Day Trip to Fertile, Minnesota

Alycia here.  We took a day recently to head to Fertile, MN, which is home to Bergeson Nursery. This was our third trip there and we now know the ropes. The drive there takes you through the Glacial Ridge Wildlife Preserve and we saw a Northern Harrier gliding around the marshes looking for food.

When we got to Fertile, we first stopped at LaLa's Cafe, where much of the food is homemade. We were there in time for a late breakfast, so we were served a variety of homemade jams: strawberry and pear. I also wanted ketchup with my home fries so our waitress brought some out on a jar. Sure enough, that was homemade, too.

Below is John being quite satisfied with his breakfast sandwich.  Their specialty is actually homemade ice cream, they have a dozen varieties.  But since it was only 11:00 in the morning, and we had much to do, we didn't want too much ice cream slowing us down. 

After breakfast we headed to the nursery, which is about 8 miles outside of Fertile. We had a list of things to buy including: ninebark bushes, honey berries, and various flowers for new planters. We were more than successful, finding many interesting plants not on our list. Future posts will showcase some of those unique finds.

 

John's note - I'm only making this face because the sun is shining right in my eyes.  And because I know there's a lot of work now for me to do.  

Better American Goldfinch and Rose-Breasted Grosbeak Pictures

Here's another picture of our American Goldfinches as well as some better shots of our Rose-Breasted Grosbeak visitors.  The ones I posted the other day weren't great (and these aren't either), but they'll do for now.  Look at all these happy bursts of bright yellow, they brighten up the garden like nothing else. 

Maybe it's time for a new bird picture-making camera.  Actually there's no maybe about it, Alycia and I have chatted and it's time to spring for a better camera.  Plus Alycia and I have birthdays coming up, perfect time for a to-be-shared present.  I won't need to tell you when we get it, you'll notice an immediate upgrade in the quality of photos. The Rose-Breasted Grosbeak is joined in the photo below on the left by two Purple Finches and an American Goldfinch. 

The Rose-Breasted Grosbeak is very handsome: black head, white underbelly, speckled black and white back and the trademark red patch on the breast.  The female is in the picture below (on the feeder on the right), she has some of the same speckling on the back, but not the same striking black and white coloration and lacking the distinctive red spot on the breast.

And I've also been recently informed there's a wedding anniversary coming up. Is that still a thing?  Am I supposed to celebrate that?  Some Interwebs research indicates that there are wedding anniversary gifts for each year of marriage?  Really? I never knew that the First Anniversary is the Deaf Dog Anniversary where you give your special someone a new deaf dog...

Bird Sightings - American Goldfinch, Rose Breasted Grosbeak

One of our favorite hobbies over the years has become watching, identifying, and enjoying birds - both in the yard and when we wander about the country.  We've been watching the bird feeders in the front yard with great expectations, waiting for the residents to return from the winter homes, and eagerly hoping to spot the migratory birds that stop by for a snack on their way to far off lands. 

Alycia was taking a Sunday morning nap on the couch when I spotted the first American Goldfinch of the year.  I was debating whether or not to wake her up, but figured that she'd be pretty stoked to see it.  Indeed she was.  It wasn't more than an hour later when the first Rose Breasted Grosbeak showed up too!! 

Spring is pretty awesome around here.  The whole homestead is thrumming with birdsong, chatter, chirping, squeeking, and fluttering of wings.  It's seemingly everywhere and Alycia and I are soaking it all in.  

One of the great things about blogging is that it's easy to access information about prior years.  With a quick search I can see when the first Goldfinch showed up last year, and when the first Rose Breasted Grosbeak appeared.  Yay for blogging!!

The End of the Semester

This is what my office at UND looks like right now. Papers all over my desk - though I haven't lost anything important yet. Students' binders (a class project) are strewn about on the floor. Two laptops doing different tasks, and a desktop running computer analyses. This might just be the new norm...

But do take note of my lovely succulents that my mom gave me. They are fake because I don't have any windows. I've received countless compliments on them and they really do add a bit if charm to the otherwise dreary room. 

John here - we haven't posted any information about Alycias' office since The Great Squirrel Incursion of 2013.  You can revisit that post here. 

Raised Garden Bed for Blueberries

Our ongoing saga to grow blueberries has taken me in many different directions over the years and in many locations.  I love blueberries and we buy and freeze about 50 pounds of them every year.  I grew blueberries back in San Diego and endeavored to grow them again when we moved to North Dakota.  The problem is the soil here is very alkaline and blueberries need and love acidic soil.  20 to 30 miles or so to the East, the soil is acidic and blueberries grow easily and plentifully, but here in Grand Forks, in the heart of the Red River Valley?  Gardeners consider any attempt to grow blueberries as pure folly. 

This is what the blueberry area first looked like. It's the space between the two doors, right behind the black iron railing (admittedly not a great photo - but this was when we first saw our future home).  It faces East and was a useless space with a few irises (not my favorite) and some unruly grasses and weeds. This space stayed this way for a few years after I finally got annoyed enough at having to mow/weed-whack the area each week.  I'd planted blueberries in another part of the yard directly in the ground and watched them languish for two years, barely surviving.  It was at this point that I actually learned that blueberries don't like the soil here.  The solution? A raised bed.

