SSDD

Guess what, it is still cold and snowy here, although, today it is in the mid 20s. Of course along with warming temperatures we now have freezing drizzle. It's funny, complaining about the weather does not make it any more bearable. I have been working on a project that gets me out of the house, I finished sheetrocking the ceiling in our new garage and last night I started on the walls. My neighbor Ray, loaned me his sheetrock jack for the project and it was a lifesaver. The toughest part was hoisting those 70 pound sheets onto the jack, once they were on the jack they were cranked up to the joists and screwed into place. Working the sheets up around the overhead door tracks, and light fixtures would have been impossible without the jack. So much for that. Last Sunday Jan and I took a drive up to Rosemount for a PGR mission to welcome home two busloads of 34th Division soldiers at their armory. These types of missions are a lot more fun than the other type, if you know what I mean. While we waited for the buses to arrive we were offered cookies, water and probably coffee, this is Minnesota after all but I didn't see any bars come to think of it. After a while we could hear there sounds of approaching sirens from cop cars and then the coaches came around the corner to be greeted by our cheers and applause. These troops had been in Iraq for a year in the area of Basra. Come to think of it I believe that the three funerals that I attended last Fall were troops attached to this unit. Ben Kopps' funeral was just up the street from the Rosemount armory and the others were in the southeast Metro just across the Mississippi from there. It was a cool but sunny day for a drive in the GT and we were home by supper time. A couple weeks ago Jan and I spent a few days in Rochester trying to take care on Gen and Steve's boys, Sam and Gus, while they were in Phoenix for the marathon. Gen ran and Steve cheered her on. Gen finished with a time that she was satisfied with. I think that most serious marathoners would crawl through broken glass to finish the race after running 26 miles. St. Jan and I chased Sam and Gus around while they were gone, again I had forgotten how much work is involved with a couple of active boys. One day we took them back over to Kellogg, Minnesota to a toy store that they had visited earlier. We will definitely will be going back there in the future. It is like a toy store in Europe perhaps, not at all like Toys Are Us for sure. Well, that's about it for now. I'll throw in a few pictures to illustrate the narrative. Take care and stay in touch.

The LONG COLD Winter

It has been awhile since I last posted here, but I have been busy moving snow for a couple of weeks or so, among other things. Last December I was working on our Christmas letter and I only have so many creative juices to go around, so the blog took second or third place. I feel like pa Ingalls in "The Long Hard Winter"- I think that is close to the correct title-by spending hours every day there for awhile, scooping, blowing and scraping snow. I spent some time on the roof of the garage scooping off a foot and a half of snow to lighten the load and raking off the house roof as high as I could reach and blowing out the drive ways. After dragging myself back to the house for a break the plows come by again and it starts all over in the driveways. Anyhow, this global warming is really turning out to be a bitch this year. Oh, and did I mention that the average temperature the first ten days of January was 0 degrees? Frankly I think that around here it must have been a lot lower than that, many days never got above -5 degrees. Enough about that. It looks as if the January thaw may be just around the corner. This is one of those winters when you are driving down a sub zero highway with the snow blowing across the road and cannot believe that six months ago you rode a bike down the same road in a t-shirt. The last PGR mission that I was on was up at Fort Snelling for a soldier that was gunned down at Fort Hood by the name of Kham Xiong. He was originally from Laos and his family had a long history of service, primarily in Viet-Nam and Laos during the war. While standing the flag line it was interesting to see all of the middle aged men in their assorted uniforms and berets shaking hands and hugging one another. Forty years ago they were all young men running through the jungles of south east Asia making life difficult for the enemy. Christmas was good this year although we missed the DeFor family greatly, they're still in Germany, probably for most of this year, so maybe next year. Gen and Steve and the boys made it from Rochester in nasty weather but they got here and that is what counts. My mother in law Bernice spent Christmas in the hospital after surgery for a tumor that has since turned out to be the only cancer site. This cancer business, it's getting to the point that almost everybody I know has had a go around with it. Anyhow, one of St. Jans' co-workers transferred to another position at the agency and they are not hiring any replacements so the work load just continues to rise. They have said that they may allow overtime to complete things which is a change. Jan would retire tomorrow if only there were some way of covering health care. It is amazing now-a-days how the health care angle keeps a majority of people working at jobs they really don't like just for the health care benefit and that is getting worse everywhere too. I have been extremely lucky to have had an account that paid for my health care after I retired that took me to medi-care and the VA. When I enlisted in 1962 I had no idea how valuable that service would be in the future, of course at that age nobody expected to live much beyond thirty, much less retire at a ripe old age of 62. I have been working on some more slides in this winter prison so I'll search around and add something new. I see in my last post that I used the same batch of pictures that I used in an earlier post, so with any luck at all these will be fresher. Take care and stay in touch. The pictures are from my brother Paul and my trip to the Canyon in 1975 and a trip that Jan, Rachel, and I took to Yellowstone the same year.

