I have been debating actually doing a rendition of our previous year, but things are really slowing down now in the time after Christmas. I was going to use the excuse that the one finger that I use to type on my laptop was sore with a crack that I ended up patching with super glue. It works like magic for all kinds of problems. After Christmas 2023 and before the end of the year both Jan and I had a go around with covid. Hers was a little more serious and I mainly lost my sense of smell for a month or so. So, all in all, not so bad as some people I see online with long covid flat on their back for a year or so. Anyway, enough about that, let's move on.
January... Not a terribly cold month or snowy either except a below zero day or two. Jan and I were recovering from our bout with covid and making multiple trips to New Ulm for shopping and her doctor appointments. It seems funny how now we very seldomly visit Mankato anymore due to how much worse the traffic has become in that "city". I did get the word on the 24th that my cousin Jerry Bolte and my Air Force buddy Bill Peck had both passed away. Jerry was always my cool cousin and Bill and I were both at Ellsworth with the 28th AEMS. Gonna miss them both. I did have the Ducati out for a run late in the month, so there is that.
February... A lot more activities this month, with birthdays for Annie on the 15th, Steve and Eli on the 23rd, Gus's on the 27th, basketball at Lourdes and the Super Bowl here on the 11th. I see some snow but not a lot, assorted medical appointments and shopping trips to New Ulm and Windom. It did get into the 60s toward the end of the month, so I was putting some miles on the bikes. I did get the pickup, Buff, into the body shop to repair the damage done at the Hy Vee parking lot in New Ulm on what turned out to be a nearly six-week project.
March... The yearly problem was taken care of, taxes of course. There were three birthdays this month with Leah on the 9th, Lindsey on the16th and Gen on the 30th. Buff got back to his spot in the garage on the 21st and with weather moderating I was hitting the road on the bikes. As is getting very common Jan and I were going to New Ulm shopping and doctor appointments for her. I think we must have gotten to Fairmont and Mankato once in a while just to balance things out. We celebrated a late Easter at Gen and Steve's on the 31st with a house full of friends and family, good food and games.
April... Pretty much another routine month with assorted medical appointments, shopping trips, Patriot Guard missions and Jan and I to Minnesota Valley Lutheran high school. Leah and Aaron both attend there and every Spring they have "grandparents' day" so we attend. This year their big construction project is moving towards completion, and it will be a terrific facility.
May... This was a month with a lot of rain which led to mowing lawn on a weekly basis and flooding in the area. May is also a month with some birthdays. Paul's had been on the 4th, Josiah and Phil are on the 19th and me on the 25th. Jan's mom Bernice's birthday had been in there too, although I am not sure of the date anymore. Another Air Force buddy has passed away and his funeral was in Gettysburg, South Dakota, which I attended. I was back in South Dakota on Memorial Day to stand with the flag over the grave of Duvi Wolf, killed in action in Afghanistan. She was born in Mexico and married an American. They were both stationed in Afghanistan. I did a blog about her a few years ago if you want to scroll back far enough. Our granddaughter Leah graduated from Minnesota Valley Lutheran High School on the 26th, how is it possible she is that age already? Time fly's even when you are not having fun.
June... This is a month of rain, lots of it. It got to the point, that if we got less than an inch it was just a sprinkle. I see several days with an inch or so and one day with 5 inches. On the 24th the dam at Rapidan failed, taking the home and eventually the Dam store too. At one time the dam was the only way to cross the Blue Earth River until a new bridge was built several years ago, which is also still closed due to damage to its supports from wash outs. On the 8th Annie graduated from high school, so now both of our granddaughters are out of high school. This time of the year I was riding to several PGR missions in the area plus just checking out the crops. The last days of the month were spent off road riding in the Black Hills with Eli and Leah for a few days. It is the sort of adventure I have been looking forward to for a few years now, three generations of Kuehls riding in the Black Hills. I know that at my age time is of the essence to get these summits climbed, so to speak.
July... This month started with our yearly trip to Lanesboro with the trailer. It was a good get together for the family, with grilling supper before the great fireworks show and some riding for me. July also saw a lot more rain, like 2.25 inch in 15 minutes on the 20th. It was also Aarons birthday on the 10th. The month must have been fairly quiet as I don't have much noted on my calendar. I did put a new exhaust on the Kawasaki and do the usual maintenance on our vehicles.
August... This month as usual was hot and the heavy rain that we had been getting suddenly dried up. I was helping Eli with a new roof on a pickup camper that he had picked up. It needed a little maintenance but he's the guy to fix just about anything it seems. I took Vince- the Ducati Multistrada- on an overnight run to Wisconsin and it was a beautiful ride again and turned him over to 10,000 miles. Back at home I put a new chain and sprockets kit on Tony, with over 20,000 miles I guess that's not too bad of wear. Our sister-in-law Marcy spent a couple nights with us before the Butterfield threshing bee. We celebrated Rachel's big birthday with her family on the 18th. Also had a few go-arounds with bad weather, with nearby tornados and some rain and humidity. Jan and I did make it to Rochester for Sam and Gus's soccer games at least once.