I dug out the whole area about 18 inches down, removing some old pieces of a concrete sidewalk that was there and also totally useless.  I made the hole slightly concave, and this also had the added benefit of catching any water overflow.  When we get heavy rains the gutters can't handle the runoff and we'd occasionally get some water in the basement at this point of the house.  We no longer have that problem.  Extra runoff finds its way in to the hole, gets soaked up by the copious amounts of mulch, or into the holding area at the bottom where it absorbs back in the ground or is soaked up by the peat moss that fills the bottom 6-8 inches.  I feel like this is one project that might have taken me a few years to push from planning to action, but was pretty well thought out and done correctly.  I shall savor these instances as they don't happen often. 

There was a good amount of material that was removed and we used it to make some raised mounds/flower beds in front of the house.  There's always something that you can do with extra soil, and I've found that raised beds/mounds are much easier on many levels. 

I had helpers the whole time.  Actually they didn't help, they were the opposite of help and usually only wanted to sniff right where I wanted to put the shovel in, it's quite disruptive. 

All cleared out, dug and ready to roll.  I had some branches and logs from a pine tree that I'd trimmed in the front yard that I added to the bottom of the pit.  They'll not only slowly rot and provide good nutrients to the soil, but hopefully help keep the acidity of the soil down to a level where blueberries will like it.  Despite all the work to keep the soil acidic, I'll still have to add soil sulfur, ph lowering amendments, and pine straw and wood chips as mulch every year to keep that ph down. 

This is fast forwarded a few months.  The blueberries are planted and thriving.  I added some verbena and sweet alyssum for some bursts of color, to attract beneficial bugs, and help fill some space whilst the blueberries spread out. 

Happy verbena blossoms.  We put a temporary wire fence around the area to keep inquisitive/nosy pooches out and give the blueberries a chance to grow without being stampeded or chomped by crazy canines.  This worked well for a while until Alycia decided it was time to get something slightly nicer looking. 

I just put this up last week and I'm happy with how it turned out. The black iron fencing really gives the area a much more "finished" look, and it'll look even better when there's green leaves to see.  I'll upload pictures once the blueberries have leafed out and are green and happy, then this area will look awesome.  Stay tuned for more pictures in a future post.

Blue Scilla - First Blooms of Spring

We've written about blue scillia before on Deaf Dogs and Benevolent Gnomes.  Every year we eagerly await their appearance in a handful of spots on the homestead.  Even though the flowers themselves are fairly small, they bloom at a time when literally nothing else is flowering, so they really pop out.  They're the one splash of color on an otherwise drab palette as plants try to push through the last hold of winter and begin greening up, growing, and blooming.  

The blue scilla are the first bulbs to pop every year.  They're a tiny delicate blue flower, and the plant itself is only 2-3 inches high.  They're supposed to naturalize here in Zone 4 and they're started to do so, spreading out in larger clumps in a few places.  These are actually native to Russia and do very well in our cold climate with long winters. 

These little blue flowers are the most powerful sign that Spring has finally arrived and a very welcome sight on the homestead here in North Dakota. 

Three Happy Wiggling Wagging Deaf Dogs

I had the foresight to grab the camera when Alycia arrived home the other day and captured the dogs greeting her as she came in the door.  As you can see the baby gate that we've set up is pretty necessary, otherwise one would be subsumed by a crashing wave of puppy love.

It's hard to stay grumpy, even if you've had a bad day, when you get this kind of reception upon arriving home.  Dog owners will understand this, they experience it every day.  Even if you're only been gone for a minute, dogs are thrilled to see you, and they let you know it with every butt wiggle, every second of tail wagging frenzy.  No matter who you are, it's nice to feel loved. 

The Final Gardening Frontier - Human Urine as Fertilizer

I've started reading articles with increasing frequency about utilizing your own "liquid waste" as fertilizer in the garden.  Perhaps this is because I'm reading more extreme gardening publications than ever before, or maybe it's because the idea is starting to go more main stream (yeah I deliberately made that two words so that it's also a potty pun).  Either way I've been reading a lot about using human urine as fertilizer. 

Even though human urine is almost completely sterile and is easily the most innocuous thing to come out of the human body, there is still the ick factor of peeing in your garden, especially if it's around plants you plan on eating, like ever.  Urine is a rich source of nitrogen, so rich in fact that they recommend watering it down 20:1 with water so that it doesn't burn your plants. And even if you don't want to use it directly on your plants, adding it to just your compost pile could really boost the activity in your compost pile.

Mother Earth News had an article about liquid fertilizers recently and included using urine as a fertilizer, Popular Science has written about it before too.  In this regard human urine has the potential to be a great organic fertilizer, but can I get over the fact of using personal human waste in the garden?

