Happy SUNDAY, October 17th!

 TERRY

As I start my blog Terry is still sleeping, I think.  It is 8:15 and I have heard her cough a couple of times but that is it.  Oh my I do hope she had a good sleep and better than mine.  For some reason I was awake most of the time from 2 AM-5 AM.  Anyway here we are beginning the second to last full week of October.  

We have nothing planned today.  I will take in church on TV as there is no way Terry can go.  Other then that I will see if there is an interesting game on TV.  No tennis on Sundays so will have to wait until tomorrow as we have a match at 9:00.

I saw this picture on my phone when I woke up this morning.

Not sure what the theme was but the cake is pretty darn fancy looking.  I can not believe how much Joan now looks like our first cousin Arlene.  I would say Joan and Ron are a pretty good looking couple for their 60th and the gal in the center is not bad either!!!  Am hoping there may be more pictures coming.  I want to see how those quads were dressed for GREAT G&G 60th.  I am pretty sure Joan was 19 and Ron was 20 when they were married.  Actually it seems just a short time ago but it was 10 years ago that we celebrated their 50th in the Black Hills where we all go together at Glorine's place.

I think they have aged kind of like a fine wine, right?

In case you don't know that is Bryan on the left and Quinn on the right.  It may be the last picture ever taken where they look innocent!!!!

I admit that I tend to get emotional when I think of the past.  Today, with J&R 60th, it brings back MANY memories of family that are wonderful.  I would add that of course not all memories are wonderful but given who I am I tend to remember only those!!!  So here are a few:

• Visiting Joan/Ron when they were in Fargo and I was still in high school.  Every time we visited them their living room was changed!!!  I still owe Joan for the top coat that I wore in high school that impressed my girl friend!  I will not go into the story but I promise you it was typical Joan.
• The times Bryan, Quinn and sometimes Bob were down to visit on the farm and Grandpa delighted in entertaining them.
• The times Ronald and Glorine came and Ronald always had something for Dave and I to do like paint his trailer.  The next day the paint was FULL of tiny black bugs!  I think we had to scrape them off and repaint and then do it in the morning and in the sun so it was dry by night time.
• Helen, Dave, Joan and I lived for the times Janet/John and Glorine/Ronald would come to visit from Ellendale.  
• In the fall of 1961 our band went to Ellendale to march in their homecoming parade.  John M had this fancy tiny sports car and he let us drive it.  My new friend, JoEllen, was impressed!
• I could not talk about fun times and leave out deer hunting in the badlands of ND.  John had this camper that he pulled with his red Ford pickup.  We would camp in the middle of nowhere and IF I remember we always filled out deer tags.  I still can smell Dad frying deer liver on Saturday as hunting opened Friday at noon.  One of my favorite pictures in my mind is going out of the camper early in the morning to do my business and seeing the camper in the rising sun of the badlands with smoke coming out of the chimney as Dad made breakfast.  
• When in grade school and maybe high school too Ronald or John would come down with their boats and we would swim and waterski on Lake Tewaukon.  For many years now there has been NO boats on the lake so that the wildlife can be there.  Progress???
• I still can see Ronald one time were were pheasant hunting.  We saw one out in the weeds and Ronal jumped out of the car and ran down through the ditch but hidden in the tall grass was a fence line which one could not see.  Almost like the movies Ronald was launched backward onto his behind as the pheasant flew away.  Nobody was hurt but the show was worth a lot!  When I think of those days I still have a ting of anger as Dad could hunt until the world came to an end but there was NO money to buy Dave or I a gun so in the fall during pheasant hunting we were the bird dogs so to speak.  Ronald gave Dave and I our first guns.  A gun I still have.  Ronald modified it just for me.
• I still remember visiting Ronald and Glorine in Kulm and going to the school for something.  Ronald needed something at the school and I got to shoot baskets in the gym.  Going into my senior year I was anticipating playing Kulm in basketball as I knew I would be in the starting lineup and big brother Ronald would be there to watch.  Ronald died that fall and in many ways much of my wonderful world came crashing down.  I still can hear my physics teacher when I returned to school after his funeral.  There had been a test when I was gone and the day I got back Mr. Henderson asked me why I had been absent.  I replied, "My brother died and I was at the funeral."  He never made me take the test.
• This last note will not get into any detail but.  I did have a girl friend about half the time in high school.  In my freshman year JoEllen seemed to like me and I was all flattered as I had never ever thought about that kind of thing in grade school.  In fact as 7th and 8th graders there was a lot of back and forth chatter about boys and girls but NEVER any dating etc.  In fact I thought girls were not for me.  BUT then at the homecoming dance as a freshman things changed.  That is enough for now but as I think back that was not such a good thing.  However my marriage to Gail came out of that so it turned out Great.  Anyway for my grandchildren I would say "please do not date in high school but for sure have good friends!

Enough!  It is now 9:30 and Terry is still sound asleep.  We have not gotten much rain so our pool was low on water.  I put the hose in the pool and put my timer on for 45 minutes.  It just went off in the kitchen near the bedroom and it did not wake Terry up.  I am finished with my FP and am ready for whatever the day brings.  Maybe a bike ride today would do me good.