September... I started this month with my traditional Wyoming loop. Out through Rapid to Buffalo to Ten Sleep to Greybull and back to Buffalo for the second night. The next day it's down to Wright and through the Powder River coal mines, back through the Hills to a night in Murdo. I rolled on into the house on the 5th which happens to be Hans' birthday. Steve and Gen celebrated their anniversary on the 6th, so it was a busy start to September this year. Eli and Lindsey celebrated their anniversary on the 9th to add to the goings on. I took Jan up to Rachel's home on the 13th and Jan and Rachel drove up to Wadena to spend a couple nights with Jan's sister Paula. While she was gone, Eli, Leah and I went to the bike races at New Ulm. The Flying Dutchmen motorcycle club puts this two-day event on, with participants from all over, of every age. It was pretty impressive. I did get to a few Patriot Guard missions in the area. Got plates on our 1979 185 Honda for the first time in 20 years I think and that's about it.
October...The first day of the month was the funeral in Rochester for Jerry Kiewatt, Hans uncle and a Navy medic veteran with tours in Vietnam, Japan and Antartica. Shortly thereafter I took an abbreviated ride to Colorado. I spent a night in Fort Collins and was glad to get out of town the next morning. Not too sure who some of the people wandering around the area were, but at least the bike was there the next morning. On the run to the east that day I turned Fritzi over to 80,000. Spent the next night in Chamberline, South Dakota and was home shortly after noon. After that we had some birthdays and an anniversary. Birthdays were for William on the 14th, Jan on the 22nd, Sam on the 23rd and Phil and Laura's anniversary on the 23rd also. We actually got a couple inches of rain and some hail on the 24th with over 3 inches of snow on the 31. Not like a Halloween several years ago when we must have gotten a couple feet on snow. The 30th was our trip to Rachel's home to get a ride to the TCF stadium in Minneapolis to watch Sam and Gus win their first soccer game of the State Tournament, pretty exciting!
November... Jan and I had a repeat trip to the state tournament, but with a not so enjoyable outcome this time. Lourdes lost that game. Sam and Gus had a good year of soccer with their high school team, and they played most of the summer too. I had two early morning checkups at Mayo on the 4th that were okay this time. The 5th brought the late news that Trump had won the vote, now if he can just make it to the presidency without getting assassinated after surviving two attempts already. I did head out to Minnesota Valley Lutheran for their Veterans Day event to meet Aaron there but turned back in heavy fog. On Veterans Day Jan and I made it to Mankato and New Ulm for the breakfast and other assorted gifts to those of us who have served this country. Another medical visit in Fairmont that was pretty much okay, except my a1c is getting up there, so I'm working on that now. Later on in November we got the pellet burner out of the basement and out to the farm. It hadn't been used in a couple years and the problem of getting bags of pellets down the steps and cleaning the chimney got to be a bigger problem than I wanted to do anymore. I had Tony out for over 100 miles on the 17th, thinking that will be the last this year and it was. We celebrated Thanksgiving at the Theobalds, with family, including Josiah home from school in Norfolk. Hans and Rachel's anniversary was on the 29th. I don't recall that it was very cold for their wedding at the Como Conservatory. On to the final segment.
December... Jan has been taking some physical therapy lately for a sore hip and finally went in to see her doctor in New Ulm for some follow up checking. It turns out that it's her hip joint that is kaputt and needs to be replaced. She had had a shoulder repair scheduled for early January but was able to get the hip operation into the same time slot. As I am writing this in January it's like this Wednesday already. As usual I am in the usual wintertime routine of motorcycle maintenance, cleaning and changing oil, checking air filters etc.. One of my former bosses passed away recently and I attended his visitation at a funeral home in Silver Lake, a fellow Vietnam veteran saved my job more than once over the years. I used up some left-over pine wall boards on another project in the basement which meant another trip to Menards or two. We had 3 to 4 inches of snow the day before we drove up to the DeFors home in Lakeville for our Christmas gathering on the 21st, kind of a repeat of Thanksgiving. Joe made it home for that party too! Jan and I spent a quiet Christmas at home and spent the last day of the year back in New Ulm for pre-op meetings for her upcoming surgery. And that about does it for 2024.
As far as follow-ups go, I went back and looked at some of the summations that I did in past years, and I agree with what I said in the past. Some of us made the jump to the next stage of their journey and some of us keep soldiering on depending on Christ's promises to believers to keep this life tolerable for the most part. So, with those thoughts I'll sign off for another year. With any luck I will be pecking away at the keyboard next year about this time, if I can work up the ambition one more time.
January 05, 2025
Peter S. Kuehl
