price of tea in China? Try to honestly think where you would rather live than in the USA. I knew you wanted to stay here. So, let's all get together and get through this tough economic time we are in. We can and will succeed if we work together as generations of the past. Do you realize that as much as we complain about the high price of gasoline, it is nearly twice as expensive in parts of Europe. We still have it better here than anywhere in the world.
As a nation, lets stop complaining about the hard times and make them better. As for me, I am glad I/we are independent, even if there is a chance we can fail. Remember, "United We Stand!"
Kayak Bandit

Faster, Faster - Oops

Living on a farm in Minnesota offers a boy all kinds of things to do. As for me, I was not limited at all. I could go over to the neighbors and hang with them. I could go upstairs in the hay loft and check out the special spot our cat always had her litter of kittens. I could go to the woods and shoot the twenty-two.
The only time I lacked freedom was when assigned to do farm work. Oh, yeah, that was almost constantly, wasn't it? I remember this one time that I was bored silly. I would carefully cultivate a few rows of corn exactly as I had been instructed. But the boredom caused me to snap. When I would come to the end of the corn row, instead of lifting the cultivator, I left the cultivator down and pushed very hard on one of the brakes. In case you are interested, tractors have directional brakes. You can step on either brakes to the left or right. Or you can step right in the middle for both sides.
So, with the cultivator down and only one brake applied, the non applied wheel would be overwhelmed and not able to make the tractor move. The tire would keep turning, but the tractor stayed where it was. In a short time, this tire would kick out all the dirt within it's reach and be spinning freely. So, then I would apply the opposite break and do it again. This time I would stop the digging as close to completely stuck as I could. A few times I got very close to really making the tractor stuck.
That is what I was hoping for. It was really exciting to be nearly stuck and work hard at regaining mobility. Some times I would have to get under the machine and shove some of the displaced dirt back into the big hole. I do not remember ever getting it stuck, stuck.
A close call would have broken the monotony enough to return to dutifully cultivating corn. Until you have been on a tractor all day, you have no idea how boring this is.
Another thing I did was discover the governor of the tractor. There is a throttle for the tractor within hands reach of the driver, right? Well it does not go straight to the carburetor. It first goes to the governor. The governor senses how fast the engine is turning and constantly adjusts the carburetor to maintain the engine speed. The manufacturer determined what the maximum rpm should be. There was a stop at this speed on the throttle.
One day while bored, I became very aware of this principle. See, if I stepped on the brakes, the governor would advance the carburetor enough to maintain the same speed. You see where I am going with this? Why couldn't I perform the function of the governor? I stopped the tractor and stood beside the engine with it running. Sure enough, I could advance the carburetor by moving this one lever toward the driver.
At this time I did not have any string with me. The next trip home, I found a piece of twine and carefully tied one end to the lever and the other end near the driver. I headed off to the field. When I got about a quarter mile away, I reached over and put that tractor into 'Steve Overdrive'. Man, o' man, was I moving along now. I went from the usual twelve miles per hour to at least sixteen, I suspect. I was enjoying this so much, that I did not see the dust cloud from my dad coming. He passed me and slid to a stop in the middle of the road. I stopped too. He walked to the side of the tractor, pulled out his knife, cut the string, tossed it to me, got in the car and left.
I never did that again!
My dad understood this phenomenon about cultivating and me. Only a few years ago, I was telling him about some of this, and he was already aware of what I was telling. He even reminded me of some things I had done without me first confessing. It seems he knew about it all the time.
Kayak Bandit

Barb's Birthday

Happy Birthday to you!
Happy Birthday sixty two!
Happy Birthday dear Barbara!
Happy Birthday to you!

In case you do not already know, Barb is my sister.