And for reasons that probably don't need explaining, I don't have pictures for this post...

So would you ever use this liquid fertilizer in your garden?  If you did, would you tell anyone?  I'm not sure that if I ever did this I would tell Alycia about it. 

Shadowfax in her Scary Pitbull Pose

Shadowfax demonstrated her best "scary pittie" pose today.  She has some pointers for anyone else who might want to imitate.

First of, you have to show some teeth.  A little bit of snarl goes a long way.

Second, show everyone else that you're tough and you don't care what anyone else thinks.  Use that fuzzy pink blankie for a pillow, not a blankie.  Yeah, you're a bad-ass.

Finally, do it all from a heated dog bed.  This literally tells everyone "I can stand the heat, so I won't get out of the kitchen", or off the heated dog bed.

That concludes the lesson for the day. 

The Frosting Bucket-Horse Poop Triangle

We gardeners do funny things, that's almost expected.  Whether we're dashing out in the middle of a ferocious thunderstorm to save a prized potted plant, covering up tender flowers with all but our nicest bedsheets, shoveling mulch while it's hailing (I did this today), or using concrete re-mesh to make tomato cages, we gotta admit we do some weird stuff.  I never thought I was above the strangeness, and my neighbors will vehemently attest to that, but lately I've set up a totally legal, but somehow illicit feeling exchange of frosting buckets and horse poop.  Allow me to explain.

I'm big on using buckets in the garden - they're handy as weed containers, hauling small amounts of dirt/fertilizer/sand, mixing potting soil, or cutting out the bottom and placing them over tender seedlings (this works really well to protect from unexpected frosts or marauding bunnies) to make a mini-greenhouse. I use plastic buckets in just about every imaginable capacity. We had gotten our buckets from Alycia 's parents who purchased Tidy Cat Cat Litter and gave us many of the leftover plastic buckets.  This all changed when Tidy Cat switched to plastic bags instead of buckets. 

So earlier this year I was at work lamenting to some of my students the fact that Tidy Cat Cat Litter no longer came in buckets, so my supply of conveniently sized 2 to 3 gallon durable plastic buckets had run dry.  One of my students at the local Community College works at the newly opened Tim Horton's Coffee Shop in Grand Forks, we'll call her Wilhelmina*, volunteered that they throw away buckets all the time and she could probably get me some of them.  The buckets are food grade 2.5 to 3 gallon buckets that contained frosting for delicious Tim Horton's donuts.  

This is what the buskets look like when I get them from my donut shop connection.  They're encrusted in various kinds of frosting/icing/glaze.  I need to clean them up, wash them off, and get all the frosting remnants off of them in order to transport them in my car and hand them off to my other student.

During this initial rambling discussion about buckets and gardening, another student and friend of Wilhelmina, let's call her Gertrude*, volunteered that she had a horse and plenty of horse manure piling up (literally), which would be free for the taking.  The only problem is that Gertrude lives about 45 minutes away, and I don't have a pickup or means of hauling large amounts of horse poop.

So once or twice per week there is an exchange in the back corners of the school parking lot.  Frosting encrusted buckets are passed from Wilhelmina to me, clean buckets are passed from me to Gertrude, buckets full of horse poop are passed from Gertrude to me.  I drive off with buckets of horse manure to compost, spread in the garden, or otherwise make my plants happy.  Like I said, gardeners are a weird lot, and I know that this arrangement and weekly parking lot exchanges should feel a whole lot stranger than they do.

I get buckets back that look like this - full of delicious, nutrient packed horse manure.  So maybe this isn't the strangest thing, gardeners use all manner of manure and have for centuries.  Perhaps it's just the seemingly illicit manner in which I acquire and swap buckets out in the school parking lot that makes it feel slightly odd.  Next week we'll tackle another interesting topic...using your own liquid waste as fertilizer, so stay tuned.     

*Names have been changed to protect the innocent.  

Easter Wrap Up

Easter weekend has come and gone.  It was filled with yard work, ham, chocolate covered goodies, even more ham, and then some more yard work.  The weather was delightful in the 60's and 70's and was perfect for getting out and preparing the garden.  I actually might be ahead of the game out in the garden.  We've cleaned up, trimmed some hedges that were in dire need of a haircut, and gotten ready for the delivery of landscaping bricks that is set to arrive on Friday.

500 hundred landscaping bricks and and equally impressive 10 yards of mulch are on their way.  This weekend should see if our garden stamina is Summer-worthy or is we need some more practice.  Lots of pictures of our newly shaped flower and veggie beds to come. 

Since our Easter wasn't terribly memorable and photogenic (nobody wants to see pictures of me sitting around eating ham and potato salad, right?), how about a review of Easter through the eyes of my awesome nephew Jacob?

Easter started out for Jacob with a trip to the fire station (where his Mom is a Fire Captain).  After sitting in the fire truck, he got to help find all the eggs and Easter treats that were hidden in and around the fire station.

Then more Easter egg hunting and cruising through the park on his scooter.