An Update of Sorts

This will be for my readers that are not on the e-mail lists. Last week I had another round of doctor visits at Fairmont and Rochester, mainly to reassure Jan that I will live another day or two. Fairmont was a visit with my cardiologist to get the results from an echo cardiogram that I had done the week before and things are just hunky-dory with my ticker. Hopefully that part of my body has inherited some genetics from my Mom's side of the family. Jan and I went over to Rochester the night before and bunked with the Theobalds for the night. Luckily we got there in time to chase the boys around a little before bedtime ( see Tatertot Hotdish ). The appointment wasn't until afternoon so we spent the next morning cruising the bike shops and the mall before heading up to 5 west to see Dr. Martin. He poked and prodded and ran the scope through my nose and down my throat to look for trouble and everything was good here too. We skipped out of there and ran for home. Saturday was another PGR mission to Buffalo, Minnesota for an airman's funeral. Ssgt Rory Gavic died at Hill AFB, Utah. He was 25 years old and a dog handler that had spent a tour in both Iraq and Afghanistan. The word was that his birth father had just recently passed away and maybe that had something to do with his passing. I have been to way too many of these missions, but I am afraid that they will just continue even with the efforts being made to recognise and treat PTSD in our warriors. I arrived pretty early after a 0600 departure from home and had the distinct honor of welcoming a new PGR member to her first mission. She also was a Gold Star mother that buried her son 5 years ago this coming February. I have no idea of the pain she must be suffering. She described something in her heart that needed to get out and she joined the PGR. Once word got around everybody was paying attention to her. The time we stood in line during the visitation hadn't been too bad she said when I asked her after that part of the service but she expected the internment at the cemetery to be a lot tougher and I expect that it was, although I did not get a chance to talk with her after that. She was lined up close to the grave site so that all of the ceremonies would be visible. I was surprised to have a comment on my last blog from a Gold Star mother in South Dakota. What a honor to be contacted by someone that is dealing with such a loss. On to sunnier subjects. The weather has been nice- for November- so I have managed to get out on a bike recently and my projects keep moving along. I replaced the timing belts on my 94 Ducati, surprisingly it was not that difficult, except for getting them over the sprockets, and it ran when I got done. I also put a performance silencer on the dirt bike and that helped too. I think that I need to rejet also but that can be a winter project as it sounds as if the temps are headed for the basement soon. Thursday this week we are off to Rochester to the Theobalds again for Thanksgiving. I am sure that it will be a good time. Everyone is staying over so that the girls, Jan, Gen and Lindsey can go shopping on black Friday morning. I suppose the guys will just stay in bed as long as possible. I think that I will post a couple pictures just to brighten up the page. Be well, and stay in touch.