Kayak Bandit

Pipe Day

Today, was a bonus day of the best kind. Here I am minding my own business at work when I discover that I had exceeded the maximum number of 320 hours of saved vacation time. Last pay period ended with me at 314 hours. So when this pay period needed to add my usual 7 hours, I over shot the maximum by one hour. Boy was I relieved it was only one hour.
As I considered what to do, I realized I had only two days remaining in this accounting period to use another 7 hours. So I went to the boss and asked what could be done. He suggested I take today off. See what I mean about a bonus day!
So, what to do with such a gift from nowhere. I got up and made a pot of coffee. I called Group Health to straighten out why they had locked me out of the site to check on my doctor stuff. It seems they lock you out after going eighteen months without using it. It was all understandable until they would not let me reuse the password I prefer to use. Once you use a password one time, they will never let you reuse it. Boy did that tick me off. How is an old man of sixty supposed to remember all these different passwords. The very nice lady on the phone told me that this is the most frequent complaint and conversation she has to deal with. Why don't they get a clue and let you reuse a stinking password? I relented when she assured me she would promptly pass my remarks on to management.
So I got that taken care of. More coffee. Oh, yeah, my results from my physical were excellent. My cholesterol is a little high, but I started out with high cholesterol. My doctor assures me it is okay.
Last weekend I started replacing some old galvanized pipes that share the wall between the bathroom and kitchen. Well, one thing leads to another, and I also rerouted some electrical wires too. All was going along nicely until I was putting the final touches on running the abs pipe above the basement bathroom. I had to stand on a step stool to reach. I propped all the parts within easy reach. I opened the glue can and glued one end of the pipe. As I withdrew my arm to get a new load of glue onto the dauber, I bumped into an electrical wire and dropped the dauber. It could not have been worse. It went right down inside a wall. It was way beyond recovery.
I jumped down from my perch and ran to the garage to find another dauber. I found an old can of abs glue. I removed the lid, but the glue had hardened so badly that I could not use it. Now I was frantic. I needed to return to my pipe before the applied glue hardened. I found a can of pvc glue and wiped all the glue from the dauber and then used it. I did not know this old man could move so fast. It all went well for the rest of the install.
The new faucet in the bathroom really works good and looks good too. If it lasts for fifty six years like the one I replaced, someone else will have to replace it. I do not intend to repair plumbing for many more years.
Kayak Bandit

Pie Irons

The subject of pie irons came up. I agree whole heartedly that pie irons are great. For those of you that do not know about these little wonders, pull up a computer and read about them.
A pie iron is actually two halves that come apart. I insist on cast iron, square ones. You always start with two slices of bread. Spray one side of a slice of bread with non-stick, butter flavored spray. Place this, buttered side toward the pie iron. Kind of tuck it in to the pie iron. Now repeat for the other half. If you are making toasted cheese sandwiches, then all you need is some cheese. Now fold the half without the cheese over the top of the half with the cheese.
Carefully and slowly heat the pie iron by holding the handles together and extending the cast irons over the fire. Every half minute or so, turn the opposite side toward the fire. After three or four minutes, check how brown the bread is by raising one of the handles away from the other handle to get a peak inside. When it is done to your liking, just turn the pie out onto a paper plate. Do not use Styrofoam plates because they melt.
Okay, now for other things to try in the place of cheese. Try:
*Pizza squeeze, cheese and pizza toppings of your choice
*Pastrami, Swiss cheese and sauerkraut on rye bread
*Left over spaghetti, but use garlic butter on the outside of the bread instead of spray
*sliced boiled eggs, ham and American cheese for breakfast
*pie filling of your choice, my favorite is peach

You get the idea. almost everything you have eaten hot with a fork can be made this way. It is the most important item in my camping supplies. Toilet paper is slightly more important.

Kayak Bandit

Comfort Food

Do you ever get the hankering for some comfort food, but you can't quite think what it is?
Peanut butter and celery - nope
green olives - nope
jalapeno green olives - nope
tin roof sundae ice cream - nope
Pickled pig feet - close, but no cigar

So, you go to the store and buy everything you have ever eaten before.

Once back home,
home made almond steamer - nope
sardines - nope
artichoke - the leaves aren't it
artichoke - neither is the heart
onion sandwich - nope
radish sandwich - nope
tomato on toast - yep,

but the fresh, homegrown ones from the garden won't be ripe for a month and a half. Now you wish you had not solved the craving, because it is not within your reach.

Saturday

My Saturday is even wilder than last night.
I have to inspect the sewer connection for a church. The members needed to connect the sewer to the public sewer on Saturday because they mostly work during the week and their Worship Service is on Sunday. I volunteered to do the inspection.
I got up at six as usual and made breakfast from leftover hamburger buns. BTW, hamburger buns make the very best french toast in the whole wide world. I am not kidding!
I wrote a blog or two. Drank coffee. Showered, and got dressed.
Getting out of the shower, I noticed the Pastor had called on my work phone. I returned his call to discover they were having difficulty. I tried to understand what was wrong, but instead offered to drive over and check it out in person. It was no big deal, and we resolved it. I even helped put the pipe together. There was a big grassy area, so I threw the Frisbee for Bandit. Soon the connection was made and I left to come home to more left over sausages. Yum.
I wasted the last half of last night's beer. May I have another one today, or am I in trouble for wasting? One of my friends demanded "Go for it!" I drank the whole thing in less than two hours. It did get above ninety degrees today. I really appreciated the beer.
Around four thirty, the people from the church got the last of the pipe installed. I went over and approved the work. Now I get to hang out in the house for the evening. I think I will carve some more stamps and go to bed early. I plan to go out kayaking tomorrow. I will go early to beat the heat.

