Talk about a bounty. Mississippi Brother Garry and Miss Jody, along with Monkey Boy, are harvesting and preserving this year's crop of sweet corn.

June 12, 2020 - Friday morning

42 degrees/clear skies/calm winds 

Pentoga Road

Garry's got a lot of nerve sending me pictures of their sweet corn harvest, especially since the temperature in the UP for the next two nights is to drop to near or below freezing. 

I'm still trying to get seeds to germinate while the folks are not only putting up corn for the winter months, they also have a bushel of tomatoes they'll be boiling into salsa this weekend.

I told Garry to be extra careful with those ears he picked from the two rows I planted in March. No doubt, they have extra sugar content, are unusually sweet, and will bruise easily, considering who planted them and all...

At any rate, the last I heard, almost forty boxes of creamed corn were bound for the freezer with fresh tomato salsa on the agenda for today's processing.

Monkey Boy and Garry having some Grandpa/grandson time

In news closer to home, Thursday was basically dedicated to completing the application for the renewal of my Wisconsin teaching certificate. Thanks to Amanda in the Florence School District for walking me through the hard to navigate steps.

Leave it up to a government agency to screw up what would normally be a simple process. 

Even after spending almost an hour with Amanda Thursday afternoon, I still had to return home and scan one last document before the entire package was complete. That, plus a $125, was submitted last night and I should be good to go for another three years.

I spent a bit of time with Jambo yesterday morning. Both of us are confused as to why our vegetable seeds didn't sprout this year. Perhaps it's the temperatures, freezing one night, in the 90's the next day. 

Maybe it's just bad luck.

Within those shadows stands a man named Jambo
(I'm thinking of the old Lorne Greene song of the mid 60's, Ringo)

He lay face down in the desert sand
Clutching his six-gun in his hand
Shot from behind, I thought he was dead
But under his heart was an ounce of lead
But a spark still burned so I used my knife
And late that night I saved the life of Ringo

Ringo, Ringo...

As an adolescent boy, I loved that song, an outlaw saved, then taken down by the law. I memorized each and every word and practiced my best Lorne Greene imitation as I pitched the Daily News from my Schwinn bicycle while peddling my nightly paper route.

Then in the early 80's, Jim Stafford sang my very favorite outlaw song, Yippie Eye Eh Cow Patty.

From the bad lands came the killer
He lived by the knife and the gun
He'd cut you just for standing
And shoot ya if ya tried to run
He was big as a tree and did as he pleased
And everything he did was bad
And they said if you was to kill him
It'd only make him mad

From the good lands came the cowgirl
Patti was her name
She was hot on the trail of that killer
On a moped she called Flame
'Cause the killer had killed her daddy
Just for spittin' in the road
You only had to kill her daddy once
To get that gal P.O.'d

Yippie eye eh Cow Patti
Yippie eye eh Cow Patti
She rode into town to find the man that killed her daddy
Yippie eye eh Cow Patti

Though I'd been teaching for over fifteen years at the time, I carefully memorized each word and sang Cow Patty to the student passengers on my school bus as I picked them up each morning and left them off at night. (That's after I was in the classroom teaching all day long. Ah, the good old days.)

Boy, you think the old professor doesn't have ADD? 

Anyway, where was I? 

Oh yeah, Jambo and I had a good visit Thursday morning. They've returned to Marquette for a few days, but I'm looking forward to Jambo's return. I'm doubtful it'll be on a moped he calls Flame.

This is Hambone's last day for a while on Pentoga Road. He, Grandma Sargie, and Pawpaw have had a good time and been quite busy, but as he said yesterday, he misses his mama and daddy. 

Other than first thing in the mornings and later in the evenings, Hambone and I are pretty much inseparable. We're buddies, of that there's no doubt. 

I know that Pawpaw and Grandma Sargie have some pretty high expectations, but Hambone rises to each and every one, the sign of a boy who's made of the right stuff. In many ways, he reminds me of my own sons of many years ago. They, too, were and are made of the right stuff and I'm proud of each.

I'm already looking forward to Hambone's return to Pentoga Road... after Pawpaw has a while to catch his breath. Ol' Pawpaw's not nearly as young as he used to be.

I'm going for my walk pretty soon. On this afternoon's agenda is an appointment with Eric the Boy Dentist. Congratulations are due to Eric for the birth of his first child, Silas, a nine pound bouncing baby boy. 

I'm going to try to tackle the trailer full of hardwood slabs this morning and see how many I can saw and put away.

Carefully guarded by Rob the Rooster, Sargie's irises are beginning to bloom.

After all, a man's work is never done.

So are the tales from Pentgoa Road...

Today's random Alaska picture: Brother Elmer, an Inupiq Eskimo, carving a bowhead whale vertebrae, making a clock that sits in our spare bedroom. A true brother, we were never far apart during my arctic days in Alaska.