Raincharm’s Weblog

We changed time zones again. The windshield wipers were on for the first 100 miles, on the highest setting most of the time. But that was less than a third of the trip.

Detroit Lakes, our destination, has several Dambo Trolls. We had seen one on a prior trip and started there. Then we added 2 more.

Barefoot Frida was part of a much larger art project. Many more pictures for a future report.

There are still more trolls, but I was getting hangry so we checked into our hotel and found a grocery store.

And now we’re off to Minneapolis.

We have roughly 1200 miles under our belt (butts) at this time. We’re in North Dakota for the night. Knock on wood the trip has been largely uneventful so far.

The highlight was visiting with a friend who lives in Philipsburg Montana. It’s a bit of a dot on the map, but their home.

These are the parents of some of the first kids Carl cared for, although our initial connection was from playing soccer together. We were playing, not our kids. In fact before kids, so more than 40 years ago. I noticed they was had a team picture up in their kitchen. We had our copy on display during the World Cup. In truth, we only got to see Barb on this visit. Wade was off on a project in Colorado.

I started to do some relocating this morning. The garage had been designated as the giveaway staging area. That meant that some normal garage storage items were in the basement. Plus some basement storage locations had been convenience in the moment rather than what makes sense longer term.

Enough of the giveaway has passed through the portal for it to make sense to think about longer term storage locations. The timing was also likely spurred by the relocation of the crib to somebody else, not us. I believe they help families in need locating supplies.

First I moved leftover paint onto our old shelving unit. The paints had been in the garage since the major remodel. I’m not sure if 10-year old paint can be shaken/stirred hard enough to be usable. A few cans were light enough to be almost empty. Further culling of these is definitely a project for the near future.

Then some outdoor chairs and tents (not sleeping) made the move.

I decided the leftover linoleum was destined for the trash. That is until Carl recalled one of our artist friends does linoleum block printing. She’s going to come over tomorrow to see if it will be diverted from the garbage. I’m all for diversions of this nature, and am willing to wait another day or two.

What this means is that it’s probably safe to come over to our house without worrying that I will drag you to the garage and force our detritus onto you.

You know sometimes you see someone you know, and it’s them but a bit off. And then finally you realize why it was off.

Luckily I noticed pretty quickly this time

In other news, I took the Corolla to the car wash for the first time in a few years.

In the garage clean out activities the crib has finally left the building! We gave it to a couple who source supplies for families in need. I hope it works out well. Now I can move on to transferring garage type supplies out of the basement and into the garage.

Link to another blog for Harry’s joke at his birthday party

I’m not there in person to celebrate this auspicious occasion, but the other sisters will be. I am in awe.

I really should remember to take before pictures when I am doing work where progress is visible. But I didn’t, so all you get is an after. I also did some general between house weeding, including a rather large blackberry vine removal.  It will come back, I could not get enough of the root.

I also paid for a certified copy of my grandmother’s birth certificate. I’m not sure I will need it, but I had requested it a few months ago – and they did their work. The cost was presented in Candian dollars, and I paid with a credit card. Seeing the actual amount charged it appears the exchange rate is about 70 percent!

Carl took his friend Chris hitting with the old and then older guys. Chris qualifies as old, but not older. It sounded like he had a good time, but may need an ice bath later. Especially after 3 hours in the car on his drive south.

We are not in or near the Washington fires, but still close enough for the smoke to have arrived. Tuesday night’s block party was postponed due to the air quality index. It will likely happen on Friday, but we are going to the Mariners game that day. Yesterday and today we largely kept the windows closed to limit the smell indoors. It has been coming and going, and we hope it really goes soon.

This has been the only damper on a visit from Carl’s college roommate.

They have managed to get to a Mariner game, an Aquasox game, and generally hanging out. We did take a long walk this morning. Up the long incline to the Maple Leaf neighborhood, home to Macrina bakery and a hardware store.

I have been busily watching the first three years of Ted Lasso in preparation for Season 4. One episode from Season 3 to go.

We took a walk yesterday, again. This time we paralleled Green Lake for a while. If I find a little free library, I often stop to browse.

This time it wasn’t so much what was in the library as the library itself.

Old news: Mariners lose, again. But that was so yesterday, they won today. We were at the loss, not the win.

Yesterday wasn’t a total loss, we got a good walk in before the game. It was a beautiful day so we took light rail to the north downtown station (Westlake), and walked through the Pike Place Market, down to the waterfront, and along the waterfront to the stadiums. And finally to the line to get into the game. The perk of this line waiting was watching the Blue Angels. It was a much better view than from our back yard.

New Neighbors: Today almost everything was different. The Mariners won and the Blue Angels were grounded (wind). We did take a long walk, this time to a community center for a birthday party.

Our neighbor, S, turned one. Our neighbors, the parents, are from southern India. In their culture, the first birthday is a big celebration, like a wedding. And the parents and S did stand together with a cake and each fed each other small pieces. S was more interested in the knife than in eating cake. It was a fun gathering with other neighbors, good food, and cake. The food included pizza with Indian toppings, such as tandoori chicken pizza.

On the walk home we managed to get across the University Bridge before it opened.

All in all a good day. Even two days.

I walked to the Museum of History and Industry this morning to see the Freedom Plane National Tour. This included seven documents associated with the founding of the USA.

The most awe-inspiring, to me, was an engraving of the Declaration of Independence. The Oaths of Allegiance signed by Alexander Hamilton, George Washington, and Aaron Burr were pretty cool – declaring what you believed. No hiding behind masks. I think I liked the markup of the Bill of Rights the best of all.  Seeing a work in progress, editing in action.

What I would have liked to do is have the time to really try to read the works. The dim lighting, others wanting to see, and the distance to the documents coupled with my less than stellar eyesight made that not realistic.

Being the first day of the exhibition they even provided some entertainment.

The gift shop had postcards and other items celebrating our Country. After I got home I sat on the back deck listening to the sounds of the Blue Angels – mostly heard them with a few sightings. And then I voted. We’ll drop off our ballots tomorrow.  All mail voting for us.

A very patriotic day.