Followed by some quality time on the playground.  I didn't ask how many trips he took down the slide, but I was assured that it was quite a few.  Nothing like the power of candy to get you through the day!!

Shadowfax Napping

Shadowfax gathered her favorite toys around her heated dog bed, got tucked in (by her concerned people guardians), and wove her noggin through the legs of the rocking chair.  This is how she spends a cool and blustery Sunday morning. And don't worry, nobody was using the rocking chair.

 

My Most Hated Garden Task and Ugly Pictures of the Homestead

Gosh it feels good to get back out in the garden.  There's enough snow melted that I can start on some of the pre-Spring cleaning tasks that have been on my mind since the snow started flying so many months ago.  Actually there are only a few piles on the north facing walls of the garage and house, so while there are a few spots I can't get to, there's a lot of stuff I can do.

I trimmed down some shrubs in the back yard that I've been meaning to hack back since we moved in 5 years ago.  The problem is that these shrubs were a huge attraction for nesting birds (specifically the grackles) and by the time I remembered to trim them, they were full of nesting birds.  Not wanting to be a truly heartless baby bird killing monster, I let them be for the season, vowing to trim the bushes once the birds had fledged, only to have the task escape my mind. 

I then set about tackling my most hated garden task.  Not because it's difficult, it's not.  It doesn't involve heavy lifting or manual labor, but I detest it, even more than scooping dog poop out of the back yard.  I hate it because it's the result of carelessness of others.  The task?  Picking up all the trash in the yard.  This is the single worst time for it too.  All the snow has melted, leaving behind 5 months of accumulated detritus and rubbish.  It's ugly. 

I didn't even need to go find a bag for all the trash, there was one conveniently located in a shrub in the yard.  Our house is on a corner, a straight shot from a main thoroughfare to the park and swimming pool. Not the best location for remaining trash free.  Every day I'm out in the yard in summertime I'm picking up trash.  My work outside shorts have designated trash pockets that I empty every time I walk past the trash can. I've often wondered how much I would accumulate if I saved up a years' worth of garbage I pick up from my yard, but that would probably just bum me out. 

Here's a super ugly picture of my yard.  No leaves on the trees, no Spring cleanup has taken place.  It's brown, leafless, dirty, in need of a good raking and tidying up.  I share this picture because I'm not afraid to show the ugly side of the garden too, somewhere a gardener is giving me mad props for my honesty.  Plus there was some cool alignment of the trash in the shrubs down the shrub line.

An energy drink can, a Styrofoam cup, and tucked under the right side of the bush is a plastic baggie filled with an assortment of pro-Jesus pamphlets.  I could have sworn that Jesus and/or the Bible might have mentioned something about not throwing thine crap in thy neighbors' yard, but I might be mistaken on that one. 

Just a 10 minute tour of the yard yielded me a plastic shopping bag full of trash.  It's stuff like this that makes me hate other people more than I already do.  But at least it only happens every day during the Spring/Summer/Fall seasons.

Spring has sprung!

It's going to be close to 70 degrees today, but Tito remains unimpressed. The girls, on the other hand, are eagerly awaiting the arrival of spring.

Snow Covered Clematis Trellis

The arrival of Spring took another step back when we got a foot of Springtime snow on Monday/Tuesday. The kind of heavy, wet snow that sticks to everything and makes for unique and very interesting photos.

This is the clematis trellis on the East side of the house.  I made this trellis a few years ago with concrete re-mesh leftover from making DIY Heavy Duty Tomato Cages.  It's kinda crazy that in a couple of months this will (hopefully) be full of Jackmanii Clematis, overflowing with green vines and billows of blueish flowers. 

Thundersnow!!

We're in the midst of a late season Spring blizzard here in North Dakota. We might be mildly dreading all the shoveling and snow hauling that we'll be doing over the next few days, but for now we're enjoying our snow day.  The dogs are tucked away in their heated beds and the people are hunkered down on their couches, plugging away on various computerized work tasks.  Not bad for a Monday. 

The weather reports have indicated that there is a chance of a very rare weather phenomena - Thundersnow!! (yes exclamation points are required)  It's been reported to the Southwest of us and The National Weather Service predicts there's a chance that we'll get thundersnow here.  

I've heard thundersnow before when I lived in Connecticut many years ago. I distinctly remember thinking how cool it was to have a thunder cell embedded in a snow storm.  The convection that you need for thunder and lightning is almost always associated with warmer storms, the typical tropical summer thunderstorm, and pretty rare for snow making systems.  We're on baited breath here hoping for thundersnow.  Intrigued?  NASA has a pretty great article if you want to learn more about Thundersnow. 

End of March Blizzard

The headline from the National Weather Service says - End of March Blizzard...No Foolin'. 

If the various weather experts are to be believed, we're in store for 10 to 20 inches of snow starting early tomorrow morning and all throughout the day.  No promises, but we could have some "Puppy playing in the piles of fresh snow" movies by tomorrow.  You can hope for that, I'll be busy hoping for a snow day, or two.

