Yes, there truly is a Metropolitan Mosquito Control District

Counting the larvae.

The tall government agent was deep in the reeds this morning, feverishly sampling the waters, looking for clues, working her scoop back and forth, protected only by a pair of sturdy hip waders.

A paid killer with her command vehicle and bucket.
Metropolitan Mosquito Control at your service.

Aha! Larvae. Mosquito larvae. Tons of them, ready to hatch into vile blood suckers. The agent quickly returned to her Mobile Mosquito Control Lab, opened the latch on a steel cabinet and sorted through the ammunition. Soluble pellets mostly -- to be dropped into the water, making it inhabitable for a mosquito hatch without ruining the quality of the water itself.
This has been a good year for mosquitoes in Minnesota. By that we mean we haven't been bitten as many times this year, compared to the number of times we've been bitten in past years.
The agent agreed, said others had told her the same thing. We congratulated her and thanked her for her important work. She nodded with a smile, then quickly returned to her deadly business, disappearing into the dense habitat.
Who was that Everyday Hero? We didn't even get her name.

Oui! Hoi's rear end spanked again

He just got the shattered rear window replaced on his beautiful new Ford Explorer. Then he returned to the shop for a faulty lift gate. Today a 19-year-old driver rear-ended Hoi Tong at an estimated speed of 10 to 15 mph, so it is back to the repair shop for a new bumper and tail pipe. Hoi is okay, just understandably quite perturbed by this string of events centered on the rear end of his new SUV.
Bad things happen in threes, and Hoi hopes it is all over for now.
We hope so too, but we're not sure he can count that faulty lift gate as a mishap. So be very careful out there, Hoi.

Now that's a big bad wolf, for sure

Got an email from a Mary Pat today. She's tracking down information about a huge wolf skin that hangs in a western North Dakota museum. Apparently a wolf killed a ranch hand back in 1915 and was shot and skinned for its trouble and a large bounty paid by the government. She's wondering if it is the same wolf, because her relatives may be involved.
Don't know about any of this, but Mary Pat thought we might, talking smart the way we do about North Dakota stuff, and with our roots growing out of McKenzie County soil and all, who could blame her. And she also wondered if Dad had covered the wolf kill in any of his books. (He didn't, and we told her so.)
Anyway, here's her inquiry. You may enjoy reading it and might even be able to help her.
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My name is Mary Pat Martell Jones. My grandfather and his uncles were early pioneers in McKenzie County. My grandfather C F Martell, Franklin, arrived in 1908 and his uncle Andrew Nohle in 1881 and George Nohle in 1891.

I have been gathering family history for over 30 years and there's a number of items in the museum in Alexander from our family. One of the items is a wolf skin from a wolf shot in 1915. (The tag says by George Nohle although we don't think that is true)

What I have been told is, my grandfather used to cut hair for people including the hair of a rancher nearby. That rancher shot the wolf displayed in the museum.  The ranger needed help collecting the bounty and my grandfather assisted him and asked for the skin in return.  The bounty was said to be "large." The wolf was nine feet from his nose tip to end of tail.

According to the book, "Called to the Prairie," from the journals of Richard Jahn, a ranch hand was killed by a wolf in January 1916. At first I was wondering if these two wolves were the same, (the years were close),  but a local historian Dennis Johnson doesn't think so. Anyway, he mentioned books by Erling Rolfsrud and thought there was something about a wolf in one of  them. Upon searching for that I came to your website.

I was wondering if you have any information about the wolves in McKenzie County in 1915? If you might know who that rancher was? If there was any information about / relating to these stories, and if there was information on how much the bounties were. I'm also always interested  in any information about  / or relating to Martell and the Nohles. (there was also a Martell brother, Ernest in ND for a time)

A lot of the info I personally have is on the website www.writinforthebrand.com

Thank you for any help you might be able to give,

Mary Pat

A Back-to-School Jacket for Maxwell

Model Father

Can you keep a secret? Our grandson Maxwell gets this new jacket this fall. Kathleen found just the thing for our BMOC -- going to be a junior at Hamline University. We hope he likes these threads, we know he favors dark, hooded stuff.
Hoi (Max's Dad) and Stan played a round of golf at Creeksbend this afternoon, so Kathleen had Dad model it when they got back -- so you could see it now before Max does. Maxwell, 21 on Oct. 3, is a tad taller than his Dad already so it looks like the new jacket is going to fit him.
Earlier this summer, Max got three new tailored suits: navy, gray and olive. He's polishing the resume… and his shoes.
"He looks really good," his Dad says. "The ladies are going to fall over when they see him in the navy suit." (Don't mention to anyone that Dad said this.)
Meanwhile, Birdie got a haircut today so we also took this selfie with Stan's new camera.
Hoi will deliver the jacket when the fall winds blow. In the meantime, mum's the word.

Then they ate cake. . .

Stan's camera broke tonight, so Kim, who had just finished preparing a huge dinner, filled in with her camera phone.
Kathleen got cut out of this one, but her cake made it.

Our Kim Seaton whipped up a teriyaki barbecue chicken Birthday dinner for eight after work today, complete with fabulous side dishes, then made this photo of her satisfied guests. She and Virg hosted family members and birthday girl Laurie Hartmann tonight, Kathleen added a four-decker birthday cake.
Virg and Kim recently returned from a summer drive through the West and regaled their guests with tales of their adventures. . . from Wall Drug through Mesa Verde. . . via treacherous mountain roads.
In other news, Cherice has a new job at Byerly's, completed some training today. Aaron and Amber  intend to enjoy another raspberry malt in the Dairy Pavilion at the upcoming State Fair.

