Wannaskan Almanac

  ChatGPT style writing is two-dimensional. It has length and width, but no depth.  I asked ChatGPT why he sounded so artificial. “Garbage in,” he said, “garbage out.” Going down the tubes sounds bad, but if you’re lucky they’ll be the tubes at the water park and not those headed to the waste treatment plant.  The good thing about driving a junker is that even if someone is silly enough to steal it, it will break down within a 250 mile radius of home. When you go to pick it up, be sure to bring one of those pine tree deodorizers along.  I used to feel bad about the time I wasted looking for misplaced items until I realized it was helping me get my daily 10,000 steps.  I don’t notice the sun till it shines in my eyes God grant I wake up before I must die We may be in the belly of the whale between our birth and our death, but I find an occasional look out the blowhole refreshing.   My life is a puzzle jumbled into a piece of abstract art. I’d sign it if...

Hello and welcome to the Wannaskan Almanac: “In Houston for 2023 FIRST Championship: Part Duo.”  Today is April 29th.   As you recall from last week's post , Kim described “The Travel Planner Friend” and all the talents that came in one package.  A lot of questions were received such as: “Who is this guy?”,  “Does he really exist?”, “Does he hire out?”, and of course the occasional denialist who said: “I don’t think he exists!”  So now “The Travel Planning Friend” will contribute to this week’s blog and will begin by answering two of the three questions.   My wife and Kim met in 1997 and when my wife and I married in 2013, I was included in the deal.  Spending time with the Hrubys and watching their family grow has been a great experience!  There’s always something happening as the kids develop, graduate from grade school and high school, start college and move about the world in pursuit of their next milestone. They are a dynamic, creative, ...

  Ever since I read Huckleberry Finn I’ve wanted to go on a river cruise. To watch the shore go by while eating fresh fish—how idyllic. But prices have gone up since Huck and Jim went south.    Penny pincher is not a nice name. I like to call myself thrifty. I’ve tried to loosen up, but when Teresa told me the cost of an eight day cruise on the Columbia River, I balked. Talk about sticker shock. But she wanted to do this so I caved and started to focus on the fun aspects: to see new and beautiful countryside and immerse myself in the fantastic yarn of Lewis and Clark.     We drove to Spokane Washington and left our car at a motel next to the airport. We hopped on a train to Portland, Oregon. The train ran along the Columbia River which we would soon be cruising up.    We spent three days checking out the fine city of Portland and on Sunday, April 16, took a short train ride back across the Columbia to Vancouver, Washington, not to be confused wit...

Stories of The Louis Palms: Part 4 As told by Raymond Palm  1937-1982 Composed chronologically and edited by Wannaskawriter/SR)     Forty years ago, Janet Strandlie, of Thief River Falls, Minnesota acted as a caregiver for a week, starting on February 26, 1983, for my uncle, the late Raymond Palm, of Roseau, Minnesota, who at the age of 20 became paralyzed from the waist down as a result of a tree-climbing accident in 1932. Raymond became a successful jeweler, watchmaker, and gunsmith. He had an adjoining living space and shop in a house on Center Street East, in which he lived with his sister, Irene, and her 2nd husband, John.      A spinal cord injury survivor, Raymond ‘walked on’ in 2002, at age 91, after surviving 71 years in a wheelchair. Janet writes: “These are Raymond’s words, written as fast as possible as he wove the tales and brought up story after story. He'd laugh so hard at times, then sometimes shed a tear. This was done over one ...

And here is the Wannaskan Almanac with Word-Wednesday for April 26, 2023, the seventeenth Wednesday of the year, the sixth Wednesday of spring, the fourth Wednesday of poetry month, and the one-hundred sixteenth day of the year, with two-hundred forty-nine days remaining.   Wannaska Phenology Update for April 26, 2023 Tamaracks Budding Larix laricina, like other deciduous trees, looses their needley leaves each autumn, but as another herald of spring, they’re beginning to emerge from buds, soon to become tufts of glossy needles. We had northern lights again on a cloudy Monday. Here’s the best place to get up-to-date predictions for Wannaska or wherever you might be traveling in the northern or southern hemisphere. Hummingbird migration progress map :  Be the first in Roseau County to report a sighting . April 26 Fickle Pickle Wednesday Menu Special : Potato Dumpling April 26 Nordhem Wednesday Lunch : Updated daily by 11:00am, usually. Earth/Moon Almanac for April 26, 2023 ...

Some jokes fall flat...like pretty much any joke about pancakes. Today I discovered a new way to increase my calorie and caffeine intake.  I call it homemade espressos.  Now, for only a fraction of the cost, I can race toward diabetes and the jitters.  What a deal!   Maybe you think making your own espresso is too expensive or time consuming.  Or maybe you are one of those people who just wants your coffee black without all that garbage in it.  All I can tell you is give love a chance...the love of a steaming hot cup of dark coffee and foamed milk.   To start out with you will need an espresso machine.  Ours was an add in to a dollar bag at a garage sale.  It seems like it is a great gift to give (like at a wedding or coffee festival) but often times they collect dust until they are finally unloaded.  I am not sure how long the polite amount of time to wait after receiving a gift is until you sell it in a garage sale, but I hav...

Stay alert ! Chairman Joe warned. This, after I had blissfully accepted the invitation to become a contributor to the Wannaskan Almanac. Those days [in between posts] go by quickly !  I had just submitted my first post for the Almanac and was ridin’ high. Woo, hoo, I’m a blog writer - look at me!   Then Joe puts the fear of God in me. I can’t blame him. You folks have been writing the Almanac for, what? Four or five years?  More? Ya, I like to fancy myself a writer, but to sustain the effort, I’m gonna have to go some. When I taught creative writing years ago, the title of the school’s annual literary magazine was BLANK . And my raison d’etre was to challenge writers to dig deep; to reach beyond predictable resistance and perceived limitations; to stare down the proverbial blank page. Which is exactly what I’m doing right now. Eeek!  In theory, I’m a big believer in the idea that creativity begets creativity. As a teacher, I wanted to provide students with experien...