EAA experience

 Today we visited the EAA (Experimental Aircraft Association) museum in Oshkosh, which was our whole reason for being in Oshkosh.  It was fascinating. I was not expecting much from this. Airplanes are my husband's thing but this place was actually exciting. There are more than 200 experimental flying machines represented here. Some are original and some are exact replicas. There were also videos to watch and I learned all about the annual fly ins, massive air shows with more than 250,000 people and almost as many airplanes in attendance. 

This one I liked for the colors. Such fun.

Here is a replica of one of the Wright brothers first efforts. Talk about experimental. I'm a distant relative of the Wright brothers so this holds special interest for me. 

And this picture is just for fun. I do like a friendly little airplane.

Heading west, after the museum we crossed the mighty Mississippi from Wisconsin to Minnesota.  Here's a quick driving shot of the beautiful river. 

Traveling...

Today was day 1 of our long awaited driving trip heading west to visit my west coast brother. We left at noon and arrived in Oshkosh, Wisconsin about five thirty.  Why, you may ask, if we're heading west, did we start the trip by heading pretty much straight north? It wasn't, as you might expect, to visit a factory that makes adorable little kid's overalls. Tomorrow we are going to visit the other thing Oshkosh is famous for, the EAA Aviation Museum which features more than 200 historic airplanes.  In the meantime we had a delicious supper in, of all places, a Culver's.  We are in Wisconsin after all.  

This is a practice picture I took after all our stuff was loaded in the car. Actually there's more on the back seat. We will be traveling for three weeks after all. I hope to have a real trip picture for tomorrow's blog. 

something new...

 Today I enjoyed a fun new experience.  Have you seen the TV commercials where there is a voice talking about a product or service while the visual image shows happy people obviously having a great time enjoying whatever is being advertised?  Well, today I got to be one of those happy people.  It was a commercial for a senior residential community.  I was paired with a nice man whom I had never met before and we acted out scenes of him bringing me a cup of coffee, and the two of us sitting in the patio area enjoying ice tea with another couple.  For this they used a couple of residents who happened to be on the patio and who thought it was fun to be part of the commercial.  Later, my 'spouse' and I took a stroll along a shady sidewalk, and had fun greeting and playing with our two year old 'grandson' (the son of one of the film company employees).  Thankfully my 'spouse' did all the heavy lifting of the toddler.  I also got my hair 'done.' The most fun part of this entire exercise was that I didn't have to memorize any lines.  We just got directions like - act grateful for the coffee, laugh like one of you just told a great joke, act loving as you stroll along the walk together.  It didn't matter at all what we actually said to each other and we had a fine time adlibbing silliness.  There was also a lot of interesting activity to watch.  Before each scene could be filmed, which generally took about ten minutes of retakes until they got the picture they wanted, about 45 minutes were spent by the very efficient crew setting up lights and diffusers and other stuff I don't know the name of and a great variety of cameras and miles of electrical cords running around, and of course the props like coffee mugs and ice tea glasses.  It was really fun.  The techs did all the hard work while we, referred to as the 'talent,' sat on the sidelines and waited to be called to our places.  We were even served a very nice lunch, and yes, I am getting paid for this job.  Easy and nice as this all was, I must admit that by the end of the day I was tired.  I guess there's a reason why they thought I looked old enough to be living in a retirement home.  I don't know yet when the ad will be aired or on what stations, but I do hope I get to see it at least once.  Although, if it's really cringe-worthy, once may be enough.

Eat up...

 According to my west coast brother today is "Eat An Extra Dessert Day."  This sounds like a fine idea to me.  I need to be up early tomorrow morning for a special project, which I will blog about tomorrow evening if all goes well, so I've had that extra dessert and now I'm heading  to bed.

PS My spouse and I played Scrabble this evening and he won the game by two points in his last turn.  I think we're getting much too closely matched in this game, but it is fun.

BBQ bliss...

