Wannaskan Almanac

The game’s afoot, as one famous detective said; he was not above sleuthing and scattering in graveyards, and neither is this poem by yours truly. It has been a while since I offered you an original poem – actually just Act 1 of 3  – hot off the right hemisphere.  My associate  Wannaskan Almanac  writers (and other friends and acquaintances) often tell me I write “dark things,” and that I take a shady view of life itself. Probably true. Yes, definitely true. But someone has to do it! That is, write about what others are afraid to – like whistling in the night while walking in a graveyard. Without delay, here is my latest work. Greatest? You decide. Keep in mind, Horatio, there are two more acts to come.   Bones Hollows and Spades Act 1 He sees each and all of them smells each unique yet same  lowers each sinking beneath the soily waves drowning but not gasping under uncut hair of graves One ghost and a madwoman ‘tis all I know I speaks end-words to them that go They lays dark-shifted, s

   The easiest time to kick a bad habit is the last time you're indulging it. I tell you my friend's face is like an elf's, and her husband's head is like a pumpkin. Please don't ask me which elf or what pumpkin. Tact can put a blowhard in his place without inciting him to discharge his weapon. The religious approach is to let God fix you. The psychological approach is to do-it-yourself. In war (or anywhere) give us commanders a little older than young and sergeants a bit younger than old. Youth does not believe in death. Middle age believes in the death of others. Old age says give me today and we'll talk again mañana.  Chairman Joe

Hello and welcome to the last Saturday of January 2021 here at the Wannaskan Almanac. Today is January 30th. It was a sad week at our house. My uncle passed away on Tuesday, January 26th at the age of 78. ( See his obituary here. ) Writing for the Roseau/Warroad Visitor Guide , I've had the opportunity to interview many of the Olympic athletes who grew up on this side of Wannaskan country. What often came to mind as I listened to them tell their stories was the African proverb, "It takes a village to raise a child." This was the case for me as well. Growing up on a family lake resort is possibly one of the most ideal environments a kid could ask for. With all my relatives only a house or two away - my grandmother and her husband, two sets of aunts and uncles with loads of cousins -  tourist kids for summer play, and my best friend across the road, there was always an adventure to be had and a pal to go exploring with. Roaming was my normal and I was impervious to adult sc

     The poem "The Raven" was published on this day in 1845 in a New York newspaper. The poem was soon republished around the country and made the author, Edgar Allan Poe, famous, though it never made him much money. Critics have argued ever since about whether "The Raven" is a great poem or sentimental trash. Everyone agrees it's one of the most famous poems ever written.    When WannaskaWriter and I started a journal of art, history and humor in 1994, we named it The Raven . People always assumed that we had named it after the poem. I'm not sure why. Two years later, the new pro football team in Baltimore named themselves after the poem so I guess people lumped us in with them.    Many years ago WannaskaWriter and I were bemoaning the fact that the aging children of Roseau County's pioneers were dying off and were taking their stories with them. We did this bemoaning in the kitchen of my old house just before Christmas of '96. I was driving school

Yet They Thrive I worked at the toy factory for over 33 years. I was older than many of my co-workers (some of them by over 40 years) and because of that fact, and that I wasn’t born nor raised around here, I was always ‘strange’ to them. I could’ve fit in if I had been more sports-minded or was in tune with thier multi-generational worlds, but by this time I was entrenched in my own age and thought of things differently. We may have been co-workers, but with one or two rare exceptions, we never became close friends. There was one individual, a Canadian, with whom I worked closely; a man thirteen years younger than I, who, for a majority of those years, we were often teamed up on work projects for the reason that we both worked hard; neither slacked off and let the other carry more of a load. I learned things from him and he learned things from me. He got along good with people, whatever age or gender; one reason being that he either liked you or he didn’t, and was brutally straight ab

And here is the Wannaskan Almanac for Word-Wednesday, January 27, 2021, the 4th Wednesday of the year, the 6th Wednesday of winter, and the 27th day of the year, with 338 days remaining. Wannaska Nature Update for January 27, 2021 In winter, elk coats consist of two layers: thick, long guard hairs and a dense undercoat. The inside of guard hairs look like honeycomb with thousands of tiny air pockets in each hair, making them waterproof and warm. This warm winter coat is so thick it can keep snow from melting on an elk’s back, which is nice when you hunker down in the snow for a long winter's night. Nordhem Lunch: Closed. Earth/Moon Almanac for January 27, 2021 Sunrise: 8:00am; Sunset: 5:13pm; 2 minutes, 50 seconds more daylight today Moonrise: 3:53pm; Moonset: 7:39am, waxing gibbous, 97% illuminated Temperature Almanac for January 27, 2021                 Average            Record              Today High             16                     44                      0 Low            

