Off to an Eric Clapton Concert

Eric came to town and heard that Michael and Erica were moving soon so he invited them to his concert. Amaya said she wanted to stay home so Nana and I cooked some brats & beans, drank some beer, fixed Amaya a bottle and watched the tail end of the Olympics.

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Actually Nana and I would have gone but we didn't have the right kind of boots. (See picture below...) As it turned out, we didn't need to go as Amaya entertained us with a few of his songs including "Tears from Heaven" as she fought her bed time. We had a "Wonderful Tonight", the three of us, and I was excited about retiring when I heard Carol humming "Layya", but then when she later sang the words, I realized it was "Layla". Shucks, don't tell her as I am embarrassed now...

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Birthday 1: Amaya Jean Cleveland

Many nice presents for the one year old Amaya Jean. Her mom & dad bought for her a very nice indoor slide and swing set. She will certainly have fun with it.

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Grampa offered to take her to Walmart on Tuesday where he goes because they have specials that day - haircuts for just $8.00. No support for that idea from the rest of the family - complete silence. I am not sure why, guess they didn't want me spending that much on her. (Sometimes I cannot help it - I am really thrifty but occasionally a huge wave of generosity washes over me and knocks dollars out of my pocket.)

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Timidly going after the cute puppy cake with her index finger. Not quite sure what to make of the frosting - it is probably her first pure sugar rush.

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She did however, get a little less bashful. She realized that she did not need to pick at the frosting with her little index when she could just bend over and go direct with the mouth.

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Erica and Michael took all of us over to the Jump Zone - the kids enjoy.

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Well the middle part of the slide is kind of scary...

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Much better when you hit the bottom without any rug burn, dislocated joints or broken arms.

Panama City, Florida There are Worse Places to Go Work to Not Work

"Home of the World's Most Wonderful Beaches."

(Not my line, I saw it on a sign.)

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I walked on the beach for at least a mile or two and finally came out at a public exit that wandered through beach homes that looked like this. I want to show Carol this place - it was beautiful - it was also crispy weather with a gorgeous sunset and all was right with the world. (Still, I am taking her there as soon as I can. This may be the real life equivalent of a chick flick. I am paying admission to this one - I may not even have to buy an expensive bottle of wine.)

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What more can you say about this picture other than it is obvious that in Florida, Canadian flags have a lot, if not almost continuous intimate contact with American flags. Just one note for my Canadian friends - the Stars & Stripes is on top.

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Doug, alone, missing his wonderful wife, hoping that she might come down in a month or so to be with him while he slaves away earning the dowry she is accustomed to.

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I wandered onto a vacant lot through a seemingly vacant house walkway to capture this picture. As I was leaving I noted a whole dinner party of people watching me exit the private property through their obviously inhabited walkway. Boy, I felt like I had been caught shooting pheasants in a State Park. But damn, the picture turned out great, didn't it?

Proof that I did step foot, be it shoed, on the beautiful beach.

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Ok, I admit it. I threw my apple core way into the ocean waves only to see it later 200 yards down the beach in the care of this here bird. Every wave would wash the core to a new location and he/she would follow. Even as I got close to it, he/she got somewhat nervous but never left the core. It was funny - I made a short video that I plan to show Panama when I get home.

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Do you remember George's line after his visit into the cold water at the beach? "It's shrinkage, shrinkage!" Well, my line after my visit to the Panama City beach. "Its crinklage, crinklage!" I am not really turning into a crinkly old man, am I? Rhetorical question, you need not answer.

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The Fred L. Oleson Cream Can, Faulkton, S.D.

Thanks Otho Eaton for sharing the information surrounding the discovery of the Fred L. Oleson Cream can... what a find!!

Parts of Otho's letter are shown below:

Dear Loyd, Max, Doug and All,

Just a few lines to tell you what I can about the cream can. As I recall, one day I was working on a trailer and Loyd and Max stopped in. As we talked, I mentioned to Loyd that I now have a trailer, I need a box to put on it. Loyd recalled that there may have been an trailer box out at the old farm west of Faulkton. He said that I should go out there sometime and check it out. I did that. While I was looking around I saw what looked like an old junk pile consisting of old tires, wire and some boards. I was almost going to skip looking in the pile, but then decided to move a few boards to look underneath. I pushed two boards aside and there was the old Oleson cream can with the copper label looking right at me. I knew for sure that Loyd would get a kick out of having it so I surprised him on his next visit. Before he left on that day, he told me some of his memories of the milking operation they had at the farm. I know he will share them with you as well. That is the story of the discovery of the Fred L. Oleson cream can as I remember it. Hope you all are well and happy.