More Talking Dogs and Talking Titos' Tax Tips

When Alycia sent me the videos of talking dogs while she was on Spring break last week, I naturally did my best to take it to its fullest logical conclusion.  It was a busy weekend of chores, outings, watching March Madness Basketball, and lots of grading tests/assignments for work.  I did manage to make the following Tito video. It makes me laugh.

Then I got to thinking - "What would be the funniest thing that I could get Tito (and the other dogs) to say?" The best idea I had was that Tito could read from my Income Tax textbook.  But that quickly lead me to realize that it doesn't have to be funny, my students could totally learn tax stuff from a talking dog!!! If just once while they're working during tax season, or taking a test in my class and they remember one of Talking Titos' Tax Tips, well then it has all been worth it. 

We thought these were so informative, that we created a separate page here on Deaf Dogs and Benevolent Gnomes.  You can see all of Talking Titos' Tax Tips for yourself. And yes, I've made all of these videos available as a resource to my students. 

Professor Cummings on Spring Break

What does a high level academic like Professor Cummings do on Spring Break? Are you envisioning thoughtful Ivory Tower contemplation?  Data analysis with scientific looking computer graphics? Grant writing?  Scientific examination of complex brain wave patterns of language development?  Or this...

This was one of three videos that Alycia/Professor Cummings e-mailed me the other day while I was at work.  Proof positive that she was hard at work with high level academic matters.

I was quite impressed that Alycia was able to teach all three dogs to talk in only a matter of a few days.  This is all courtesy of an app from her iPad called My Talking Pet.  It's highly entertaining, but maybe not the high level stuff you'd expect from a college Professor.

Happy St. Patrick's Day

Happy St. Patrick's Day everyone!  There won't be any corned beef, or cabbage, or green beer, but Shadowfax the deaf pittie celebrated anyways with a few things green.

She played with her green stick, the awesome and very hardy Goughnuts dog toy. 

Then heartily napped in her green slumber ball.  OK, so she might not have even understood that it was St. Patrick's Day today, but to her each and every day is a holiday and that's just one of the many reasons we love her. 

Camry Update - It Lives!!!

The hero has just stabbed the creature from the deep/crazed psycho camp killer and breathes a sigh of relief that the ordeal is over, only to have the creature lurch back to life once again.  Why on earth these movie characters don't decapitate, hack, chop, mince, puree, and set fire to the creature to make sure it's dead has always troubled me.  Horror movies aside, the Camry that we said farewell to lives on like a horror movie creature.  Well a tiny little piece of the Camry lives on...the license plate. 

Unbeknownst to us (and poorly communicated to us by our local Subaru dealer), we were supposed to keep the license plates from the Camry before we traded it in to the dealership.  Miscommunications and non-hilarity ensued and we ended up having to request new license plates from the North Dakota Department of Motor Vehicles, but these "new" license plates were actually the same ones as from the Camry.  There's some manner of bureaucratic issue here where it's easier to keep the same plates and switch the car that they're associated with than to request new plates.  I don't pretend to understand the mechanations of the North Dakota DMV.  

The vehicle that replaced the Camry (a Subaru Impreza - more on our new car in a later post) will now proudly carry around its' license plate, so a tiny piece of the Camry spirit will live on in infamy.  If the new car doesn't feel like starting or begins leaking various fluids, a vehicular exorcism may be in order to expel the Camry demons from the new car, but for now we'll just assume the best.

Slushy Snow Playtime with Shadowfax

It was 40 degrees outside today, the first tangible and credible evidence of Springs' arrival.  The snow was soft and slushy, perfect for getting some fresh air and sunlight on our winter weary skin. 

The dogs were all exhibiting Spring fever and we happily obliged them with some time outside.  I had on shorts and a sweater, Alycia had her more typical pink jacket and track pants.  Alycia's outfit was more about puppy-splashing management than being cold though, so don't judge her.

Alycia is utilizing the unconventional "two-handed" throwing method for tossing deflated basketballs to Shadowfax.  The deflated basketballs are one the best toys we've ever purchased.  Not only are they less than $1 at a local thrift store (or free from Freecycle), but Shadowfax loves them.  They have just enough give but still offer chomping resistance and haphazard bounces when thrown.  She's a happy little pup. 

O'Keeffe's Working Hands - Hand Salve Testimonial

We don't usually pitch products here on the Deaf Dogs and Benevolent Gnomes blog.  Our humble blog is small enough that it never attracts the attention of companies who would offer us free samples in exchange for a glowing product testimonial.  So any praise you read here is genuine and all products were procured by us, at relevant market prices. 

OK, legal disclaimers and other information aside...If you have dry or cracked hands, you should pick up some O'Keeffe's Working Hands.  It works and it is awesome.  And this is coming from a dude (me) that hates anything that makes my hands greasy, so when I say that I actually don't mind using O'Keeffe's, that's about as high praise as I could offer.  I'd seen ads for it in Mother Earth News over the years and finally bought some several months ago on a whim during a visit to a local hardware store. 

