[Trekkin and Birdin]

Lovely day but really windy.  Too windy for me to kayak on Lake Neshonoc….I’m a wimp.

Trekkin’ is painting in the porch.  I guess one thing about this pandemic, we’ve gotten to a lot of projects that have been ignored in favor of more fun stuff.  Hopefully the building of the Little Free Library can be next on the list, since the garage is cleared out and there’s room to work in there now.

[Trekkin and Birdin]

It started raining here around 3PM.  Just your typical all day rain type rain.

[Trekkin and Birdin]

We were lucky as far as any damage from those crazy storms the other night.  I was hiking and birding a favorite area yesterday and there were a couple big trees down over the trail that I had to shimmy over to continue.

I am giddy with excitement….tomorrow my friend and I are getting together to do a socially distanced activity…kayaking one of the canoe trails in the area.  I already got my saddles on the roof rack.  We decided we’ll wear our masks when helping one another get our yaks off the car tops, but once in the water, we should have plenty of social distance between us.  This will be my first social outing with someone besides my husband in almost 4 months.

[Trekkin and Birdin]

Thanks for checking….very odd.  I did manage to contact her through another channel.

[Trekkin and Birdin]

Summer….my least favorite season.  The past couple days have reminded me of that….don’t like the heat, the bugs.  It’s too hot to be on the water today.  Ugh.

Also, as much as I dislike summer, I really don’t like A/C.  Hopefully if I get up really early tomorrow, I can go hike and bird a bit before it gets awful.  I waited too long today!

[Trekkin and Birdin]

We have it on, too, but just now I heard the commentator there say it’s a 50/50 for liftoff.

Question of the day for me….do I buy another dulcimer?  I could keep it to a different tuning. (I hate retuning).  Plus….the sound holes are birds.  I mean, really!

[Trekkin and Birdin]

Jim, That is a great story.  Trekkin’ actually has had a lot of similar experiences.  He spent over 30 years teaching kids with emotional and behavioral issues…like Steve.  Sadly, he had some bad outcomes, but many, many of those kids have called or come to visit and tell him that what they learned in his classroom finally clicked for them as they got older….sometimes only after they were released from prison and decided to change their life path.

So many of those stories are really pretty funny, too.  One he likes to tell is one day, this group of guys who looked like refugees from the set of Road Warrior walked up toward our front door.  He told me he’d go out to see what they needed, and he heard the lock click behind him as he stepped out.  Turns out….former students.  Obviously not mainstream society, but doing all right.

One of his formers put his middle school skills to use and has opened a CBD store in downtown La Crosse!

One odd coincidence….many of his formers have ended up working or connecting in some way or another with our older son.  When they hear his surname, they ask….Are you related to Mr. C?  They all tell him they really liked him, he didn’t take any crap but was always fair.  Our son chose to work in the trades, and a lot of those kids are suited to that line of work….hands on stuff with problem solving built in.

[Trekkin and Birdin]

So, bear with me here.  I just wanted to share this someplace.  You might know I was a special ed teacher for over 30 years before I retired.  Anyone who has been a teacher often wonders what happens to our students later in life.  In the past month or so, I’ve been lucky to hear follow-ups on some of mine.

I traveled as a teacher-leader with People to People four times.  I learned in February that one of my former charges is now the director for the new Ho-Chunk Museum in Tomah.  She came back to town to serve her tribe.  I was hoping to go visit it but we know what’s happened…..

Then, a couple nights ago on the news, they were doing a story about the huge food drives happening here on behalf of the Hunger Task Force.  One of my formers, who I saw for a speech impediment when she was in middle school and was very shy….she was on camera, talking just fine as one of the staff for Hunger Task Force.