Sincerely,

Otho

The Tale of the Fred L. Oleson Cream Can

by Loyd Oleson 3/1/2010

In the late 1930's, when I was growing up on the farm, which was six miles west of Faulkton, SD on Highway 212, we milked a few cows. I would guess the number to be ten to twelve. We milked them the first thing in the morning which meant getting up at five o'clock to got out in the cold barn in the winter time to help Dad milk the cows by hand. We sat on a one legged stool holding the milk bucket between our knees. After the morning chores were done, dad would fix us our breakfast. After changing our clothes, we would be ready to go to school. In the evening, it was milking time again. We did this winter and summer and it not only kept the family in milk, cream and butter for household use, but also left some to be sold for money for groceries.

After taking what milk we needed for the family, it was taken to the cellar (basement) to be separated by the cream separator. (You might want to go to Google to find out how this was done.) The excess cream not used by the family, was pit into the cream can, such as the one that Otho found at the farm and gave to me. When a can was full, it would be taken to the Faulkton railroad depot from where it was shipped to the Creamery at Lakeville, Minnesota. After the cream was removed from the milk, what we had remaining we called skim milk, because the fat had been removed (skimmed off). The skim milk was fed to the baby calves and baby pigs. People pay extra now for the skim milk we used to feed to the animals, what a switch.

When the full cream can was dropped off at the depot, there was always an empty one there with Dad's name on it. We would take the empty one home to be filled again. As I recall, it took about three days to fill the can such as the one you have. We did not have to pay the freight going or coming as the Creamery took care of the expense. Dad would get his check in the mail.

It was the creamery that made the nice metal address label and installed it on the cream can.

When I left home, we were still milking cows but my younger brother Duane disliked it so much he was able to talk Dad, who was aging, into quitting this chore. This eliminated much of the work on the farm, unfortunately too some of the income.

I left home on the farm in the Fall of 1945 and moved to Aberdeen, SD, where I worked on a Survey Crew at the District Off of the Highway Department. In the summer, we surveyed highways in the north eastern part of the state that were scheduled for improvement. I enjoyed the summer work; in the winter we plotted all of the survey plotting that was done the previous summer.

In November of 1947, I went to Spink Electric as Work Order Clerk - my job was to keep all records of the materials used in building power lines. That is when I started my 42 year career working for the Rural Electric Administration (REA). I worked at Spink Electric for ten years where I had been moved up to Office Manager. In November of 1957, we moved to Mitchell where I was Office Manager at the larger Intercounty Electric. I later became Staff Assistant and then moved up to Manager. I enjoyed and am proud of being part of the organization that lit up the rural areas of South Dakota.

I am glad that there is an interest in the history of the cream can - the family history. Otho is going on 90 and like myself no longer running foot races. We try to see him and Delores every time we get to Faulkton to see my only surviving family member, Marie.

Thanks Loyd and Otho for sharing your memories of the Fred L Oleson cream can. Hopefully this blog will survive in some form that interested family members can enjoy access to these bits of history - Doug

My Daughter & Grandbaby

Etchings Done by Chuck E Cheese

We took our granddaughters to Chuck E Cheese in the early afternoon. We had a great time - see a later post for details. They have a little photo machine there that will etch your photograph - we had fun doing that. I then took photos of the etchings and here they are.

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An Afternoon at Chuck E Cheese

The castle below has officially, days later, disappeared to Doug's chagrin. He is not sure that global warming will ever bring snow like this back to Tennessee. What you say? Never again?Doug says that "dinosaurs are next... the world as we know it is carbon doomed." Carol says that Doug needs to quit listening to Rush Limbaugh.

The castle is still there although it is shrinking by the day.

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Evidence from Michael's truck that he did indeed do circles in the interstate ditch.

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Chuck E Cheese pictures - Carol and I took Amaya and Panama over there for the afternoon. We had a great time - they are both quite the entertainers.

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I Miss My Pancake...

Holy Cow!! More Snow in Tennessee.

It is not supposed to snow this much in Tennessee. The snow started about 4:00 pm yesterday, Michael went into the Interstate ditch coming home from a study session, just behind a big truck accident and Erica had school off. Michael got home without any truck damage, however he did have to change his pants. I made another castle today with the drive-way snow. This one is pretty tall & solid but the ambient temperature is pretty high.

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I do not remember taking this picture - I believe that Amaya had hypnotized me. I woke up and realized a bit later that I had snapped this picture without any knowledge of it. As I woke up she was in the process of reaching for my ice cream, which is a no-no/nein-nein. (I am not yet licensed to feed her ice cream - this should come as soon as I can raise the $2,000 for the license. I am not sure of the origin of the "ice cream feeding to baby" license, I just know that Michael says he is authorized to accept payment and administer the test.) I think that this whole hypnotizing thing is my fault because I let her watch an old rerun of Kreskin the other night...

