Christmas Post Part Ein

  It's funny, when I am not in front of this keyboard, I think of all kinds of profound things to say, but my mind goes blank when the screen lights up. So we shall just have to go with the  run of the mill mid level vocabulary I normally go with, ok? Anyhow, as years go, this one has not been extraordinarily different from the past several years, so I will try to fill in the blanks for those of you who do not read my slowly posted blogs. Traditionally I start with January because, you know, it is the first month of the year and does make a natural starting point, so I will stick with tradition, not wanting to confuse anybody.
  So it's January 2014, let me see. The temps were in the negative region a lot of the time, and we made several trips to the Fairmont ER or Sherburn to help with Jan's Mom's medical problems, and Fairmont scouting out a new refrigerator for my Mom, so we, and primarily Jan, are entering an era of caring for our parents. In the middle of the month we had some freezing rain progressing into near blizzard conditions, and a trip to Rochester to visit the Theobalds. Later on it was brutal cold and high winds, and more trips for doctor appointments for me and Jan's Mom. We did get our new couch in there, and I worked on re-assembling the engine on my 185 Honda. We got a used carpet remnant to replace the several scraps that I have covered the floor in the shop with over the years.
  February is next. It looks as if I spent considerable time on projects that have been hanging fire for years, one, a model of a B-36 that I started on in the 60s I think, and am finally getting together and painted, and second our Honda 185 that has been sitting disassembled in the garage attic for at least 10 years. Eli got the tank and frame all nicely painted with the proper color, and I spent a lot of time with a scrub brush and parts cleaner on the rest of the bike. When it was finally reassembled it looked pretty good, and actually ran, although the carburetor needs work. The weather continued with January's trend of below zero days and nights, and some snow. The 15th was our 43rd anniversary, so we took a couple of days and ran out to the Hills. It was 5 above here and 65 by the time we got out there. Jan and I tried to get over to Rochester one day but had to turn back due to bad roads, watched the Kuehl kiddos, and started to develop a cold.
  March follows, in my books anyway. I was nursing a cold and we had  heavy snow storms, which always means time blowing, and scooping snow- more fun in the snow. We celebrated Leah's 8th birthday on the 8th, and spent early morning hours at the Fairmont ER again with Jan's Mom. The next day I was at Cpl Caleb Erickson's visitation in Waseca. The Cpl was killed in action in Afghanistan. Patriot Guard missions are really starting to slow down, particularly KIA's, which all in all is not a bad thing. Primarily what we are doing now is veteran funerals. I was over to Waseca the next day for the funeral and burial. Luckily it was a sunny day with melting temperatures, so standing in a snow bank at the cemetery was ok. Jan was spending more time with her Mom, who seems to be failing mentally, and is no longer able to stay in her assisted living apartment. The weather is moderating, thank God, and I managed to get bikes out of the garage again. Jan did manage to get her Mom into the rest home here in St. James, so the trips to Sherburn won't be done any more.
  Then comes April. I started getting the trailer out of hibernation, then we had a heavy snow, and then the temperatures started heading in the correct direction. Bikes were running out of the garage and getting serviced in anticipation of trips to come in the coming season. Jan and I ran over to Rochester to see Sam and Gus' program, also here in town for Leah, and Aaron. My brothers, Phil, Paul, and I did some projects at my Mom's house one day. I did get the 185 running, but it turns out that it has a plugged low speed jet that needed to be cleaned. It has got to the point that I can pull the carb off of that engine in a matter of minutes, I've done it so many times over the years. Easter was at Eli and Lindsey's house as is usual, and I see that I must have been trimming trees and cleaning up the yard. Was doing a lot of catch up riding whenever the weather co-operated and made a PGR mission at Yankton, South Dakota. Jan and I went to Leah's first piano recital here in town, it looks like we may have another pianist in the making.
  May, what can I say? We were getting some moisture, because I mowed the lawn 3 times in the first 10 days of May. Jan and I made our first trailer run to the Albert Lea KOA over Mother's Day weekend. This is pretty early in the year so it was not unusual that it was cold and rainy, but we did get some riding in, and there is heat in the trailer so it's not too bad. The next major project to start out was the change of the living room and den carpet, which necessitated getting movers to move the baby grand to another room, pulling all the wood work, and painting the walls. Luckily I was not tasked with the paint job, or moving the piano, whew. With the change of the season came trips to Wooddale for Donna's choir concert, Blaine for our nephew's stepdaughter's funeral, Mankato to pick up my sister Kathy, Rochester again for Sam and Gus' program, and Owatonna for our annual Memorial Day picnic. Jan's Mom, Bernice broke her hip in a fall, and Rachel fearing the worst, made a flight home from Japan, and we went to the Cities to get her from the plane. Rachel, Josiah, Annika, and William are living in Japan, where her husband Hans is stationed in the Navy. Hans is in command of the destroyer USS Curtis Wilbur, so Rachel being a COW (commanding officers wife) has a lot of activities on her plate along with three young children to ride herd on. So May was busy in mostly good ways, and just on the last day, Phil, and I departed on our bike trip to places southwest mainly.
   June started out with Phil and I on the road across Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, and Texas for starters. We wandered across northern New Mexico, western Colorado, and Wyoming, South Dakota, and home. We never even got wet or had bike trouble, and while we were gone they had several inches of rain at home. I think that we ran out to the south ahead of the weather and it swept in behind us and had moved to the east by the time we returned, sometimes you get lucky. Less than a week later Jan and I got the trailer out and loaded, and on the road back to the Hills again, to Hot Springs this time. Before Gen, Sam, Gus, Eli, Leah, and Aaron showed up Jan and I managed to get some riding in. One day we ran down to Fort Robinson in Nebraska, it was an interesting trip. Once the gang arrived we spent time touring the area and hanging out in camp. If you scroll back through my blogs you can see a more detailed tale. At home again, we took down another ash tree east of the house that was starting to look a little shaky, so that was the last ash tree of the four that we had at one time. I'm not sure if it will get replaced or not. We made a trip to Rochester again, although this time was to Mayo for a check on another suspicious spot in the same area as my major surgery six years ago. I heard the dreaded word again "biopsy". Anyhow. after that and a pet scan we went home to wait for the results. It's cancer again and surgery was on the 10th of July. They can't quite figure out how it can show up in the same location again since all of the tissue was removed and replaced with skin from my leg. The thinking is that a margin of the original had some cancer in it and developed from that. Phil and Laura were down and spent the night toward the end of the month. That about wraps up Christmas 2014 part Ein. Stay tuned for the next part.