This last one was last night’s news, and there’s lots of backstory to this one.  For several years, I had a student storytelling club, first at my middle school, and then when I was transferred to an elementary school.  This young lady was one of my middle school tellers.  She later went and grew up, subbed at my elementary school, and then became a kindergarten teacher in the room next to mine at that school.  When I retired, I had some stuff I’d purchased with grant money and it really wasn’t mine, so I was trying to figure out what I could do with it.  I decided….give it to Michelle, she knows how to use it.  I snuck into her room during our prep time, handed it off to her and she looked at one of the puppets, said “OH…Timmy the Turtle!” and then gave me a big hug and we both shed some tears.  She was on the news last night.

https://www.news8000.com/award-winning-spence-elementary-teacher-honored-by-colleagues-students/

So often we wonder….whatever happened and did I do anything helpful?  I have a signature story I sometimes tell that covers that thought.  So there’s your heartwarming stuff for a rainy Monday!

[Trekkin and Birdin]

About wine…..I shared a cartoon to both sons’ fb pages yesterday….”Check on your mom.  She’s stuck at home with your dad.  She is not doing well.  Send chocolate and wine.”

Well, our son in CO posted a laughing emoji, then didn’t send wine or chocolate, but a video he took from inside their car when they took their take out lunch to a park and saw they’d better stay in the car to eat it….because a moose was having lunch on the lawn.

I might have to cut him out of my inheritance for that.  Those who know me, know I have a long history of being in places where “you *just* missed this moose that came through.”

[Trekkin and Birdin]

As others have said, this is a difficult decision.  Jim points out that we can’t really know if it’s the right one or not, but I will say….we have had logs from cachers who live on the opposite side of the state in the two state parks we trailboss (which were both still open at the time they visited).  Yes, it’s okay for them to hike there….but should they be traveling all over the state to do this during these uncertain times?  It surely isn’t just geocachers, either.  I was out in my “local patch” (birding term for an area within a 5 mile radius of home) yesterday.  Under normal circumstances on a nice day like yesterday, I’d maybe see one or two others, or more likely, no one.  There were people all over…none with face masks available.  I just went down onto deer trails, where I could see more birds anyway, and I do hope these folks who are just now discovering the outdoors will continue once it’s all over.  My 10 year old grand-daughter points out that when people are cooped up, they just *have* to get out, and I think she’s onto something there.

Two weeks ago, a variation of this question was posed in the geocaching forums.  This was my response at that time, on March 27.

“I have developed some pretty strong, and probably unpopular, opinions in the last week of this crisis.  This same conversation is taking place among the birding community, and I suppose any of the various outdoor oriented activities enjoyed by people. So, remember…..you asked!  [;)]

While I agree it’s good to get out, get fresh air and enjoy nature during this time, I don’t feel encouraging lots of people to do this by having entrance fees waived is helpful….at all.  I know some of our National Parks have closed now to avoid this issue.  Some parks in the Twin Cities as well.  Yesterday the United States surpassed every other country, including those that were hit with this first, in number of reported cases.   “Safer At Home” means just that.  Stay close to home.  I have friends currently living in France.  Last week they received an order in their *small* village that they need to print out a new permit each day they go for a walk, which cannot be any further than 5kM from their address….and she and her husband must walk separately.

I will paste (I hope) the editorial from Matt Mendenhall, editor of Bird Watching magazine, regarding our shared playgrounds.

https://www.birdwatchingdaily.com/news/birdwatching/its-time-to-close-public-lands-bird-from-home/?fbclid=IwAR1IBbiqCRq9wTJ_lSmh2l3iRSAvlhEdzXV-idpr2TM-ujMX_AJzINvKRmU

Rediscover old hobbies or new ones right now that can be done at home, or close to home.  If we insist on going out to “play,” this is just going to take longer to resolve.  That’s my soapbox.”

Enjoy the outdoors….close to home with your family only.  Don’t worry about finding geocaches right now.  I have told myself the same thing regarding the birds I see….see the ones in my yard and close to home and don’t worry about that once in a lifetime Surf Scoter way over at Horicon!