Kayak Bandit

Friday

I hope all of you other single people had as much fun as I did last night. This Friday was even better than most. I came home from work fifteen minutes late because a detour prompted the closure of my normal bus stop. When the bus seemed to be late, I read the notice and walked to the correct bus stop. No big deal.
I had a wonderful Friday night meal of left over sausages from the letterboxing party. I even had a half can of beer. Yum.
Next, I washed the dishes.
After this I deserved a reward, so I scooped up a dish of vanilla ice cream and topped it with chocolate covered peanuts. Also pretty yummy.
The chair was quite comfy, so I fell asleep in front of the TV.
I woke about ten and went to bed. Bandit let a whopper of a fart as he lay down beside my bed. (his way of saying sleep well)
After such a wild single person night, I have to rest up a bit.
Kayak Bandit

Letterboxing Sells Itself

I started letterboxing at the urging of my oldest daughter, Stephanie. She got her tendency to jump into something with both feet from me. So when she starts telling me about all the fun she is having searching out letterboxes by following clues, how could I not chose to join her fun.
At first, I could not imagine myself as an artistic carver. I can draw snowmen, rabbits, maps, and a boy. All are pretty basic. I make maps for work. I have developed a style that relates the important information without any artistic flair. The boy is created by starting with the word

boy

and then drawing a curved line from the top of the b to the right side of the y. and then I draw a curved line from the bottom of the y to the left side of the b. The two circle become eyes and the y becomes the ear of my boy picture. I usually give him a crew cut for hair. A few quick facial lines and he does not look too bad. Even though I can draw a boy, does not mean I feel artistic.
Shortly after telling me about letterboxing, Stephanie forwarded to me an announcement of an upcoming letterboxing event. The Fat Lady was planning a letterboxing party for her younger sister, The Pied Piper. What could a dad do but sign up to attend as Kayak Bandit.
I attended this event. From the second I met the first one until now. Everyone involved in letterboxing were and continue to be so very welcoming, warm, open and sharing. Especially helpful to me was Stormcrow. He encouraged me to sign into his logbook and gave me his stamp. He also had a stamp of a dollar bill. He conducted a quiz where the person guessing the right answer would get the image stamped and he would write in the amount that was won. I think I won five bucks. It was a lot of fun.
I had already bought the idea of the hobby from Stephanie's first explanation. Yet, I had to somehow draw an image of a dog (named bandit) paddling a kayak. I assured myself and anyone listening that I could not do it. I was telling my friend Melissa about it, and wondered if she could help. You see, she has shown me some nice artwork of hers. In a couple days she had drawn a picture of what I needed. Great job, Melissa.
As most new carvers do, I chose to carve a negative image of her artwork. I am not real happy with the result. I plan to recarve the same image, but make it positive instead. It will have to do for now.
After attending the party, but before I finished my signature stamp, I went to the Atlas Quest online site to check out nearby letterboxes. Wow, there were lots to choose from. I delayed searching for any boxes until I could do it up right. I wanted my own logbook and stamp. Eventually I was ready. Stormcrow listed a new box named Loveboat. We chatted on line about it. He pointed out that he used snow shoes to get to the spot as there was about two feet of snow. Not to be deterred, I went out the next day and found my first box. I had no snow shoes, but managed to get to it. Some times I would break through the crusty snow, but it was worth it. Bandit and I sat down in the snow and logged our first find. Physically, I was cold and wet, but not emotionally.
Now when I find a letterbox, I absorb all I can about the letterbox. I look carefully at the stamp to see what technique was used to carve it. I look at the way the logbook is bound. I look at all the images stamped into the logbook and read the comments. People come from all across our country to find letterboxes. I even have a hitch hiker letterbox that came from Erie Pennsylvania. I hope the interest in these treasures remains for me. Judging from the others I have met, I bet it intensifies. I cannot imagine, but okay, bring it on. I am ready.
Letterboxing really does sell itself. For more information about letterboxing, check out this link. http://bayareabackroads.com/RecentShows/April562008/tabid/92/Default.aspx It was taped in California. See you on the trail.
Kayak Bandit ----/---- '(*!*)'