Sgt Wolf

Just a short one today. Yesterday I made the run to Alexandria, South Dakota to attend another KIA funeral. It was cold, windy, and spitting rain on the way down, smartly I drove the GT. I arrived about an hour ahead of time and already there were several members and their bikes hiding on the downwind side of the car wash at the Shell station in Alex. We were there to honor Sgt Eduviges "Duvi" Wolf's sacrifice in Afghanistan on October 25 of this year. She was 24 years old, and leaves a husband, Joshua and two small girls, ages one and three behind. We lined up across from the Catholic church in town for the service. This service was attended by a rather large group of women dressed primarily in black from head to foot. I wondered about their involvement until I talked to Jim, the state ride captain and a local former law enforcement officer. It seems that Joshua's Mom had taught school on several of the local Hutterite colonies, so the group were there because of his Mom. The Afghanistan story is, that the couple were stationed at different posts and she was coming over to visit him when here vehicle was hit by an RPG (rocket propelled grenade). His unit was called out to assist but he was forced to remain behind. Gary the Sioux Falls ride captain had visited with the family the evening before and found Joshua very quiet. I think that the consensus was that he should be watched over carefully for awhile. After the funeral Mass we escorted the procession and the hearse to a small cemetery on the north side of Farmer, another town on the Great Plains that is virtually a ghost town. We, the PGR formed a flag line near the grave site with our flags popping in the wind and held it until all family members had left. A person has a lot of time to think while standing on the line. You wonder how it is that a girl born in Cocula, Jalisco, Mexico comes to be buried 24 years later in a small cemetery amidst the corn and soybean fields of South Dakota on a cold windy day in November, 2009 after dying half a world away in a country she probably never heard of as a child. What makes this doubly bad is the two small children left behind. The last female service member KIA service I attended was in Madison, Wisconsin for Rachel Hugo a couple of years ago. At yesterdays' graveside service Sgt Wolf was awarded the Bronze Star and the Purple Heart by a Brigadier General, who also came over and shook my hand when he noticed the Red Bulls 34th division patch that I have on my vest. He related that they were a pretty tough outfit and I said that it was my father-in-laws' (Fritz Thielhorn) outfit. On another subject, last Saturday I attended a PGR leadership conference at St. Cloud. On the way home I stopped in New Ulm to check at Target for an item for St. Jan, no such luck. On the way out of town on Highway 15 I looked to the right at an office building and as I was turning ahead I caught movement out of the corner of my eye. I looked left just in time to see the belly of a deer going over the car, checking the right mirror I saw it land on the shoulder and head off into the weeds. Like I've said before "I live a charmed life", although I don't think that it is a good idea to push your luck. Well, stay in touch be well and as contented as possible. OK? Oh ya, a p.s. here. If you go online, look at station KDLT from Sioux Falls, they have a good video story about the funeral. They were the ones doing the interviews and shooting video in Alexandria and at Farmer. I saw myself a couple times where they film down the back side of our flag line. I'm the guy with the grey hooded sweatshirt over my head.

Jan's birthday

A week ago Jan and I made a run to the Hills for her birthday. We left home at 5:50am and arrived in Rapid City before noon after a couple rest stops and a refueling in Chamberlin. I was using the gps for an accurate speed reading and as usual the speedometer was a little optimistic by a couple of miles an hour. It still seems a little amazing to be able to make the run in a little over 6 hours and what is really amazing is the fact that in 1964 I rode with a guy and made it back to the base in about the same amount of time, this is before there were any 4 lane hiways between here and there. I have contemplated trying to contact him to find out how fast we traveled but it must have been up there. I think that he said that he had been stopped for speeding three weeks in a row in Mitchell. Needless to say he was going with a girl from St. James that was a year older than me I think. Anyhow, back to the subject. The weather was clear but cool as we cruised up to Sturgis to visit the BMW dealer and check out their t-shirt collection. I added one to my closet. Then it was over to Nemo and back to downtown Rapid. We hit "Prairie Edge" and some other shops. They have one of the few stores left that serve model and radio control builders among other crafts. I did business with them when I was stationed in Rapid 45 years ago. They have model aircraft, ships, armor, etc., etc., from all over the world. It's fun just to walk around and look at all of the things that are out there. I have thought about a KC-135 to go with the B-52D that I have hanging in our bedroom, but first I would have to finish a B-36 that I started 30 years ago and never finished, plus repair a second B-52D that got broken at about the same time. Oh well another project for the future. The next morning we headed home on hiway 44 out of Rapid down south of the Badlands and then through Wanblee on the Pine Ridge reservation. That was a scenic route with very little traffic this time of year. Once we got back on the interstate at Kadoka I stepped it up a little and though we made a side trip to the mall in Sioux Falls we were home by supper time. We had two cameras along and I got a couple shots around Interior, so I'll put them in. It seems lately that I just don't shoot as many landscape shots as I used to because it never captures what it really looks like. Ansel Adams could get it done but it seems to escape me. Anyhow, last Saturday we, Jan and our Mothers made a return trip to Rochester for Sam's birthday party on the heels of a 4" snow fall over there, more proof of global warming I guess. If you want to flesh out the details and more pictures you can jump over to Gen's blog using one of the buttons on the upper right. We had Theobalds, Kuehls, Thielhorn, Joe's girlfriend Lauren and their new puppy Jack. Sam and Leah spent most of the day palling around and Aaron and Gus being about the same size hung out too. What more can I say, the food, cupcakes and fun was fun. I hate re-using that word usual so much but it was a great party as usual, which is a good thing. To flesh things out some I will put a couple of our pictures in on top, just to show our view. I should mention a project that has been taking up some of my time in the garage this week and that is cleaning and replacing gaskets in the carburetors on our 94 Ducati. Amazingly enough it actually started and ran quite well except it was leaking gas like a sieve. So that meant tearing into it again and adding a couple o-rings and a new shutoff in the fuel line. I'll put in a picture of what she looked like while the work was in progress. Take care stay touch.

