Cows with Strange Equipment

It amazes me sometimes just how much non-farm people don’t know. Just recently AFLAC insurance started to run a new commercial about a farm. Some of the animals are a little creepy looking. The good thing is they feature a Hereford. Herefords are the best beef breed and what we raise. However, you NEVER put a milking machine on a beef breed. They don’t make enough milk for it to be worth your while. It’s just WRONG. You can view the commercial at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g2oz2PHdzlA

The part with the seriously WRONG cow is at second 19. Oh, milking machines have to be hooked up to some place for the milk to go and they don’t go up and down like a bunge cord.

This is the worst cow since Barnyard the Movie, where the MALE cows have udders. Take a look at them in the trailer.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqHn_BXOQXs

When You Get the Jokes

Lately it has really come home to me that you really know you are part of a group when you start to get the jokes, the small references, the reuse of a phrase. When you use one of them and someone gets the joke or you get theirs, you know you are home. I had that experience just lately several times. (Once standing on the pageant grounds in De Smet, once reading a posting on a message board, and once when a particular message popped up off my e-mail. Of course, I have a wide and diverse set of homes, I once spent a weekend where one day I was giving a lesson on how to Ebay and the next I was getting a lesson on how to use a telegraph, my various homes present a broad and unique mix.) I thought I’d try to mix in as many as I could below just to amuse myself from all over. I really wanted to get a red shirt reference in their too, but  I couldn’t quite figure out where.

 Just recently I’ve had several instances of that that I’ve especially noticed references online and in person showing up and ringing a bell, yeah, that sentence kind of got away from me. I’ve really put some elbow in it and it’s been putting a big stupid smile on my face. I’ve been looking for something in a fairy ring and enjoying the violets. It’s so nice to be with people with whom you can do the Dance of Joy and they understand. Probably nobody got all those, so don’t hit yourself with a slate if you didn’t, but as you wish.

It’s  a really good feeling to feel like you are a part of something, so whatever you are really interested in join a group today.

Walnut Grove Pageant Quickly

This last trip to Walnut Grove has been my most underplanned visit there since my very first one which was a complete surprise. (My mom added the extra leg of our vacation to Walnut Grove as a birthday present and didn’t tell me anything about it ahead of time.) I wasn’t sure I was even coming for sure until a day before I left and I didn’t know I was going to the pageant until 10 minutes before it started. Having seen the crowds at 4:30 on Friday I can warn you don’t plan on seeing anything then. I decided to hit stuff in the morning instead and had even almost forgotten it the Walnut Grove pageant weekend. (I was on my way to De Smet, but I just wanted to stop.) I can also say that while it is still a good idea to order reserve tickets in advance, I got a chair ticket ($12 compared to $10 without a chair) literally 10 minutes before curtain and it wasn’t the last one available.

Programs are valuable and sold by women in Laura dresses, not available for the sourvenir stand or food stand though many people asked there just as I went by. I think they were inspired by the Guthrie programs last year. They are now full color on slick paper with “period” images. They have a lot more background information and are really interesting and nicely done. I would have liked at least one page of normal paper included for cast autographs. If you want to ask the cast to sign in the program bring a Sharpie type pen. Ballpoint is hard to use on the slick paper. There is an autograph period at the end and you might as well use it while you wait for people to clear out.

I had a blanket and a jacket in my car and bugs weren’t even too bad. I really enjoyed the show and I’m glad I went. As long as you already have a place to sleep, go ahead and stay for the show, plan or not plan.

If You Lose It…

Smaller is better seems to be the motto in technology. Also, many cell phones, memory sticks, etc. look nearly identical and in my job at the library I see many of both lost daily. It’s easy to leave either someplace.

However, we can take steps to speed their return. There is a national campaign in place to get people to put a tag in their phone under ICE (In Case of Emergency). Then if someone else has to use your phone in an emergency or to identify the owner of a lost phone, they know just which number to call. With the tag in place, it’s obvious what number is an emergency contact or the person who can reconnect the phone and its owner.

This second idea is all my own, I’d like to suggest that any time you get a new memory stick, you create a new word document called “This belongs to.” Within the document put your name and contact information so that if it’s lost, it’s easy to return it to you. We find lost USB sticks at the library all the time. Try to describe yours (Uh, it’s black, it slides in and out with a little plastic switch). It’s worse than describing your suitcase. So take the time to create your file now and pass this tip along!

Burr Oak Goes to the Ordway

The Laura Ingalls Wilder Park and Museum in Burr Oak  is again sponsoring a bus tour to “Little House on the Prairie – the Musical.” On Wed., Oct. 14, they will arrive in time for a special pre-show in the Lobby at 6:30, with the play at 7:30. After the show there will be a special Talkback with the cast. The plan is depart Decorah at 3 pm and return around 1 am. Tickets at the Ordway are higher than the Guthrie, so no meal will be included. The bus tour is $120 per person. It includes the ticket, travel, and a snack on the way home.

Mary Margaret McBride Owes Rose

Mary Margaret McBride wrote Rose that “I have made up my mind that you have to accept half of anything I get for fiction…I wish I could make you understand that I never in the world will fell that you haven’t done exactly what I feel now you have done.” Basically she thought Rose helped her so much with her writing so much that she owed her part of the money. I guess Laura wasn’t the only one she helped. McBride actually went on to do rather well regionally. I don’t know if she ever made good on her promise or not.

MLA 7.0

A new edition of the MLA citation system is out with substantial changes. I’ve been banging my head against the wall as I worked on updating our MLA page for the library, but I did find a couple of bright spots. I found a great quote about how they see citing digital sources:
“Electronic texts can be updated easily and at irregular intervals. They may also be distributed in multiple databases and accessed through a variety of interfaces displayed on different kinds of equipment. Multiple versions of any work may be available . In this sense, then, accessing a source on the web is akin to commissioning a performance. Any version of a Web source is potentially different from an past or future version and must be considered unique. Scholars therefore need to record the date of access as well as the publication data when citing sources on the web.”