Gas Prices

Has everyone had enough of the high price of gas yet? I have. It is getting in the way of seeing my grandkids.
Steph called today saying she had been trying to arrange a surprise trip to visit me with her four kids. When it came right down to deciding she had to side with frugality. It is just under four hundred miles and the cost of fuel alone would have been close to two hundred dollars. When you add in all the other costs of traveling it put it over the top.
I hope we are not forever hostage to these prices. I still have a nice pickup and camper that I am not using at all this year. When I haul the camper and tow my boat, the pickup only gets about seven miles to the gallon. That mean a trip of eight hundred miles would cost around four hundred and fifty dollars in fuel alone.
So the next thought is to sell the truck. The truth is that you cannot even give the truck away. So I am stuck.
I hope we have the political will to find better ways to supply our energy needs for the long term while drilling to supply our needs for the short term. I suspect the urgency is helping to find alternatives. There will be some breakthroughs when someone sees a way to profit from their effort. Let's be grateful to that person.
Steph, I hope we can get together soon.
Kayak Bandit '(*!*)'

The Prize

I am always telling about my family. This story is probably my favorite.
Bear was a picky eater. He loved home cooked food, but hated peas. As for me, the more veggies in a beef stew the better. Not Bear. He would work at the bowl of stew as though his tongue was a scalpel. His head was huge. It amazed me that he could even know the existence of a pea in the stew.
I think you could have counted out ten peas and stirred them into the stew and he would still segregate them. And then when you counted them there would be ten peas in varying degree of smashed. He would not have injured the peas, but were probably injured by the person stirring the stew.
Like I said, Bear was a picky eater. He would not be interested in the dry food in his bowl. He would come into the house and glance at the bowl, but walk on by until he had to eat or starve.
But there was a way to get Bear to eat these dry morsels. It was a game for our two daughters, Steph and Jenny. One of the girls would take Bear into a closet with the door slightly ajar. The other girl would start a domino trail from this closet door. The domino trail would be made up of his rejected food spaced about a foot apart.
Some times the trail would lead in a serpent path through the whole house. When the trail was complete, it always ended at a different closet with the door slightly ajar. The person that constructed the trail would call out that it was time to find her. Bear would almost jump out of his skin in anticipation of the hunt. He would eat each and every nugget as if he had not eaten in a month. Some times the trail would be very near to other nuggets that were farther along on the trail, but he would not cheat and skip any of the trail.
As the hunt progressed, Bear would occasionally look to his huntmaster for assurance. He would hear "goooooood dog" with excitement. Some times you could hear uncontrolled giggling coming from the eventual closet. Still, Bear would continue his Hansel and Grettel hunt.
If I was busy, it rarely was so much so, but what I would be on hand to watch the happy reunion at the end of the hunt. Both girls would be giggling so hard and Bear increased his intensity in a crescendo as Bear nudged open the closet door. There were hugs for everyone and a very happy howl from Bear. What a happy memory.
Kayak Bandit '(*!*)'

