Wannaskan Almanac

Hello and welcome to the last Saturday of August 2024 here at the Wannaskan Almanac. Today is August 31st. Tomorrow is September. It's a Sunday, followed by a holiday Monday. This suggests full permission to leave the calendar on August til Tuesday. September 3. Sometimes denial does a body good. Yesterday I started journaling again after a long hiatus. Have you ever found yourself on a spin cycle of people pleasing? I have. That's where I found myself with novel writing, which spilled over into my journal writing. I have been journaling since I was a child. It was the place where I processed all of my, well, everything. My curiosity, my disappointment. My anguish, my hope. Wonder, regret, anxiety, and sorrow. My dreams, my mistakes. As many proud moments as pissed-off ones. Grief. Embarrassment. Joy. Enthusiasm. And through all the emotional unpacking and recordkeeping, my sense and understanding of the world. And through all of that , a slow scratching out of an understanding...

  Simple Simon met a pieman Going to the fair; Says Simple Simon to the pieman Let me taste your ware. Said the pieman to Simple Simon, Show me first your penny; Says Simple Simon to the pieman, Indeed I have not any.   Simple Simon should have gotten a job at the Fair. Then he would have had many pennies. And pie too. Probably on a stick. You can get anything on a stick at the Fair: hot dish, deep fried Snickers, even beer, well..., little cups of beer on a paddle.   Teresa and I have fantasized about working at the Fair. We would opt for an early six hour shift with some kindly vendor in a leafy corner of the Fair. Minimum pay is only $11.00 but that's negotiable. And there's the tips, plus the vendor covers your admission to the Fair, so there's an $18 bonus right there.     So we'd be free by noon. We'd have the rest of the day to explore all the nooks and crannies of the Fair. Up to now we've only spent a single day each year at the Fair. We make sure to hi...

  Over a trail in our woods I discovered a treetop had broke and fallen against a tree on the opposite side creating a scene of impending doom for passersby. The trunk end looked ready to fall off with any wind coming through the trees. The several times I passed under it on the four-wheeler, I began feeling my luck was going to run out one of those times and then I'd be sorry for not doing something about it; then too, what if it happened to one of the family or a visitor?  So, finally I decided to take it down, but how was I to to do it safely? Cutting either tree down would be risky, I figured. So I decided to sleep on it and see if a solution would come to me just before I woke up. It did. "That'll work," I thought to myself. "I did that a few years ago when couldn't find someone to hire to repair a roof vent for me."  First, I had to gather a few tools: a bow, an arrow, a hundred feet of strong string, and a hundred feet of strong light-weight rope ...

And here is the Wannaskan Almanac with Word-Wednesday for August 28, 2024, the thirty-fifth Wednesday of the year, the tenth Wednesday of summer, the fourth Wednesday of August, and the two-hundred-forty-first day of the year, with one-hundred twenty-five days remaining.   Wannaska Phenology Update for August 28, 2024 It’s Puffball Time Lycoperdon gemmatum and other common puffballs have a worldwide distribution beyond Wannaska, found even on Antarctica. Growing on the ground in deciduous, coniferous, and mixed woodlands under trees, on roadsides, in open areas, and even in urban areas, it usually grows in clusters. Puffballs are saprobic [/sa-PRŌ-bik/ adj., obtaining nutrients from decaying organic matter]. The genus name Lycoperdon is formed from the Latinized form of the Greek words lykos , meaning “wolf”, and perdesthai , meaning “to break wind” or wolf fart. Other colorful names include Devil's Snuffbox and Gem-studded Puffball. August 28 Fickle Pickle Wednesday Menu Speci...

Let’s dive in to what is the difference between a lake and an inland sea. Lakes: These watery gems are like introverts at a party—they’re completely surrounded by land. No oceanic VIP pass for them! Lakes don’t hobnob with the salty sea; they’re content being landlocked. Landlocked Lake Inland Seas: Now, these are the social butterflies. They’re at sea level (literally) and have an all-access pass to the ocean. Picture them as the cool kids who can seamlessly transition from lake chat to ocean gossip. This way to ocean! Lakes: Think cozy, intimate gatherings. Lakes come in all sizes—small, medium, or large. Some are like pocket-sized puddles, while others sprawl out like watercolor masterpieces. But they’re generally shallower and more chill. Inland Seas: These are the grand galas. They’re massive, covering vast stretches of real estate. The Great Lakes, for instance, are like freshwater continents. They’ve got depth, volume, and a guest list that includes tsunamis, rogue waves, and st...

