Wannaskan Almanac

I have been playing around with short stories lately...ones about growing up near a small town.  Hopefully it will be okay to share a few of them with you.  This is what happens when you finish all your conferences on Wednesday and have all day Thursday to stare at your computer. Extremely rough draft but still readable.  Enjoy! I didn’t grow up in a town. I grew up outside of a town... and that town was so small that people in that town didn’t consider it to be a town. The people in that "town" claimed to have grown up near a town that was about 25 miles away. It was a hierarchy of distance, a strange social ladder where the closer you were to a paved road with a yellow line down the middle, the higher your status. Where I lived, the roads didn't have lines. They didn't even really have names, at least not names that appeared on any map. We called them things like "The Old Miller Run" or "The Creek Path," and if you were giving directions to a str...

Originally published September 20, 2020... Endings are difficult, and this ten-segment of the eleventh Song, Dragons True,” is no exception. The next time you see a post featuring The One , a new Song will have opened – number 12. But for now, we remain with EndMaker and the mysterious girl. The main character with Argose have been sliding deeper and more steadily into their world inside the cave. All along, EndMaker doesn’t act like we imagine a Dragon should; the girl deports herself more like a bat than a human. Yet, the two cave dwellers communicate perfectly, and even bring in Argose and his master to the dual mind of Dragon and girl. Just as with Shield Bearer, the main character, and his faithful buddy merge farther into the inner world of Dragons and other startling creatures. What’s to be gained by all these fantastic experiences? Why do we love Dragons, monsters, and Dragon-monsters so much? A few fantasy films include a docile Dragon, or one that has formed some sort of alli...

  The Palmville Globe Volume 2 Number 5 Man Sorts Out Coffee Names Joe McDonnell, 78 and a resident of Palmville Twp, Minnesota, recently learned how to order coffee in a foreign country. "When I first got overseas, I just pointed to what other people were getting," McDonnell tells the press. "It turned out to be espresso. My only objection to espresso is the tininess of the cup. The locals can nurse an espresso for two hours. Not me. Café Americano was on the menu. I feared it would have cream and sugar, but it turned out to be an espresso with extra hot water. That's what I wanted. The next restaurant did not have Americano. An ex-pat next to me said, 'Order a café allongé. It's basically the same as an Americano'." In a follow-up report, McDonnell says the allongé is actually better than the Americano. "Ordering it makes me feel less like a tourist. Man Keeps Low Profile on Plane Joe McDonnell, 78 and a world traveler, recently traveled betwe...

Hello and welcome to the last Saturday in February, here at the Wannaskan Almanac. Can I get an "Amen?" I'm thanking the good Lord above that February is a few days short of a regular month, because UFFDA . What started out as a promising month took a sharp left turn into a malaise that hung on and just wouldn't quit.  I've been working on intentional self care for over a year now, so when the sniffles first started, I wasn't concerned. I'm super healthy - or rather, I practice super healthy habits - so I thought that I'd endure a few days of a stuffy nose then be on my merry way. Well, that didn't happen. The stuffy nose lasted about a week. What lingered was an excruciating fatigue and brain fog. Have you ever had to drive even though you were so exhausted that you shouldn't have, but had to, because you needed to get to your final destination? Your eyelids are slamming shut, and you're barely conscious while holding the wheel? When I...

    I wouldn't normally think of going to Paris in winter. But our granddaughter had convinced her father to take her to Paris to celebrate her twelfth birthday. It didn’t take much convincing. Joe had enjoyed his travels in Paris and told his kids stories about his adventures. Isla and her nine year old brother Nash were especially fascinated by the catacombs where Paris had buried her dead for a couple of hundred years when the aboveground cemeteries were full.   Isla's birthday is February 21 so we planned to arrive there February 17 and fly home on Sunday the 22. Joe, Isla and Nash would fly from Boston and we'd meet at an Airbnb apartment near the Bastille monument.    Due to flight delays we ended up missing our first day in Paris. Joe and the kids arrived on time, dropped their bags at the apartment and enjoyed a sunny day walking around the neighborhood and riding the subway or métro as it's called. When we arrived Wednesday morning the apartment had a l...

    In a vain attempt to relieve the boredom of windy, cold & cloudy February-March days I'm reproducing a series of Sven & Ula stories in hopes of generating periodic laughter inside or outside our bodies. I think is important to entertain some silliness once in awhile, in response to what negatively confronts us day by day.                                                                Sven and Ula Do Nebraska     “Vere?” Ula asked, squinting off into the distance.     “Dere!” said Sven, pointing with his left hand while holding his Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ18 to his eye with his right.      “Vere?” Ula repe...

And here is the Wannaskan Almanac with Word-Wednesday for February 25, 2026, the eighth Wednesday of the year, the tenth Wednesday of winter, the fourth Wednesday of February, and the fifty-sixth day of the year, with three-hundred nine days remaining. Wannaska Phenology Update for February 25, 2026 Snow Fleas As a sure sign of the approaching spring in Wannaska, Palmville's own official bug, Hypogastrura nivicola , manidoosh in Anishinaabe, has started to sprinkle snow surfaces on warmer, sunnier afternoons. These tiny, harmless, dark-blue, or black hexapods are not true insects or fleas. Commonly seen jumping on melting snow in late winter, they're classified as a springtail, using their forked, tail-like appendage called a furcula to leap about in the hopes of getting close to one another. They have been endowed with a unique protein that acts as antifreeze, allowing them to survive sub-zero temperatures. February 25 Fickle Pickle Wednesday Menu Special : Potato Dumpling F...