 Texting has led to a very unusual phenomena...the rise of auto correct fails.  We have all done it...whether it is on purpose or accidentally or the result of some sort of hypnosis...we have all sent that text that we realize wasn't quite right.  And...it is always a split second after we hit send that we realize our blunder.  The whole problem is that "smart" phones seem to think they know what we wanted to say.  They don't really care what we input.  They are out to show that they are smarter than we are.  Here are some examples I found: Actual text from my wife...I wondered if I had crossed the line too many times Special price for seals This is why I only shop at Sears So how do you really feel about my mental capabilities? Poetry in motion... Sometimes it almost looks like people are trying to make mistakes.  They say something and then follow it up with "stupid autocorrect".  This is usually after a misplaced innuendo or insult.  It is that awkward mo

  Poetic Inaugurations John F. Kennedy / Robert Frost Bill Clinton / Miller Williams / Maya Angelou  Barack Obama / Richard Blanco / Elizabeth Alexander Joe Biden / Amanda Gorman Last Thursday, Wannaska Writer (WW) published an article written by The Chairman wherein The Chairman wrote, and I quote, “Thank you for reading this article [‘Get Rich With Poetry’], and congratulations: You are a part of the .01% of the population that will read a story with the word ‘poetry’ in the title.” Later, he said, “It’s tough for a newcomer to break in. We unknown poets need a local forum.” That all changed last Wednesday, the Inauguration Day of President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, where entertainment/homage for the new leaders, and for the country they now lead were offered by the likes of Lady Gaga and Garth Brooks. Hard acts to follow on any day. But followed they were. Late in the program, the 2021 U.S. Youth Poet Laureate, Amanda Gorman, a woman in her early twenties and Harva

Former President Trump can claim larger crowds at his Inauguration, but Biden's ratings were much higher.  One challenge of aging is to take delight in new things as your old favorites are disappearing. The Victorians loved death and feared sex. We've flipped that equation, swapping one kind of suffering for another. When creating your own recipes, the greatest insights for making it better are what not to put in the dish. It happens in this order: Philosophy sees a pile of rocks and says, "That's a house." Science says, "So it is," and builds a house. Our passions are like the magma bubbling under the surface of the earth. We can tap it to heat our homes, but when it comes pouring out the vents, bystanders must run like hell. Comedy sets off laugh bombs as it goes. Wit lights a longer fuse. Chairman Joe 

Hello and welcome to an absolutely frigid, ya-you-betcha Saturday here at the Wannaskan Almanac. Today is January 23rd. Yesterday the hubs celebrated his birthday. Another year around the sun, another year closer to 50. Not there yet, but, when you hit the backside skid of a decade, it's hard not to look around (or back) and say, "Whoa, wait a second! How did I end up here?" Ah, that strange, elusive feeling of aging when you realize your needle bends farther and farther to the right, towards the higher numbers of a decade. Sort of makes your chest get tight and feels like time is running out. Then you crest a new decade, the needle swivels back to the low-end numbers, and a body's got room to breathe again. " Yes ," you say as you exhale. "There's still time." In our neck of the Wannaskan woods, if you haven't already heard, there is a brand new skating path on the Warroad River. The Riverbend Skate Path is a 2-mile stretch, marked at reg

     We had wanted to go to the Grand Canyon, but here we were rolling into Tombstone, Arizona on a late February afternoon, 2019. Tombstone is in southeast Arizona not far from the Mexican border and about 300 miles south of the Grand Canyon. We had also missed the last reenactment of the day of the shootout at the OK Corral.    We had flown into Phoenix four days earlier to visit Teresa's uncle Vernon and his daughter Kelly. Vernon and Kelly are perfect hosts but in order not to wear out our welcome we decided to rent a vehicle and do some sightseeing on our own in the middle of our weeklong visit. These were the carefree days before Covid.    Teresa and I had done a hiking tour of the Grand Canyon with a group twenty years earlier, but hadn't had a chance to see the sights along the rim. That was our goal, but a snowstorm up near the Grand Canyon had stopped us at the city of Sedona. A guide at the visitor center sent us off to a canyon a few miles outside of town that was l

Thursday January 21, 2021 Reading Between the Lines     THE RAVEN  VOLUME 2 ISSUE 10   NOVEMBER 1995   Get Rich With Poetry  by Joe McDonnell Thank you for reading this article, and congratulations: You are a part of the .01% of the population that will read a story with the word ‘poetry’ in the title. On the other hand you may be part of the 99.99% that cannot pass by the words ‘Get Rich Quick.’ My goal is to satisfy both groups. Those of you who have driven that stretch of county road between Gully and Grygla know what a spirit killing bit of highway it is. Twenty-eight miles of swamp and lonely farms, then a one mile jog east and another 12 miles of the same into Grygla. I was driving this stretch one Friday afternoon last month, sucking on a can of pop and listening to Minnesota Public Radio, trying to stay awake and out of the ditch. Playing on the radio was mandolin music so bright and lively it seemed to spread sunlight over the countryside and bring out the beauty of the ancie