Sargie riding the shuttle train in the Minneapolis Airport on Thursday

March 8, 2013 – Friday

14 degrees/sunny/calm

Pentoga Road

It feels good to be home. We had such a great visit with Andy and Mollie, saw things we’d never seen before, and (naturally) ate until we were ready to bust, but you can’t beat home sweet home. Thanks, kids, for a wonderful week. It all seems now like a dream; a beautiful and fun dream. We love you both.

We concluded our trip on Wednesday with visits to a couple of Army Surplus stores and a pawnshop near Fort Polk. Talk about surplus! I purchased a very heavy pair of Gortex/leather gloves for very cold weather. I won’t get to wear them until next winter, but they’ll keep just fine. Another place we visited looked like a Sanford and Son junkyard. I’d love to return someday and simply nose around the place. It was an acre of…. stuff.

The next stop was at a local steakhouse to celebrate Andy’s birthday. I enjoyed a huge rib eye steak, Sargie two kabobs of skewered jumbo shrimp. An hour-and-a-half later, we waddled to a nearby shop where Andy treated us to hand-mixed ice cream. It took me half an hour to finish my pecan pie ice cream nestled in a bowl lined with a Butterfinger/chocolate shell.

Since they had to drive through the night, Andy and Mollie took naps after we returned home. Sargie and I stayed awake. The four of us left at 12:30 AM for Houston and the drive was a good one with the four of us talking most the way. I felt sorry for Andy… it’s three hours to Houston and the same home. He later sent a text saying they safely arrived home.

Yesterday’s flights were good ones. After being awake for thirty-six hours, we were both dead tired. The five-hour layover in Minneapolis went by fairly quickly and we kept ourselves entertained by riding the shuttle train around the airport, people watching, and later, I caught up on reading assignments and projects.

At one point, we were both sitting in recliners, those type where one inserts money and can receive a back massage… the chairs that I’ve never seen anyone actually pay to receive a massage.

There were no free electrical outlets, so I unplugged a chair that I might power my computer. An old, cranky, employee later came along and completely ignoring me, bent over, unplugged my computer, threw the cord off to one side, and plugged the chair in. I apologized and told him I was going to replace the plug before we left. He didn’t acknowledge me and continued to complain and mumble, to the point of being more than a little bit rude.

There’s still a bit of a six-year-old in this sixty-year old body. My last act before walking away was to unplug both chairs. NOW he has a reason to be cranky and grumble. As Will Ferrel said in one of his movies, “He wasn’t a nice elf.”

We arrived in Rhinelander on schedule and after a stop at the grocery store in town, came home to find the house on Pentoga Road exactly as we left it. Within an hour, a fire was roaring in the stove, our bags were unpacked, and we were enjoying a salad and rotisserie chicken. We were home.

Bedtime came shortly after 8 PM and I slept the clock around. Sargie’s still slumbering away. Her vacation over, she has to work on Saturday.

I am going to work on the boiler today and possibly tap a few trees. It’s to be ideal weather for making the sap run over the next three days before the temperatures sink below freezing for the rest of the week. I’m in no hurry, but the earliest sap makes the clearest and most mild syrup. For the first time in all the years I’ve been sugaring, I purchased a commercial filter through which to pour the finished product. It promises to work better than the usual kitchen towel/flour sack material used in the past.

So with all that being said, it’s time to pour another cup of coffee and contemplate tapping a few sugar maple trees. After all, a man’s work is never done.

So are the tales from Pentoga Road…

Passing time in the Minneapolis Airport grading assignments