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I asked Amaya to hypnotize Nana - she did and I gave her some orders. First I told her to go to the garage and get a dustpan. Then I told her to go out on the deck and shovel the show with it. It was absolutely fantastic!! She did everything that I told her to do. I knew no one would believe me so I attempted to get a picture of her in her pajamas, shoveling the snow off of the deck with a dust pan. However, she woke up just as I was taking this picture and did not remember doing any snow shoveling. At any rate, she is cute in her jammies... too bad that she woke up so soon. Amaya is starting to earn her keep around here.

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Amaya and the girls got jealous when they saw me having fun building the snow castle so they came out to take a walk. It was a nice afternoon but supposed to get colder later tonight.

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More Fun in the Clarksville Snow

Michael and Erica took Amaya out in the backyard again today to play in the snow.  She had a great time even after doing a face plant into the soft snow.  She wanted to stay out and whined about it after we made her come in - she had some pretty red cheeks.  She is a trooper...

Doug Needs More to Do Says Carol

All good things come to an end.  Read on...

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So we get about 3-feet of snow last nite (6-inches, shrinking as we speak in the above freezing temperatures) and I decide to shovel the drive way with a 8-inch wide square shovel.  (I have no idea where the dozen of snow shovels are that I have purchased since I turned 20.)  Who needs a snow shovel in Tennessee anyway...  well, I guess you need one once in awhile.   I digress...   Carol goes out to do errands into the empty streets of Clarksville with my TDI - I pray she doesn't run into anyone she knows.   I have no idea what is so important that she needs to forge the way in the newly fallen 3-feet of snow - however she is a big girl and does what she wants, regardless of my mostly unstated opinions.  I digress...  Carol returns and admires that I have shoveled half the drive-way with an 8-inch shovel.  She asks me to build Amaya a Snow Man.  I accomodate - but instead build her a German Castle.   (Germany has been on my mind, why not build a Castle with this great snow.)  Amaya comes out with Nana and admires my work for about 3-minutes - Nana got cold.  Erica put her into the baby room window an hour later - Amaya waved and then disappears suddenly to have had her diaper changed.  Another hour later, Amaya waves from the upstairs family room - I note that she cannot even see the castle that I am making her from that window.  Another hour later, Carol comes out to take a picture, mentions that I need more to do...  she also mentions that my largest castle tower that I took a lot of time and care to design looks like a big dil_ _.   I ignore the remark but add twelve more inches to it.  (Sort of a personal statement.)   I am a bit irritated with her as I come in, frozen solid, an hour later.  The castle looks great and I think will last until tomorrow since I did some extraordinary engineering bracing, especially of the very large dil_ _ tower.  My irritation evaporates when I note on the kitchen counter that she has purchased a large bottle of expensive Gin and moderately priced Tequila on her errand run.  Life is good...  Doug is happy, slave to beautiful woman and a wonderful baby.

Yes, the dil_ _ in question is peaking over my right shoulder.  Since I am 6 foot, 3 inches, you can judge the size by comparison, taking into account of course the appropriate paralax.

Alotta Cheap Thrills Around This House

Its true, we try hard to entertain ourselves frugally around this house. This includes visits to the "upstairs indoor carnival." Check out the in-home Merry-Go-Round in the above video. We don't pay the operator anything - in fact, when not operating the ride, she has an outside job to pay her way in this house. The capital investment of the Merry-Go-Round ride itself was very low - zero in fact, since it was a gift. We have not spent any maintenance money on the ride, nor will we. When it gets to dangerous to ride, we will throw it out. Enjoy the video.

Amaya and Erica At School Together

Amaya is fascinated with the Apple computers - she walks a chair from the lunch table and starts pounding on the keyboard. What a great computer... the keyboard takes the abuse.
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I finally got a picture with her two teeth showing.
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Panama Sleep Over: We Have Lots of Fun!!

Panama came over last nite to stay with us. We always enjoy her visits and we never know where the play interactions might take us. After her bath, she got very interested in Amaya's hair bows and that led to trying all of them out. First however, she had to try the Queen Amaya's crown on. We think that she looked first rate.

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Panama dressed Grampa up a bit with the hair bows as well. It was tough trying to decide which color should go in which postion - there were many changes made which left my ears rather tender - especially when the hair bow was extracted without a corresponding retreat of the clip holding it in place. Ouch... Papa was a good sport though - only complained 6 or 7 times.
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The final bow detail was to try them on herself. She enjoyed it. We took them all off and she was soon off to bed. This morning, she found a red clip on her Wal*Mart pajamas that was missed. She pointed that out to Grampa, who was responsible last night for taking them off.