Between the extreme cold here and the dry air of winter, my hands get pretty gnarly in the winter.  And for some reason, playing basketball and volleyball causes the ends of my fingers to simply split open.  All the time.  All winter.  It sucks and is pretty darn unpleasant.  It's like constantly having a half-dozen paper cuts on the tips of your fingers, but O'Keeffe's has really fixed the problem.  And not only do I love this stuff, but so does Alycia.  Double endorsement ahoy!



On the rare occasion that we do pitch products, it's always something we truly believe in like: Tuffy Dog Toys, Goughnuts Green Stick Dog Toy, and Iron X Weed Killer.  We don't put our Deaf Dogs and Benevolent Gnomes stamp of approval on much, but when we do, it's something that we use and love.  We've accordingly added this product to the DDBG Stamp of Approval Amazon widget on the left side of the page.  You can buy it online, but we've been able to find it locally at Ace Hardware, Lowe's, and Menard's.

Anyone else ever used O'Keeffe's before?  If so what'd you think?  If not, what's your go-to remedy for gnarly, chapped, or winter-battered hands?  

Deaf Pibble Butt Rub Video

During the prolonged stretches of cold weather we start to run out of ideas for indoor exercising and burning off puppy energy in the house.  Sometimes the best we can manage is sitting on the floor for some active tummy and butt rubs.  Even that can burn off a little bit of energy, and every little bit helps.

A quick video of pittie puppy smiles and heavy dog-breathing is maybe just the thing you need to pep you up on a Monday morning. 

Thursday Morning February Temperature

It's a crystal clear morning here in Grand Forks, North Dakota.  The sun is bursting forth over that Eastern horizon and it's truly a lovely start to the day.  The only problem is that it's -25F. Yup 25 degrees below zero.  Chilly. 

We plugged in the block heater on the car last night.  While it's not necessary (it's our new Suburu), as one mechanic told us "it's just a lot easier on the car".  I'm always amazed that anything can operate at this temperature - cars, people, dogs, houses.  I'm always appreciative each day that the house doesn't just spontaneously collapse out of exhaustion of keeping us warm. 

Hopefully this last week of February will be the end of the really chilly temps for a while. 

Shadowfax - GSD

Every passing day brings us new deaf dog related discoveries and entertaining new revelations about our four-legged companions. After years of trying to decide what type of breed she was, we finally realized that Shadowfax is in fact not a Pittie/Bulldog mix, but a GSD.

Now traditionally GSD has stood for a long admired dog breed - the German Shepard Dog.  But Shadowfax is a new breed of GSD - a Green Stick Dog.

The green stick is a goughnuts dog toy.  We've extolled their virtues before, but are now here with photographic evidence of their awesomeness.  We have had this particular toy for a year, and it's still fully intact with little more than a few minor teeth indentations.  And it's one thing to have a toy for a year, but quite another to use the toy every single day like Shadowfax does, and still have the toy remain intact.  This is one impressive dog toy, seemingly perfect in it's ability to hold her interest (she plays with it EVERY day) and remain in one piece. 

Shadowfax with her stick again. One of her favorite things to do is plop the end of the stick on my laptop as I'm sitting on the couch working.  (Yes I sit on the couch and work, don't judge).  If you ever read a blog post that says "jladhf ajksdhf;kauyer;aljkdhf kjladhsflkauyeblahgfasderlndkc" it's either because I've finally passed on to the other side of sanity or Shadowfax and her toy have written and posted the story together.

If you have a dog that's a heavy chewer I'd recommend trying one of the goughnuts dog toys. They're not cheap by any means, this green stick was $20 or so, but if it lasts for a long time, it might be worth it.  We also have a few other gougnuts toys that Shadowfax plays with semi-regularly, and they've also withstood the chomping jaws of our little pup.

And naturally after playing with her green stick, it's usually time for some snuggles and pets with Alycia.  Shadowfax is a pretty spoiled pooch. 

Farewell to the Camry

John here with a stern warning - this may be an emotional post.  It may be tough news for many of you to handle, especially those who have come to love Alycia's Toyota Camry over the years.  Don't ruin this moment by saying something snarky about how in the world Alycia could still be driving that piece of vehicular rubbish.  Mostly because it's not nice, but also because it's not true. I've been driving this unreliable hunk of crap/four-wheeled curio of nostalgia for the last two years while Alycia has been styling in the comfort and heated seats of our new Subaru Outback.  Now I'll turn things over to Alycia.

Yes indeed. It seems like yesterday when my mom (aka, Mama Bear) brought home the Camry. Well, it was actually August 1999 and the Camry was already 7 years old and had nearly 100,000 miles. Soon enough, the Camry and the Bear Family took off for the first of the Camry's many adventures - a cross-country road trip back to Stanford for my senior year of college. Note - look how young I am, and how good looking the Camry is.