Roller Skating

Do you remember back to when you were a kid. One of my memories is skating. We did not have a roller rink in our home town of Verndale, Minnesota. When we went skating we had to drive to Wadena.
I started skating when I was about ten. At ten years old I would pull myself along the railing. I hated coming to the end of the straight-a-way because I had not learned to turn. All the good skaters would make this graceful turn at both ends of the rink, but I would have to rely on the wall to keep myself from falling down. So, when I came to the curved portion, I would follow the wall to the square corner. I would stop and realign myself along the end of the rink. There were often other skater stopped here to visit. They were out of the way of the main flow, but usually in my way. I was a skinny little runt, so I could squeeze through if I was patient.
Okay, so now I got to the second straight-a-way. Here I had to time getting into the flow without getting smashed into by some big jock that was skating backward or something. Those big jock types were always skating backward in front of the cutest girls. Man did I want to know how to skate backward.
Eventually I got a little better. I could go full tilt all the way around the floor. The only thing I had to be careful of, was making sure both skates were in contact with the floor all the way around the curve portion. If I did not have enough steam going into the curve, and had to lift a skate, it was only the outside one. You know, the one foot push and coast stroke.
Some times the mean announcer would call for everyone off the floor. Once we were all off, he would announce a reverse skate. Crap. What was a guy to do. It was so unnatural to turn clockwise after learning to turn counter-clockwise. I had to try though. Those guys that were able to skate backwards and flirt at the same time had no trouble at all. If there was jealousy before, it had just gone another notch higher.
I never did like having to skate reverse, but I did get a lot better at the turns on the end. Eventually I was able to maintain a good speed and keep putting one skate in front of the other. I was so proud of myself when I learned this. The down side to a good night of skating for a boy was when they announced couples only. I paid good money to be able to skate. But no, only those that had a partner could skate. I just had to sit down, how boring.
Then one evening, someone planted an idea in my head. Why not ask a girl to skate? Who me? Are you crazy? Tell me more. Why, it is not that hard. Every girl here wants to partner skate more than you do. You see, you go up and ask them if they would like to skate and at the same time be heading to the floor. That way they will answer yes. It takes the tension away if you make it seem natural.
But wait just a minute. How do I skate with a girl? Do I have to hold her hand? What if our skates bang into one another? So, you do not want to skate with a girl? Why yes, but how? So my friend explained that you take ahold of her left hand with your own left hand. And then you start skating nice and slow. The girl will match your skating pace and you put your right hand behind her back and take ahold of the inside of her right elbow.
It was amazing how the couple skates changed from dread to something to look forward to. It was not that you were discouraged from skating as couples during an all skate. It was that, well, during an all skate, us guys were seeing how fast we could make the turn at the ends. It was a big thing to make our skates growl from the force of the fast turn.
Those were some really fun times.
I wrote this earlier with plans to publish it on the 27th, but discovered letterboxer, Lady B, is a roller skating instructor from Beaverton, Oregon. Lady B is coming to a letterboxing party at my house tonight, so I moved the publish date up in her honor.
Kayak Bandit ‘(*!*)’

Walking to Work

When you walk a familiar path, where do you look? Do you look for the spot to land your next footstep? Do you look at something far ahead? Or do you stare at nothing special as you think deep thoughts?
When I walk to the bus stop en route to work, there are lots of interesting things to look for. I see the work a neighbor has done to build a retaining wall. I see the new addition that another neighbor is building. I see that a neighbor has brought some fence material home. Now I need to watch to see how quickly he moves forward with the project.
Some times I notice the cracks in the sidewalk and remember back to when we chanted the line "don't step on a crack, cause it will break your mama's back." Boy, would we walk gingerly to avoid stepping on a crack for this cause. But if the cracks got too close together, someone would change the chant to "don't step on a crack, cause it will break your teacher's back." When that was the chant, we were eager to step on a crack if our teacher was perceived to be mean.
Some times you must stop all progress to marvel at the way a tree leaf emerges. Recently, I noticed that a laceleaf maple tree leaf grows to full length before it starts to unfurl. Then each day you notice that the leaf grows broader and broader somewhat like a fan stretching out. You know, the fans like the elegant people used at the theater before air conditioning.
But some times you notice things that gnaw at you. There is this duplex where the people come outside only to smoke and talk on the phone. The yard has a birch tree that was broken at Christmas when someone must have tried to climb up the scrawny thing to put Christmas lights on it. Well, the partially strung lights are still in the tree and after six months no one has removed the lights or the broken tree. The yard has not been moved, no weeds have been pulled, the sidewalk is almost overgrown like the jungle and bear cans where they landed.
I was told by a friend that I need to let things go. I take too many things too seriously.
But then there are the times that you no more have started toward the bus that you are already there. Those days I have been thinking ahead to when I will be riding bicycle with my grandkids at the beach. Or sharing popcorn over the campfire. Or tutoring the next generation how to carefully heat up graham crackers and chocolate on a flat rock by the same fire that you are toasting the marshmallow.
And then there are the times I compose, in my head, good stories to tell my grandkids at bedtime. I always try to think up stories that can have characters with the same names as the grandkids that need their rest for another day of bicycles, dogs, popcorn and s'mores.
Kayak Bandit '(*!*)'