  I'm not a scaredy cat. As a kid in the late 50s, I giggled, screeched, clutched onto my friends, and begged for more spooky stories while sitting around a summer campfire. I relished how the suggestion of ghosts caused the night air to fold onto itself and deliver me into a shivery, altered sense of mystery. Fast forward to what seemed like an ordinary morning in 1976. I'm in my late twenties, married with two small kids, and living in our first sweet house in a quiet neighborhood in Arlington, Virginia. Unannounced, one day, my across-the-street neighbor shows up at my door with a pale face and need to talk. The night before, she dreamt that she and a small group of others circled the distraught, bare-chested Hollywood actor Sal Mineo, famous for 'Rebel Without a Cause' and 'Exodus.' In the dream, he was bare-chested and decked out in silk pajamas. At the same time, he was forcibly resisting being put on a rocket ship that was headed into outer space. Her job...

President Biden decided to step down when the Secret Service refused his request to be grazed by a bullet. "Single Cat Ladies" are the "Basket of Deplorables" of this election.  Robert Kennedy Jr. has withdrawn from the race. His father can now renew his process of resting in peace. And now for something completely different... AI is a success! It can be just as knuckleheaded as we are. Sin is like an iceberg in the night  dead ahead. We see it. We turn the helm. Hard... But it feels like forever before our ship to start to turn.   That my candidate is totally unfit for office is not a good enough reason to switch my vote to his or her opponent. Click bait is not angling for you, but for your wallet. Your item donated to the thrift store may bring a small profit to charity, or it may just be on its last stop before the landfill. The saints don't mind the humiliation that frees them to be of use to the world. Scientists need a lake surface that's calm so they...

Hello and welcome to a penultimate Saturday here at the Wannaskan Almanac. Today is August 24th. On this side of Wannaskaland, an Englishman known throughout these parts for a) wearing suits and b) walking everywhere, likes to use the word "penultimate" (along with a few other words with impressive syllabic largess.) Penultimate is a great Word of the Day for this Toastmaster. It's one I've kept stashed in my own vocabulary satchel for the ideal moment, and what could be a better opportunity than to remind my Wannaskan countrypeople that there is only one week of summer vacation before school starts? The blog's first Wannaskan Almanac Kid Writer-in-Residence, aka WAKWIR, has graduated and is off to college. (If you haven't seen it, here's the WAKWIR's final post:  A WAKWIR Sighting .) Fortunately, his younger brother has been a willing writer-in-training and has officially taken the reins as WAKWIR 2.0. Here's his account of our Penultimate Week of...

    It never fixes things by killing an opponent. A minute after Trump was shot, most Democrats were relieved he wasn't killed. Those personal armories all around the country are primed to go off. Most Republicans found the near miss exciting.    The motives of Trump's shooter are still under investigation. He donated to the Democrats and registered as a Republican, so we may never know. Maybe he was just disgruntled, like John Felton who killed the Duke of Buckingham back in 1628. Felton was an army lieutenant and was mad at Buckingham for not promoting him to captain.   The Duke had other things to worry about, being in the process of raising an army to invade France. The Duke had already lost two armies because he was a terrible administrator. The Duke had been born George Villiers, into a family of minor gentry, that group between commoners and nobles. His father died young, but there was still enough money to send young George to dancing school.   Vill...

  August 23, 2014  "Just call Me Mark."     One reason, I moved to northwestern Minnesota was to get away from all the hatred and violence that was happening all over the country. I was tired of living under lock and key; tired of watching riots and demonstrations on television; just fed up with society at large. Northwest Minnesota seemed just the place to go where there wasn't any of all that. No racism, no prejudice, everybody is happy, yada yada yada. (What a dope!)    I had spent a few winters laid-off from various jobs I had and began writing journals, reading and studying American history. I've always been bookish and possessed a penchant for reading and writing versus watching TV or whatever the rest of the world is doing in their spare time; I don't mind isolation or quiet places. Outside stimulation, like video games, is out: a brilliant display of the northern lights is in. I lean toward the natural, fade from th...

And here is the Wannaskan Almanac with Word-Wednesday for August 21, 2024, the thirty-fourth Wednesday of the year, the ninth Wednesday of summer, the third Wednesday of August, and the two-hundred-thirty-fourth day of the year, with one-hundred thirty-two days remaining.   Wannaska Phenology Update for August 21, 2024 Chokecherry Harvest Prunus virginiana is at its prime. One of the most common and ubiquitous trees/shrubs in North America, chokecherry adapts easily to forest lands, prairie margins, and mid-alpine regions. Its fruit contains high concentrations of hydrogen cyanide - mostly in the seed. Some humans are almost as fond of them as birds. If you're one such human, here's a Mennonite recipe for chokecherry syrup: As a young girl I remember my mother making syrup once the chokecherries were ripe. We called it "supsil". I didn't always enjoy picking the berries but oh my I did love the syrup. My favorite way of eating this is to dip fresh zwiebach in t...