That first big trip was perhaps an indication of all that the Camry represented. Not 100 miles down the road we had to stop to buy a headlight for the car. And then in the middle of the Nevada desert in September, the AC died. Good thing that the AC system had been recently recalled and we got it fixed up as good as nearly new. My mom had paid for the extended warranty on the car, and I made good use of it, having all sorts of subtle mechanical issues with it in that first year.

But the Camry survived and was my constant companion through a few years of "working" at Stanford, and then through all of my grad school years in San Diego. During those years, it made countless trips throughout California: to the Tahoe area multiple times for ski trips, to Ukiah for camping, to the City (San Francisco) for shopping in the Haight, to Napa/Sonoma for wine tasting, to LA to see friends, and throughout San Diego county for many years.

By the time I finished grad school in 2009, the AC had died again in the Camry. But, since my Camry was the better of the two Camrys that John and I owned, we fixed it up again for an unimaginable trip back to North Dakota - the Camry's homeland. Never did we think that it would come back to North Dakota, but it made the trip home with no issues, carrying not only John and myself, but also Shaak Ti, Tito, and our 2 fish.

Once back in North Dakota, the Camry remained the "good"car for 3 years, as John drove the Grandma-mobile (the 1989 Ford Tempo that my Grandma owned prior to her death). When the Tempo was on its last gasp, we bought our Outback in 2012. That is when I went from the Camry's primary caretaker to its occasional rider, and John took over driving it. The past few years haven't been quite so kind to the Camry, as it became less and less reliable in starting, and it did not handle very well on the snowy and icy roads. John finally got fed up with the enigma of the Camry (Will it start today? Probably not) this January and declared that we needed another new car.

In a very ironic twist, we had decided to buy a new car the same week that the Outback got smushed by an irresponsible teen driver. And perhaps even more surprisingly, when we went through the new car paperwork, the dealership offered us $500 (American dollars no less) for a trade-in of the Camry. We were planning to donate it to some non-profit to get the tax deduction, but the $500 was a better offer and so we jumped on it before the salesman had second thoughts.

The dealership was even OK with the fact that the car didn't start and they offered to come and tow it away. It took them a week and a half to come and get it, but that gave us time to say our goodbyes to the Camry. We cleaned it out and found numerous interesting relics from the 15 years that I had the car. Directions to all sorts of places I visited, and of course the little notebook in which I kept notes on all of the mechanical fixes the Camry had over the years. I wanted to give that notebook to the dealership, but they took it away before I could put it back in the glovebox. Now they'll never know how many miles ago it had its timing belt replaced. Oh well. And in a somewhat anti-climatic end, the dealership's guys came with a pick-up and a tow-rope a few Tuesdays ago and towed it out of our driveway. At 235,000 miles, the Camry was a great car.

Here, in its last photo, the Camry doesn't look quite so beautiful and graceful. It's covered in snow and ice and we hadn't been able to start it for over a month. But it was an excellent, awesome car. One that many people would have been proud to own, and I was. We had many adventures, the Camry and I, and I hope that its new owners will treat it with the respect that it deserves.

And yes,  I know that my pink coat is a little gray there - I blame playing with Shadowfax and her dirty basketballs in the backyard. It is just my dog walking/playing coat. I wouldn't wear that coat anywhere fancy...

Snow Pictures from North Dakota

I haven't really posted any snowy winter pictures at all this year.  But now that we're nearing late-February and the possibility of winter ending seems real, I think I can muster the wherewithal to post some pictures of the homestead in the snow.

We've gotten a lot of snow this winter.  No huge storms, just a lot of Alberta Clippers that have swept through and dropped 2-3 inches, or quick overnight storms that left 4-6 inches.  We've had about 44 inches of snow this season, which is a bit above average.  These are the apple trees in the garden, and they're about 9 feet tall. 

The front of the house with snow piled up. The front of the house faces North and even though there isn't much roof surface that faces that direction, the snow really piles up on the little roof area that's available.

The bird feeders in the front yard.  These branches that the feeders are hanging from are between 5 and 7 feet tall, but with all the snow pack they're almost at eye level.  All the snow makes it super convenient for the squirrels and bunnies, they can just sit right up and get the sunflower seeds. 

But the picture that really puts it into perspective is this next one, a picture of the front berm on the North side of the homestead.  Just a big pile of snow with no definition, or anything near it to give you perspective.  What a great shot 'eh?  I included this photo as a public shaming to myself to never take pictures like this again.

The Great Backyard Bird Count 2014

We participated in the Great Backyard Bird Count of 2014.  And if you also want to participate, there's plenty of time - it runs the whole weekend February 14 to 17. All you have to do is set aside at least 15 minutes to record the birds that you see in your back (or even front) yard.

Check out the Great Backyard Bird Count website.

Alycia spent about a half hour counting birds (I helped quite a bit).  For being a "scientist" in her professional life, Alycia's methodology for counting birds lacks a certain scientific quality at times, but that's OK. We still love her despite her abhorrent aberrations from proper scientific bird counting methods.