Driving With Grandpa

My Grandpa Hess was a warm, wonderful man. I remember fondly the times we shared. As most old people do, he had some interesting truisms. My favorite is on my letterboxing website. "You will not get stuck if you just keep moving." Another one was his admonition to someone shoveling grain into the granary. "Don't worry at all about the toe of the shovel, concentrate on filling the heal and the toe will take care of itself."
Visiting at grandpa's home was special. He had a windmill. A lot of things happened at the windmill. The obvious, was the water would get pumped up into a trough that led to the cattle tank. When the wind blew steady for quite a while the tank would become full. Grandpa had a knack for knowing how close to full the tank was. When it was nearly full, grandpa might ask me to go to the windmill and release the lever which in turn stopped the windmill from turning. Even though the wind would blow whether or not the pump was turning, grandpa did not want to wear out the bearings on the windmill.
Another happening at the windmill was washing grandpa's 1950 Chevrolet. Grandpa was very pleased with his car and kept it clean. It was exceptionally clean compared to our car. Why, dad would drive our car across a rough field to get a closer look at a herd of deer. Or deliver a greasy part to Ole's repair shop. If grandpa needed to haul something, he would put it in the trunk wrapped in a gunny sack.
Often, I would help wash his car. We would suds it up real good and then throw buckets of water onto the car to rinse the suds off. When the car had adequately dried, Grandpa would let me sit in his lap and drive the car. He would choose a short route for me to drive, ending in parking it inside the garage.
Even though I was accustomed to driving tractors, a car was a big deal. And doing anything with grandpa was special.
Kayak Bandit '(*!*)'

Long, Long Ride

My daughters love to help tell this story. It seems my perspective selectively dismisses some of my guilt in the good parent category. Their version always paints me as a slightly bad parent.
We had this very reliable older 1962 Chevrolet pickup. It had a shell canopy. I built a shelf at the front of the pickup bed as well as seats along each side of the bed. I upholstered them so they would be comfortable for sleeping or sitting. When we went camping, I would pull our trailer house with the pickup, and Kathy would pull the boat.
On this particular trip, we were camped at Pelton Dam, or Lake Simtustus. Lake Simtustus is created by Pelton Dam. The entire lake is very pristine. There are no homes along the edges of the lake. The fishing is fabulous at times and the rest of the time it is pretty good.
Shortly after this trip some of the campsites slipped into the lake. And for many years afterward, they canceled all camping at the lake. I see that they now have 71 camp sites. So, they must have resolved the problem.
Well, one nice day we decided to go for a drive. Kathy and I rode up front. Steph and Jenny always wanted to ride on the bed in the back. So after a little debate about the safety of that, it was decided we would only drive on secondary roads. No fast highways for us. Oh, and Bear would also ride in the back with the two girls.
So we set off, enjoying the view of the central Oregon desert overlooking the deep chasm of the Crooked River. Here is where the recounting of the story is tricky. It seems the girls were trying to get our attention. I suspect that we saw them waving their arms and interpreted there gesturing as appreciation for the fine ride. They contend that they were desperate to get our attention because Bear was having a fart attack. According to our indignant young girls, the farts were borderline lethal. And they agree that the frequency between farts was intolerable.
Well, if this was not bad enough for my little darlings, Kathy read the map and suggested a route that was long. We rode for much of an afternoon. My memory is all positive. It was a magnificent day. We crossed a bridge that I did not previously know about. Fun for everyone? Not quite.
If the situation with Bear's farts was not bad enough, the longer the trip went, the rougher the road got. So, these two girls, that were eager to start the trip were even more eager for it to end. I can only imagine how rough the road must have felt to those two very full bladders.
I have to ask. Girls, was the pain worth the memory? I sure hope so.
Kayak Bandit '(*!*)'

I Can Pee Better Than You!

