Memorial Day weekend

Well, we had a very busy weekend at the railway. Among the visitors was an English family who came to the States last year because of the mother's job (university-related). Before that they had spent nine years in Denmark. They said Wisconsin winter was worse than Denmark, but I tried to reassure them that this past winter had set all sorts of records and they could expect the next one to be not quite so bad. The weather report yesterday had called for morning showers and severe thunderstorms in the afternoon, but nothing happened around here (and then not much) until about an hour after we had finished operations for the day.

I had a telephone call from Steve Payne Saturday night. He was at Holy Hill for the weekend, but our schedules did not permit us to get together. He will be visiting his family in various places and then returning to Kenya later in the month. He still likes Kenya very much -- despite the political violence the country experienced this past year following elections.

Tom, Helen and Jay flew back from Peter's graduation in Santa Fe and arrived at the Minneapolis airport last night shortly after a tornado had touched down at nearby Hugo (pictured), killing one. Tom decided to drive home despite the still-threatening weather, and he had to get off the road at one point when another tornado was reported near Eau Claire, just inside Wisconsin. After that he basically drove between two lines of severe weather and made it home a little after ten. He had picked up a bug on the trip and just wanted to get back here to recuperate. The cats were delighted to have him back, someone besides me to torment.

I had expected to work all day at the railway on Memorial Day itself, but as it turned out I didn't have to do that. So I was able to go with Tom to the Wisconsin Dells Memorial Day parade and program. This is my third Memorial Day up here and my third Memorial Day parade. It takes place pretty early, nine in the morning, so that the locals can be off the Strip by the time the tourists crawl out of bed and start meandering up and down the sidewalks looking for ticky-tacky to take home.

The parade reflects the small town that is the Dells: the high school and middle school bands, the veterans organizations, the Boy/Cub Scouts and the Brownies/Girl Scouts, a local Lutheran school with their kids on decorated bicycles, the Kilbourn (Wisconsin Dells) and Lake Delton Fire Departments and their equipment. The funniest part was the high school band marching along playing the overture from Andrew Lloyd Weber's The Phantom of the Opera. What this had to do with Memorial Day, I'm not sure. Tom says they probably only know three songs and you go to the parade with the band you got. They did play traditional patriotic songs at the ceremony in the park, though.

The speaker for the occasion was a lieutenant colonel who has served recently in Afghanistan. He is a nurse who normally works at the VA hospital in Madison. He mentioned that a recent Gallup poll shows that only 28% of Americans surveyed knew that Memorial Day commemorates the military men and women who gave their lives in the service of the country. Most people confuse it with Veteran's Day in November, which honors all who served.

The first year I attended the Dells event they read the names of all the area men and women who had died in armed conflicts beginning with World War I up to the present. They did not do it last year or this year, which I think was a loss. They not only had read the names, but they gave a brief line or two biography, and it made those present realize that these were people, many with relatives still here. I don't know why that has been dropped. I doubt it added more than ten or fifteen minutes to the program and it was the most moving part, IMHO.

Rich is out of town (in Austin right now), and so we invited Peggy over for a cookout. Tom made chicken kabobs on the grill and a fine time was had by all. Afterwards Tom went out to mow while I watched The Big Bang Theory.

On the wildlife scene, I have been seeing lots of deer (none on our property), a pileated flew through the backyard yesterday and an oriole was at the feeder this afternoon. Peggy suggested putting out a cleaned up tuna can filled with grape jelly to attract more orioles. Oh yeah, you have to paint the outside of the can orange to get their attention first.