A great way to see the country and the state

A few of the signs from state and national parks in this last year.  The Rainy Lake visitor center is for MN one and only national park.  Minnesota has 72 state parks and in the last two years we have visited or stayed in 65 of them.  It is a great way to see the state from east to west and north to south.
As I sit writing this morning the 220v heater is going in the garage.  I am sure the electric meter is humming as it circles the meter that determines what we owe Xcel!  I noticed the temp was 42 in the garage this morning so thought it would be nice to get it UP to 50 as least.  The indoor/outdoor reads 63 in house and 34 outside. 
Time is getting short as we wind down October and head towards November in a fast trot it seems.  We are thinking Travis will be here alone to tend the house in about two weeks.  My blood is thin I fear and I was wondering this morning how I will survive the November mornings 16 feet high in Dale's field in two weeks.  I can remember deer hunting when it was snowing and very cold and then also when it was in the 50's so we will see what happens in a couple of weeks.
We had an interesting experience last week.  Friday evening Terry turned up the furnace a bit to take the chill off and it would not start up.  I have lived here for 36 years and I have never had the furnace break down and I have not had to put a dime into repair.  It is an old boiler type with gravity feed and a thermostat that operates from a thero-coupler (I fear I have my words wrong).  I do know that if we lose electric power our furnace would work. Any way I tried several things and nothing worked.  We do have a service contract which we pay for each month so here I am calling them at 8:30 Friday night hoping they will answer and maybe get here sometime on Saturday.  Well I called at 8:30, they were here a little after 9:00 and we had heat by 9:30.  I have never had service like that with ANYTHING.  I guess I will not second guess myself each time I get the notice that our service contract has been paid.
I checked the garage and the temp is up to 47 and I am guessing that only took half of my monthly retirement check!
I stopped to get some oxygenated gas at Gellers across the river Saturday.  Dave, the son of our first superviser on the paper route, was there and he said Craig, his Dad was sitting in the back.  Craig was the person who came to our house to ask why we had complained about our paper delivery and he talked us into taking the paper route.  Ten thousand plus days later we quit the route!!!!  Anyway Craig asked about the boys and we talked for about 10 minutes.  It was fun to see him again.  He retired in 1991, sounds like a long time ago but then it also sounds like a long time when I say I retired 6+ years ago.
We had a fun visit from Mark and Mary Saunders yesterday.  The last time they were able to stop and visit was in October of 2009.  We enjoyed about 2 hours of their time before they had to head home.  They have exciting times ahead with new grand babies coming, a whole family vacation in Hawaii and there must be more too.  They do take great family vacations.  A daughter and her husband are planning to sell their cars, put things in storage and in January start a year long travel--sounds like fun.
I have finished several Christmas presents, I am more than half finished with a table to match our bed but I do have several things left so...............
I just poured the last half cup of FP, put in about a tablespoon of whipping cream so I am "good to go" in the garage for a while.