Since, as long as there have been towns and cities, there has been competition between city slickers and country bumpkins. I happen to fall in the latter category. And, truth be known, I am a bumpkin.
There have been numerous times that I did not measure up to city standards. How was I supposed to know that you have to cross a street near the intersection, for instance. By the way, why do they call that infraction "J Waking?" Could it be the way us farmers perceive a jay? After all, city dwellers, jays do strut around in a random fashion. And which farmer gave the city folks permission to use our verbiage? Did you notice I used the word verbiage? Pretty impressive word for a bumpkin, wouldn't you say? I hope I spelled it correctly.
Well, my cousins lived in town. They would come to the farm for visits. They were exposed to things in their town of Silver Bay, that we were not. I remember how interesting their lives were. But, they liked coming to the farm for equal and opposite reasons.
My memory of cousin Chuck always intrigued me. You see, I remember challenging him to compete with me to see who could pee and make the stream of pee hit the fence wire. I do not know how I learned not to pee on a fence. I do not think I ever did. Also note that the fence we were attempting to pee upon was an electric fence.
The way I remember it, is that my aim was not as good as Chuck's aim. He won the competition. His reward for winning was a jolt of electricity through a sensitive part of the body. Congratulate him if ever your paths cross.
Admittedly, the question crossed my mind whether this could lead to serious reproductive harm. In time the question was answered with the birth of his wonderful girls. Speaking of these girls, I traveled back to Minnesota about fifteen years ago to visit Chuck and his family. We had a wonderful visit.
Chuck stayed true to his Christian upbringing. He raised his daughters to be Christian too. Because I was aware of his faith, I was taken aback when he said to me as we were preparing to leave, "Take care you old turd." His daughters were shocked to hear their dad say "turd", which was obvious to me from there harmonious "Dad???"
Chuck replied to his daughters by adding "Well he is a turd. Do you realize that your uncle Steve tricked me into peeing onto an electric fence?" I was so embarrassed that he would discuss this in front of his family. I was always too embarrassed to discuss this with him, even when no one else was around.
I collected myself enough to ask (since he had breached the subject) if his memory was the same as mine. I said that I remembered tricking him twice. My very honorable cousin, Chuck, admitted that it was twice.
Chuck, I am glad that you were not injured by my prank. I hope you can forgive me.
Kayak Bandit '(*!*)'

Truckin

Oregon gets a lot of credit for the copious amount of rain that falls there every year. While the coastal area west of the Coast Mountain Range, live up to this belief, not all of Oregon is deluged. Truth be known, the eastern half of the state is a high desert.
My brother, Andy, lived in Clatskanie when we were young men. Let me assure you that Clatskanie is not high desert. No way, It is about as rainy as any place. The constant rain helps grow some mighty trees. Much of the timber for our nation comes from this part of the country. Everyone knows about Douglass Fir.
Another tree that is highly sought after is the Western Cedar. Cedar grows in the very bottom of canyons in the wettest places. Like I said, it is very wet around Clatskanie. You can well imagine that the surrounding canyon bottoms are even more wet. Yep, there are places that you must walk carefully across the tree roots and down trees to navigate these swamplands.
When the forests were first logged many years ago, the cedar trees were not wanted like they are today. Mostly they cut the very large Douglass Fir and left the cedar standing. If the cedar was cut down or knocked down accidentally, it was left where it landed.
Some years ago people started using cedar for fencing, decks and increased the use of cedar for roofing. This increased demand for the cedar trees and the fact that cedar grows slowly, caused a shortage of cedar. Well, the very quality that cedar is known for (slow to rot) also kept the left behind logs in pretty good shape. Mind you, these logs are in that very swampy area at the very bottom of some very big canyons. Oh, and did I say already that the canyons themselves are very wet. I did? Eh, sorry for repeating myself.
Well, Andy was building a home for his family. He needed roofing material. He needed beams for the living room. He needed paneling for the home. In other words, he needed the cedar from these canyon swamps.
Whenever we came across a good log that had been left behind, we would make a mental note where it was. Then when we had the time, we would figure out how to retrieve the brute. Sometimes we could get a four wheel drive pickup into the area. This took a lot of skill to navigate between trees, rocks, old stumps, fences and other obstacles. We would help each other by standing nearby and indicating how close the driver was to something. Inside the heart of whoever the spotter was, is up for discussion. Even though we were truthful about the closeness of a tree, or whatever, we were always hoping the other would get his pickup trapped. Oh, the bragging rights that come with Steve towing Andy! I suppose there were the times that Andy towed Steve, but I can think of none.
Along with brother competing with brother, was Chevy vs Ford. Some times, when not using the pickups for useful tasks, one of us would find a spot that we thought our particular pickup could conquer, but our brother's Ford or Chevy could not. We would argue long and hard about such a spot. Usually we would challenge the other to go first. But, the person that came up with the cockamamie idea would have to relent and go first or even worse, admit that the challenge was not doable.
Andy's Ford was taller than my Chevy. Andy would usually win the competition where it required going in and out of a steep ditch. My pickup's bumper would impede me. I would usually win when it was a steep side hill. My pickup's lower center of gravity would be the winning difference. We made the hard work of retrieving those cedar logs into a lot of fun. Thanks for the memories, Andy.
Kayak Bandit '(*!*)'