Who are we? We are our stories.

Wednesday, April 24, 2013

He Stopped Loving Her Today

This one just topped a list of the saddest songs ever written. They said when they first recorded it they almost didn't release it because it is so low. And few people would argue that George Jones, on the rare occasions when he was sober, was maybe the greatest country singer who ever stepped up to a mic. After my mother-in-law Florence died, Bob really never got over it. I first listened to the this song right after his funeral. It's not something I can listen to casually.

Tuesday, April 23, 2013

Pelicans

The White Pelicans nest locally, but not on Fountain Lake. These were taken on the northwest corner of Edgewater Bay, where the creek comes south of Darv Habben's house.





A shot from our deck this morning 4/24/2013
Here's some miscellaneous, Double-crested Cormorants that always flock with Pelicans, and Pied-billed Grebes. A flock of grebes caught my attention, because they are are normally solitary birds.
:




Loons

The uncommon Common Loon is the Minnesota State Bird. Most years we see a handful on our lake for a couple of days as they pass through to the lakes of the northern woods. This year those lakes are still frozen solid so we have been treated to probably a hundred birds scattered around the lake with their haunting calls in the morning and evenings. There are also a dozen  different kinds of ducks. We took a drive around the lake this afternoon and I took pictures of loons, pelicans and ducks, but Lorna has been posting some nice waterfowl pictures so I won't bother posting all of mine



8:30 PM: Lorna just came home from a meeting and reports that they counted a flock of 3 dozen loons. Loons only flock to migrate. I'm betting they will soon be gone.

Monday, April 22, 2013

Waterfowl

Lorna has been down by the lake burning through pixels with her new camera like there is no tomorrow. She has some really nice shots.

http://lgbsnaturephotos.blogspot.com/

Friday, April 19, 2013

Juncos, Snow, Spring?

The snow finally melted off. The black-eyed juncos haven't migrated north yet. Last night it snowed again - just enough to cover the ground. They seem to relish the snow and cold. It could be worse, in Minneapolis, a hundred miles to the north, they got 12 inches, and far north in Duluth, a couple of feet of new snow.


The ice is pretty much off the lake and there have been various ducks and white pelicans swimming around out front. Yesterday, Lorna took some pictures of loons (link on the right). She has also taken some nice ones of the ducks, which she will eventually post.

I've been hearing the loons. especially in evenings. If you never heard them, they are quite loud and spooky beautiful.
 http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/common_loon/sounds

Be well,
Gunnar

Sunday, April 14, 2013

Lanesboro Breakfast ;-)

I'm getting old enough that food has become a major part of my pleasures. This morning I had Eggs Benedict, pretty standard Sunday morning fare. Brett said he was bored baking at 4:30 this morning so he baked some extra Danish pastry, kicked it up a notch, and came up with this. The result of his boredom was my breakfast - Danish pastry (without frosting) stuffed with spinach and thin-sliced ham, resting on bed of crispy hashbrowns, capped with two eggs, then covered with hollandaise sauce. Sliced strawberries on the side. It was not necessarily healthy, but it was a great combination of textures, sweet, fat and salt.

Before I forget, there were ten whitetail does scampering across the cottage yard last evening. No fawns yet.

Be well,
Gunnar

Friday, April 12, 2013

Pedal Pushers

I am an old chauffeur putting miles on my little Honda. Before and after my last posting we left Lanesboro after Lorna's Friday morning yoga session, back to Albert Lea where she helped set up a Saturday morning woman's yoga retreat. Then Sunday we were back in Lanesboro for Lanesboro Live, back home Monday so she could be at Tuesday morning yoga (She missed her Monday morning session). Wednesday evening another yoga session to make up for the missed Monday session. There were other chores and side trips, then Friday night, back in Lanesboro again. The Boro is alive this weekend with the Ibsen Festival and parking is at a premium.

We're coming off of a fasting day and we decided to eat rather than go to Over the Back Fence at the St.Mane. We opted for Pedal Pushers, assuming that some of the other restaurants would be filled with morose Norwegians. (Brett from the Pastry Shoppe told us he is doing a special Norwegian BBQ, called The Ibsen, which will be black, so sad and bad that it's good.)

Pedal Pushers serves locally sourced fare. They pushed "local" a little with the beer, but it's five different styles of beer from five different Minnesota breweries. I thought the Surly Bender, a brown ale, could have been Surly Furious, an IPA. But as Scott explained, that would have forced him to change the Summit Saga IPA to Summit EPA and that have thrown the whole scheme off. My opinion is that arbitrary rules should broken and why do you need an EPA when there would be two IPAs? Scott says, yeah, but IPAs don't marry well with food anyway. Whatever, I'm glad they are here. They also roast their own fair trade coffee beans and sell it in bags if you need to take some up to Church Hill for morning breakfast.

The weather sucks. It's cold, rainy, snowy ........but we now have a television at the Church Hill cottage for just such an occasion. 


Take care and be well,
Gunnar

Monday, April 8, 2013

Lanesboro Live

Lanesboro can be a little touristy during the Summer. I love that fact. It is responsible for the arts, theatre and great restaurants - or at least allows the artists to make enough money to survive. It probably helps that our cottage is on top of Church Hill and except for the handful of people who stay at the B&B next door, most tourists don't have any reason to make the climb up the steep hill.

There is professional theatre at the Commonweal, but for the locals there is the St. Mane, with Over the Back Fence - local variety programs, and Lanesboro Live, billed as "Conversation, Comedy & Cool Jams . . ."  Last night Paul Metsa came down from Nordeast to sing a few songs, read from his book, Blue Guitar Highway and generally bull-shit a little - for instance, a story of meeting Woody Guthrie's daughter and getting to hold the original copy of This Land is Your Land, then singing in the Woody Guthrie Tribute Concert. Pretty heady stuff for a smalltown folk singer. There were silly little skits, a local version of Jeopardy, where people were pulled out of the audience to answer questions ... or not. And I should mention the house band, which is great - a jazz combo, which I couldn't find on YouTube. After it was over, Metsa and bunch of the others went over to the Pedal Pusher to talk smart and drink beer. The following isn't from last night, but you get the idea. 

Monday, April 1, 2013

Springfield, Oregon's Finest

... okay, second finest - the Old Toad still holding down the number one slot. Mickey Newbury singing a couple of his compositions, which makes one realize how badly Kenny Roger butchered it.

Be Careful Out There

My 27 year-old bicyclist daughter used to live in this neighbothood. This is too close to home. Peace to her parents.



"Twenty-eight-year-old Elyse Mary Stern was riding her bike eastbound on Lake Street around 2:15 a.m. when she was struck by a Monte Carlo driven by 27-year-old Juan Ricardo Hernandez-Campoceco. Hernandez-Campoceco drove away from the scene but was arrested minutes later near East Franklin Avenue and Bloomington Avenue South." 

Photos and copy:  http://blogs.citypages.com