I can’t decide. Did we ….

I can’t decide. Did we have a killing frost or not? Some plants look pretty sick. Especially tomato plants, but mums and flowers next to the house seem to do pretty well. My Dad always said a white frost wouldn’t kill anything. Let’s just say it was a mixed frost and chilly night. The woods across the highway are now a mixture of red and yellow. Like I said last week, it changes every time I look at it.

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I spend a lot of time highway watching. It is kind of interesting. The speed limit is 65 as this is a divided highway but not classed as an interstate as it has uncontrolled access. As I sit and watch the traffic go by, it is an interesting mix. Cars of all colors, pickup trucks and then big trucks. Semis, flatbed trucks, log trucks, cattle trucks, you name it, it has probably just gone through.

Assuming traffic is moving along at 65 miles per hour, then how do you explain all the passing going on? Probably just a lot of people with heavy feet. I can see pretty well looking out to the southwest. However a hedge blocks my view somewhat. West bound traffic just zips along but I can see the oncoming traffic part of the time. The hedge blocks out cars, but semis are easy to see and at night it is a different mix. It seems no two trucks use the same number of lights on their trailers. Some are just ordinary, then others look more like Christmas trees.

There was an unusual sight one day, which I probably won’t see happen again. A car carrier with nine new vehicles on it was heading west.

At the same time a similar unit was moving east. It was something to see as they crossed in front of me. I wondered why they just didn’t turn around and head back to dealers where they came from?

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The big news this week has been the hurricane Ian. Especially if you know someone who lives in that area or owns property. Such is the case with daughter Jackie and her husband Bob, along with Jackie’s cousin Chuck and Sandy Forss of Little Falls, Minnesota. I kind of kidded Chuck the other day by telling about the day in Port Aransas when there was a knock at the door in our apartment. I answered it and there stood Chuck.

All I could think of to say was, “What the h - - - are you doing here?”

Well, they had booked in a condo called Cline’s Landing. I think Jackie and Bob were already there.

Then came their move to Florida. I’m not quite sure when the hurricane hit Port Aransas, but Cline’s Landing was a six story condo and lost their air conditioning units located on the roof. Needless to say, all six floors got flooded by rain, which resulted in at least three to four years before repairs got made so they could reopen.

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I’ve told you about my daily search of funeral homes just checking on the recent deaths. One is the Skinner Funeral Home in Cumberland, which also has homes in Turtle Lake, Shell Lake and Rice Lake. When I checked the other day I noticed an obit for a 75-year-old man named Gene Bussewitz. His brother’s name was John and they also had a cousin, who looked enough like the twins to think they might be triplets.

The three of them were members of the Turtle Lake basketball team which had eight players, all capable of scoring double figures, not all on the same night but any given night. They were fun to watch as the coach made sure he moved them around so he always had fresh players and easily just kind of out ran their opponent.

Turtle Lake never had a gym when I was in high school. Sports, class plays and prom were held in an old building downtown. It has been built by the Turtle Lake Legion after World War I. They weren’t able to make payments and lost it. An old gentleman with lots of money who seemed to be at the right place at the right time bought it. Anyway the joke was that the basketball players didn’t have to do warm up drills, they just had to run to practice.

A gym finally became a reality and then in later years a giant building project was proposed. It included a new gym, auditorium and swimming pool, which voters approved. The new gym was scheduled to be ready during basketball season but for some reason the old gym had to be used one more night. I don’t recall who the opponent was but as usual the team had no problem getting ahead.

The crowd began to pick up the tempo and the cry went out, “go for eighty, go for eighty.” Well, first they reached eighty and the chat became ninety, which they also made. And you know it got exciting then. With time running out, one of the twins got the ball, took a final toss falling as he did, but the ball went through the hoop just before the final bell and the Lakers had just scored 100 points. It was a night to remember.

This was still back in the days of only two points for a basket and our shorter players couldn’t match a taller team during tournaments, so they never got very far, but the 100-point game was still there and the record probably still stands today.

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Did you hear about the five ants that rented an apartment with five other ants. So then you had tenants.