Here's what we ended up counting:

• 10 sparrows
• 2 chickadees
• 2 nuthatches
• 1 American crow

Not the most exciting list by any means.  Not as exciting as last Spring when we saw all manner of awesome birds: Scarlet Tanager, Indigo Bunting, Baltimore Oriole, Rose Breasted Grosbeaks, and American Goldfinches.  Soon Spring will return and so will the awesome bird sightings.

Photo Credit

With a little luck, we'll see this awesome Scarlet Tanager again this Spring. First we need a little bit of snow melting to happen...that may take some time.  

Professor Cummings Honored

January is thankfully behind us.  January is the nadir of cold and snow, and even though there are two months of winter left, there seems to be some faint light at the end of the tunnel.  I'm also finally starting to approach feeling normal even though I'm not fully recovered from the malaise detailed in A Rough Month.  One sure indication of feeling better is having a sassy enough attitude to want to write a blog post.

Instead of focusing on illnesses and crunched cars and continued sub-zero high temperatures, we'll mention something more positive...like Professor Alycia Cummings being honored by her own students in the University of North Dakota student newspaper, The Dakota Student.

At the end of last semester Alycia was approached by one of her students and asked if she read the current edition of The Dakota Student.  She hadn't since she never does (chock full of school spirit is she).  Alycia was told that the students in her class (and in the National Honor Society) had placed an notice in the newspaper thanking her for being such a great instructor.  It might bear mentioning that this was unsolicited and no extra credit was granted. 

It was quite the honor for Alycia and she was proud that her students were enthused enough about her teaching to place a "Thank You" notice in the student newspaper.  Alycia was grateful for the unexpected gesture from her students and realized that things like this look great when going up for tenure (which is right around the corner). 

A Rough Month

Well gang, it's been a few weeks since I've broken radio silence.  I'm not ignoring you, this isn't some complicated tough love experiment.  Without turning this into a (yet another) woe is me missive, I shall endeavor to merely describe why I've been negligent in my blogging duties. 

Starting the weekend after Christmas I've been knocked flat on my keester with some manner of "digestive" issue (yes I'm trying to be delicate here).  Multiple trips to the doctor and many diagnostic tests have been unable to ascertain exactly what the problem is, and I've gotten slowly better.  But there are some lingering issues and my doctor has me on a gluten-free, dairy-free diet that includes avoiding chocolate, spicy foods, acidic foods, fatty foods, anything that tastes good...and worst of all coffee.  Sigh. 

The good news from the bout of who-knows-what is that I've lost a lot of weight and am reveling in my new svelte figure.  Please bear in mind though that this is NOT a diet program that I would reccomend. 

On top of that we're experience transportation woes here at the homestead.  It's finally time to put the 1992 Toyota Camry out to pasture, and last night on our way to the UND basketball game a stupid high school girl who was driving too fast (and probably texting) lost control of her car, slid across two lanes of traffic and the median and smacked into our only remaining drivable vehicle.  More hoop jumping, phone calls, and annoyance.  But we're both OK, though our only mode of transport at this point is deaf-dogsled, we'll let you know how that works out. 

So to take our minds off our various worries, let's watch a clip from an old South Park episode, yes Petey the Sexual Harassment Panda.  I dare you to not let this song get stuck in your head.

Polar Vortex, Historic Cold

I know that in winter I post a lot "jeez look how cold it is here" kinds of things.  These posts are only slightly meant to be an outlet for my complaining about the weather.  Mostly they're about cool weather related stuff that until we moved here 5 years ago, I'd never conceived of. For instance, I'd never heard the phrase "polar vortex" until this week. 

A polar vortex is a gigantic semi-permanent cyclone that hovers near each of the Earths' poles and can bring significant cold air to other areas during weakening/oscillation.  Essentially we'll have the weather that should be at the North Pole here in Grand Forks for a few days.  I won't tell you how much time I've spent browsing scientific websites reading about polar vortices (plural of vortex), but it's been quite fun.

As an accountant and numbers person, these numbers are fascinating to me.  These are numbers I never even would have thought possible until I moved here,  And granted, these are just the actual surface temperatures, this doesn't factor in the wind chill, which is expected to be in the -50, -60, even -70 range today through Tuesday - that's just plain crazy!!  Local news and the newspaper has stated that weather this cold "Hasn't been seen in the area in decades".

Weather forecast picture from the Grand Forks Herald.

Fourth Coldest December on Record

It's been a cold stretch here over the last month or so, dang cold.  We've had the kind of cold that literally takes your breath away when you step outside, makes you mutter expletives, and forces you to strongly rethink your life decisions.  How cold?  The fourth coldest December on record since some crazy ass pioneers settled here and started measuring the temperature and writing it down in 1890. 

You can read the full article here in the Grand Forks Herald, but here's the relevant piece:

"Jeff Makowski, meteorologist at the National Weather Service office in Grand Forks, said December 2013 was the fourth coldest December in the area since 1890. The average temperature was 0.6 degrees."

Yes you read that correctly, the average temperature was 0.6 degrees. Average.  0.6 degrees.  And we've got four months of winter left to go.