Fresh pictures of Will

For those readers that are interested in following up on my previous blog, you can link off on the " Minnesota is Heaven" button on the upper right of this blog to see pictures of our newest grand child William Friedrich. A couple are of him when he was quite fresh from storage and the rest will give you an idea of the rest of the DeFor family. Joe and Annie are growing up so fast and her hair isn't curly anymore, although it is still thick and beautiful. We, St.Jan and I, still cannot get over how we ended up with such attractive offspring and grandchildren. Such a mystery, but a good one. I was on a PGR mission yesterday afternoon for a Veterans Tribute in Fairmont. We had a pretty good turnout considering the weather was cold and damp and three other missions in the state for KIA's and Gold Star families. It was one of those weeks again with three KIA missions in northern Minnesota, but I'm thinking that they were well covered by members in that end of the state. In Fairmont we had members from Iowa and South Dakota attending. I also talked to a guy from Wisconsin that was gassing up ( we were at Super America) and he was headed for Custer South Dakota and maybe the west coast. Some guys are a lot tougher than I am, probably a lot younger too. Stay in touch.

It's William

I am going to put up a short post to inform my readers about a major event in our family. Last night- Tuesday- the phone rang and it was Hans calling from Germany. I and St. Jan knew right away what the call was about, William Friedrich ( I hope that I have the second name correct) had made his entrance. The time was before 10pm in Stuttgart, he weighed 6 pounds and 15 ounces and is 21 inches long. Shouldn't we say tall for that measurement? It sounds like a big fish that you just landed. Will joins big brother Josiah and big sister Annika. It feels a little odd not being able to run and see him. When Joe was born in San Diego we loaded up the pickup and headed west and we were waiting to leave the Minneapolis airport on the way to Japan when we got word that Annika had arrived. That time we actually got to the hospital to see her after a 13 hour flight. I'm thinking that Jan and I will not jump the Atlantic as the DeFor family should be back in the States in a couple of months, if they can just get the orders that they have been waiting for for some time. I will post another blog in the future when we get more information. The weather here has been kind of nasty, cold, rainy and just gloomy. We had a couple more windows replaced today with Anderson replacement windows. They are really good looking and tight, but not cheap, but then what good thing is ever cheap, inexpensive maybe but not cheap. I also started into cleaning the carburators on my 94 Ducati. They are really grungy, primarily from spending too much time sitting in the garage waiting for her turn to go, not easy when there are newer and prettier faces getting all of the attention. I am also trying a twist on remembering which part goes where, I am actually video taping the process. Anyhow, stay tuned when I hear something I'll get it on line. Bye