The web as performance that gives you something to think about.

Wide-Spread Despondency Quote

I think I have found the best Dilbert Quote ever, maybe even better than “Never spend time in meetings with time wasting morons.”  In the second panel of the July 1, 2009 strip, ( http://www.dilbert.com ) Dilbert explains that test of their new software program shows, “Our user interface triggered wide-spread despondency and self-mutilation.” As someone who helps the general public with technology all the time, I surely identify with this. Recently at work I’ve been helping update our MLA handout (an updated version just came out) and trying to find stuff in it, reminded me of the quote as well, so it works for non-computer systems, too.

Manny Returns – Last Bauer BBQ

NOTE: I’ve noticed several people finding this post by searching for Michelle and Danny Santos. I want to recommend a blog/website if you are looking for information on them. http://glmanny.wordpress.com

Those of you who read my recent post, or have talked to me lately know that I have become totally sucked back into the Manny (Michelle and Danny) phenomenon on Guiding Light. Well, a month or so into my getting sucked in, it was announced they were returning to the show in the person of the one and only Paul Anthony Stewart as Danny Santos and Nancy St. Alban who played Michelle to his Danny for 5 years. The child actor Patrick Gilbert who played their son Robbie (Robert Fredrico Santos – named after her grandmother and longtime heart of the show Bert Bauer, Michelle’s great-great-grandfather Fredrich, her brother Rick, and Danny’s uncle Fredrico)  also returned in his original role and Nancy St. Alban’s real life daughter will play their daughter Hope Santos (her name came from Cassie, but also Hope Bauer is Michelle’s cousin and was a longtime heroine on the show, look for the stuff with her and Alan on the island on Youtube). So far we know that they have been living happily in California near Ed. Rick has apparently spent some of his off camera time over the years flying out to visit his family and adores spending time with his nephew and niece and is teaching Robbie his magic tricks. At least for right now you can view these episodes (beginning July 2nd) as officially posted on cbs.com and I’m sure they will be posted unofficially to Youtube as well. Manny has one of the strongest Youtube soap couple  followings with literally thousands of people watching individual clips, even when they are posted by different people multiple times. This was a great Bauer BBQ and even though some things could have been improved on (could Manny maybe have had a conversation with each other or could someone said Happy Anniversary since they were married at the BBQ???) it was great to see together as a family and happy. They remembered Rick always trying to get Danny to wear the chef’s hat and Danny hating it, Michelle making apple pie from Bert’s recipe, had Danny in full father mode running around looking after young Hope, Danny’s cousin Father Ray being overjoyed to have his family back in town, and a tribute to Bert from Rick who she always had a special relationship with. I hope we see Manny again, but even if we don’t it makes their fans happy to know they finally have the life they fought so hard and so long for. They are really, truly happy at last with no more black clouds hanging over them.

If this was the last Bauer BBQ, it was one of the best of recent years, not missing a thing from the traditional beginning of a flag raising, to the annual egg toss and three legged race. Rick spoke about remembering being a kid and sitting on the diving board eating cookies and that’s what makes Guiding Light so unique and irreplaceable. I don’t quite remember Rick doing that (he’s older than me), but I grew up with the Bauers and watched the BBQ faithfully since it started in the early 1980s. I know Rick, his dad, his best friend since high school Philip, all his various wives, all his cousins, and even his grandparents. I can remember his prom with his friends the Four Muskateers all four of which were at this year’s BBQ (3 of which were the original actors and the 4th having played the role for over 20 years). I’ve heard stories about his great-grandparents and various extended relatives from my grandmother who still talks about Papa Bauer (Fredrich Bauer, see Robbie Santos note above). I can tell you the life history of his Great Aunt Meta who was such a beloved heroine that a write in a vote campaign to decide if she would be convicted of murder, let her off so she wouldn’t leave the show, even though the whole audience had heard her kill her ex-husband (she held him responsible for the death of their son). The layers and family connections are all there, built up in real time, you don’t have to make them up. Those kind of connections, a show that you can share with generations of your family, characters you can talk about and everyone knows who you mean and their connections to everyone else in town can’t be replicated in less than each one of those 72 years and when the light goes out for good in September our popular culture will permenantly be the poorer for it. Will any show starting today, no matter how good, still be on in any technological format in 70 years?

Beef Up Our Troops

I was saving this to talk about over Memorial Day, but since I missed that, I think July 4th is fitting, too. When the War on Terrorism started the Iowa Cattlemen’s Association started a program to send them beef, mostly in the form of beef sticks. Local Burger Kings even helped them raise money for a time. However, costs increased and eventually the ICA gave up on the program. Ted and Dee Ann Paulsrud heard that the program was ending and decided to take it over. They discovered that shipping costs would have eaten up most of the money so they started looking for a deal. They arranged to buy the beef sticks from Triple T Specialty Meats who deliver them to the Sioux City Fareway store where the Sioux City’s 185th Air Refueling Station which transport the sticks to Iraq and Afghanistan and distribute them to the troops. They have sent more than 40,000 beef sticks to the troops since taking over the project. Each beef stick costs about 68 cents. I did get my donation sent in for honor of Memorial Day and I hope you’ll consider sending one, also.

$25 donation buys 38 beef sticks
$50 donation buys 73 beef sticks
$100 donation buys 147 beef sticks
A recent generous donor gave them program $1000, but even small donations can add up.

Please send “Beef”n Up the Troops” donations to:

Ted and Dee Ann Paulsrud
4980 – 320th St.
Danbury IA 51019-8505