Heading toward the last week ….

Heading toward the last week in May and all seems to be just dandy. The spring flowers are continuing to add beauty to the countryside and I think I’ve spotted even a better patch than I saw on Mann Road. It’s a little down the road on Bobwhite Road. It appears the whole woods is carpeted as far as the eye can see.

Meanwhile I am waiting for our flowering crabs to bloom, but actually it is more like ten days to two weeks away.

Our spring weather seems just grand for the farmers rushing to get their crops in. A couple of minor showers has kept the dust down, but hasn’t seemed to have stopped any planting. There is more and more brown ground out there, but I suspect in a few weeks the new plants will spring forth and add another shade of green to the countryside.

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Talk about being a day late and a dime short, that was my story last week. I’d filled the car with gas on the second of the month. Twelve gallons cost me $15.85. On the 11th, I decided it was time to buy more gas. This time nine gallons cost me $15.95. I actually think it jumped the last dime the day before I filled.

I wasn’t too upset as my diary told me I’d been to Holmen last year and bought gas on the way home in Galesville. The pump price that day was $2.73 a gallon, almost a dollar more than I paid this time.

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Thanks to the Wisconsin Supreme Court we are now living in a period of total confusion. While our governor had set May 26th as the end of our period of quarantine, the court decided yesterday, the move wasn’t legal and businesses could open up any time.

So for a few days we are living in a period of confusion trying to figure out who believed the court and who believed our governor and shall we say, the law of common sense.

The virus has not gone away and there has not been a method of totally testing, nor a remedy against it. So doesn’t it just make sense to go one step at a time and make sure we aren’t inviting it to start up again? Especially when we near the 100,000 death toll mark.

IwenttoMarshfieldtodayandevidence of the confusion was everywhere. Fast foods haven’t opened yet and still are just doing carry-out orders. Some stores that could be open weren’t and the public seemed confused if they should be wearing a mask or not.

The trip was well worth it just to watch a hoarder in action. I had gone way back to the paper department and found the shelves of tissue empty. It’s the first time that has ever happened. Then, as I was walking back out of the alley by the toilet paper department, I thought the lady was stocking the shelves. Instead she was taking the packages of toilet paper, nine to a bundle, and filling her cart. The cart got full and then she started piling them underneath. Good grief, I wonder how many trips to the bathroom she’ll be making.

ÓÓÓÓÓ A letter to the editor in last week’s TRG raised a comment that brings back a lot of history. The words, “Pass the butter, please” brought memories of some 50 years ago when we first moved here. The words were butter and then something called margarine. I remember we had to be very careful if we ran a recipe that we change the word to butter if it had mentioned the other spread.

I also remember picking up the ad from Loyal Foods, which always had one prepared by the wholesale company, and we had to change the ad should it contain the other word.

Going back a few more years when I worked in the post office, a family in town would occasionally get a package mailed in Upper Michigan. The postmaster explained it was a package of colored margarine as that was not allowed in Wisconsin at the time.

Even further back as a youngster, we were sending our milk, and for a time, just the cream, to a creamery in Comstock. It was actually connected to Land O’ Lakes. Dad was on the board, which explains his loyalty. For a time we had the additional chore of running the milk through the separator just to get the cream, which went to the creamery. The pigs got the skim milk.

Whenever we had company, Dad always seemed to get into a discussion about some farm issue. I can still remember he always insisted farmers needed 90 percent of parity, but I never understood what the parity issue was all about.

What really took the cake though was the switch that Land O’ Lakes did. For years they were known as the butter people, but then suddenly the growing of soybeans became a major factor in Minnesota and wouldn’t you know it, they started making margarine as well as butter. After all soybeans were also a farm product.

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If I was going to grade myself on how good a reporter I am it would probably get pretty low marks right now. A week ago, when I went for my mail, I noticed the City of Greenwood’s bucket truck parked across the street. I know the city has used it at Christmas time for putting up and taking down the Christmas decorations on the light poles.

I even saw someone working on the pole, or something to be placed on it.

Later in the day I was scanning my Facebook pages and discovered the pictures of our graduating seniors hanging on the light poles. What a clever idea and then another sign is placed in their yard or at the end of the driveway. It is pretty neat to be out driving and suddenly there is a home where a senior lives. So out of something bad, something good has taken its place.

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I am assuming next week’s paper will be carrying an early copy notice so I’d better get my thinking cap on right away. It will be kind of an historic column so maybe I can come up with something special. Otherwise it might just be more of the same.