Raise your hand if you're a movie star!

Gary Lindstam, left, appeared in "Airport," the 1970 flick starring Burt Lancaster and Dean Martin. John Gerken, upper right, appeared in "Grand Prix," the 1966 movie starring James Garner. Sorta.
Tonight's Abbey Point dinner conversation revealed heretofore unexplored brushes with immortality. Remarkably, our neighborhood is represented to this very day (or late night) on the Silver Screen.

Gary, a retired airline captain for Northwest Airlines, saw a notice at the Minneapolis airport seeking extras for the filming of "Airport" and he jumped at the chance for greatness. After deductions for the Screen Actors Guild and lunch, he netted $5 for his appearance in a crowd scene and got a glimpse of Dean Martin. His madras shirt is visible . . . whenever you watch the movie. . . for about 2.5 seconds.
John Gerken was stationed in Europe during the filming of Grand Prix. He was touring France, driving a VW on some back country roads and unknowingly blundered onto a by-way being used for the famed auto race. He glimpsed James Garner. You can see John's skinny elbow sticking out a car window in the final cut of "Grand Prix."
He was paid nothing.
Wes Anderson, at right, did not make the movies, but raised his hand anyway. He claims a dramatic role in his high school senior class play, "Little Women."

You're back. And you're still ugly

This uninvited pond denizen reappeared on the island yesterday and stunned our good neighbor Joe Daly with its unkempt, ugly countenance. We've tried rotting shrimp, stinky beef strips and sundry offal to bait this bastard into a Hav-a-Heart live trap -- without any success.
Meanwhile it has dined at will on fellow pond creatures, drawing surges of predatory urges from the pond master.
"I've never seen a snapping turtle," the California migrant confessed as he gazed at the repulsive, sunning carcass. "They sure are ugly."
We join with Joe in this candid assessment and wonder again at the rules for the discharge of a firearm within the Shakopee city limits.

How I Spent My Summer Vacation

Matt diligently studies his iPad screen, hoping to somehow unlock the treasures secreted within.

Today's installment on the Frustrations of Modern Life.

Our good friend Matt Drees returned from a two-week fishing adventure with an iPad packed full of movies and photos. 

His loyal nephew, who can be a bit of a show-off, had flown in with a high-tech camera drone to go with the bait, tackle and sundries. He busily photographed lots of camp activity shot from the Canadian treetops, buzzing about the wilderness, working the little joystick in this pristine setting. Then the nephew kindly loaded a copy of the movies and stills onto the iPad that Matt carries with him for no particular reason.

Seated on his comfortable back yard deck yesterday, Matt was eager to show the movies to a visitor. Alas, try as they might, doggedly poking and pushing on the touch screen, they couldn't locate the movies or still files anywhere.

Please understand, Matt is one of the more competent folks you'll meet in Shakopee. He managed the town sewage treatment plant for decades, can farm, flock a Christmas tree, re-key a door lock, or run a high-pressure paint sprayer without killing the grass. But his iPad. Well. 

"This is why I shouldn't have one of these," Matt sighed in resignation. 

No matter. His visitor settled in with a cold Orange Crush and together they used their imaginations to relive Matt's summer adventure.

That worked.

Simple, easy installations

65-inch Vizio with Surround from Costco. Want professional installation for $250? Nah. We got it.

An update on the rattling refrigerator for those still holding an interest in the mundane:

As suspected, the two-year old fridge was simply out of balance. An 18-inch "wonder pry bar" raised the corner long enough to spin the adjustable foot about three turns. When the bar was released and weight returned to the foot, the rattle was gone. A two-minute adjustment, put off by the retired handyman, while he and the wife endured two months of the intermittent sound of a small engine revving in the kitchen.

From left, ROKU, Comcast, Sound bar, TV

Flushed with success and housebound by hot and sticky weather, the handyman turned to the installation of a basement Big Ass Smart TV, five inches bigger than the dead one. Challenges included mounting the screen on the wall, rerouting the cable around the fireplace, connecting the screen to ROKU and the Comcast set top box using HDMI cables, connecting the Digital Versatile Disk player,  logging on to the WIFI and talking with Netflix by using the remote control arrow key as a typewriter, tying in the Surround Sound Bar and subwoofer, pairing the Bluetooth ITunes Music source to the Sound Bar, training the extra remotes to share sundry functions, and most difficult of all, re-activating the Comcast service by calling their Help Line, working with their polite, persistent, oblivious robot that asks the same irrelevant questions and then at last explaining to the live foreign-sounding tech that they should just reset the system and keep on trying, not give up and send out a tech to our house at the next available appointment in five days.

It was the better part of the week for the false starts, redoes, blood pressure spikes and bad words required to set up the system, all the while carefully following written instructions and YouTube videos for dummies.

Without exception, these instructions invariably begin with the word "Easy" and liberal use of the term "simple steps."

Which one would you use to play iTunes from the Mac on the Soundbar?
See the cookbook, read the blue labels. It's easy.

Happily, we are watching the baseball game on the new system today, with booming bass and life-like game sounds and crowd noise. Unhappily, the Twins are losing to Seattle -- in glorious high definition.

Kathleen has suggested showing her how to play a movie on the new system, using the DVD player and the brand new array of remote controls for managing it.

The retired handyman has agreed to explain how the new system works. He will begin, of course, by saying: "It is easy to play your movie dear, just follow these simple steps."