[Trekkin and Birdin]

Trekkin’ went out for essential shopping a couple days ago, and like others here have commented…hardly anyone wearing masks.

As for the park situation….I was actually surprised Perrot didn’t get included.  We haven’t gone out there since this began, because we were seeing the effects of all the closures in our own close to town areas.  We’ve encountered packed parking lots in areas where one other car is unusual at any other time, and have turned around and gone home.  A friend who is on the board for Friends of the State Parks lives closer to Perrot and has shared that it’s been bad there as well, with litter and vandalism and big groups of people gathering.  Most of those trails are not conducive to maintaining distance if you meet another along the trail.

We received some logs on a couple caches today and the name wasn’t familiar to us, so of course with nothing better to occupy my time, I followed up.  It turns out to be someone literally on the other side of the state, who’s been caching all over between here, there and the southern border.  I don’t think that’s quite in the spirit of things. IMHO

Since I’m kind of not a social being anyway, this hasn’t been as tough as it might be for others, but I do look forward to feeling it’s okay to go to Minneapolis to spend time with my mom, or take our trip to CO to visit our son and his family.  Wyalusing is one of the parks that was closed, and that’s my “every May” trip for birding.  Sigh.

[Trekkin and Birdin]

I have developed some pretty strong, and probably unpopular, opinions in the last week of this crisis.  This same conversation is taking place among the birding community, and I suppose any of the various outdoor oriented activities enjoyed by people. So, remember…..you asked!  [;)]

While I agree it’s good to get out, get fresh air and enjoy nature during this time, I don’t feel encouraging lots of people to do this by having entrance fees waived is helpful….at all.  I know some of our National Parks have closed now to avoid this issue.  Some parks in the Twin Cities as well.  Yesterday the United States surpassed every other country, including those that were hit with this first, in number of reported cases.   “Safer At Home” means just that.  Stay close to home.  I have friends currently living in France.  Last week they received an order in their *small* village that they need to print out a new permit each day they go for a walk, which cannot be any further than 5kM from their address….and she and her husband must walk separately.

I will paste (I hope) the editorial from Matt Mendenhall, editor of Bird Watching magazine, regarding our shared playgrounds.

https://www.birdwatchingdaily.com/news/birdwatching/its-time-to-close-public-lands-bird-from-home/?fbclid=IwAR1IBbiqCRq9wTJ_lSmh2l3iRSAvlhEdzXV-idpr2TM-ujMX_AJzINvKRmU

Rediscover old hobbies or new ones right now that can be done at home, or close to home.  If we insist on going out to “play,” this is just going to take longer to resolve.  That’s my soapbox.

[Trekkin and Birdin]

I am not an alarmist, but this is a new virus and the information on its spread is evolving all the time.  I guess I’m glad to see that businesses and other organizations are choosing to err in favor of caution.  Read the history of the 1918 flu epidemic.  Anyone who’s done WSQ caches will see many who were lost during that time.

My mom lives in a senior citizen apartment building, and she just read me the new regulations for visitors.  Basically I’d have to check in at the nursing home part and pass a serious screening…..which is kind of annoying, but good to know, too.  She’s 95; I wonder if I could drive up there, call her from the parking lot and bust her out of there to visit us here?  She’d probably be game for that.

 

[Trekkin and Birdin]

And….in other news, we’re leaving in just a bit to pick up our son and grand-daughter and head to the Owl Festival. She is *finally* getting to go, and will compete in the kids hooting contest.  Trekkin’ and I went yesterday already, but we’re happy to go again.  Last night we saw Ladysmith Black Mambazo in Viroqua.  Fun stuff.  Good luck at the casino, Jim.  Is that the Battle Over Rice virtual?  Spirit Rock is up that way, too.

 

[Trekkin and Birdin]

I saw that comment in the board minutes as well.  This is the forum that actually gets the most traffic anymore.  Maybe whoever made the comment needs to stop in here, LOL

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