 In the early 1950s there was a popular book published called "Five Acres and Independence."  My parents bought the book, and then they bought the farm, not the whole farm, just five acres.  Our little piece of property contained an old house that needed lots of work, a somewhat newer garage and two chicken coops.  It happened that my parents knew someone in the chicken business, learned what was involved, and decided to raise chickens.  So every thirteen weeks a nearby hatchery would deliver 1500 day old baby chicks (so cute) which were put in the freshly scrubbed and sanitized coops.  Twelve weeks later the full grown nicely plump chickens (not cute at all) were sold as Fancy Flock Friers, and we got top money for them.  It was a good bit of income for a while, but eventually Mom and Dad got too busy with their real jobs (she was a teacher, he was a carpenter) to want to stay in the chicken business.  Happily for them, they got out of the business just before the bottom dropped out of the Indiana chicken market.  One of my happiest memories of that time involved those chickens.  Every year my parents would have 100 chickens butchered and held back for our own use.  We stored them in the Locker, a small town establishment where people could rent freezer space.  Then every Sunday, all year long, we had chicken for dinner.  In the cold months the chicken was baked or fried.  My mother was an excellent cook.  At that time there were four of us in the family and we each got half a chicken to eat.  We weren't rich but we never went hungry.  In the summertime, my father would grill the chicken halves in half of a barrel made into a grill.  It was so delicious.  I recently came across the recipe he used for the sauce.  I found it in a brochure titled "Hoosier Barbecue Chicken" which had been published by the Purdue University Agricultural Extension Services (extension leaflet 364), and tucked into an old cookbook.  What I really liked about this sauce is that it's vinegar based with no tomato in it.  My west coast brother, who was born after the chicken era, had not heard about Dad's barbequed chicken until today.  I shared the recipe with him by text and am hoping he will use it to BBQ some chicken while we're there.  I don't think he will need to make his own grill out of half a barrel but the brochure tells just how to do it just in case.

paperless??

 Happy Labor Day everyone.  To celebrate Labor Day (and to avoid having live talent on air) one of my husband's favorite TV stations ran a series of shows today on various kinds of jobs.  The one I found most interesting was all about the production of paper products.  They looked at everything from creating reams of printer paper to rolls of toilet paper.  They made the point that we, as a country, are using much more paper than ever before.  I know they're right and it made me laugh because I saw first hand that increase in paper usage when I was working in real estate, first as a mortgage loan officer, then as a Realtor.  Early in my days in real estate, we were all excited when we could access information about houses on a computer instead of relying on the big fat Multiple Listing book that was published regularly.  Of course, when we found several houses listed on the computer, we had to print out the information on each property before we could show them to our prospective buyers.  Then we made multiple copies so everyone involved had the information.  If you were the listing agent, you made many many copies of the information about the house you were selling, to had out at open houses.  But that was the olden days.  Now everyone can access MLS information on their phones or tablets and there isn't nearly as much need for paper.  Until, that is, we come to closing on a transaction.  When I was still selling real estate I observed that every closing involved at least one more document than the one before it.  A friend of mine, who is active in real estate now, assures me that it's still the same.  Just to give you an idea of the amount of paper involved, a closing involving a conventional mortgage will require a stack of legal size paper one inch thick.  For an FHA loan figure an inch and a half stack of papers, and for a VA loan, two inches.  So rest easy, all you paper producers.  If the real estate industry is any indication, your product will be needed for years to come. 

a small pet

 Today, according to my west coast brother, is "Pet Rock Day."  If that doesn't mean anything to you, you are obviously too young to remember, but, take my word for it, they were a sensation.  It all started when they were first released in time for the holiday season in 1975.  People bought them as gag gifts and stocking stuffers. They were packaged in nests inside special little boxes with air holes.   I know that my family owned at least one.  Not sure who bought it for whom but I'm sure it was as a gag gift.  It was a short lived but very popular craze.  You could even get a book of suggested names for your pebble pet.  I'm not sure what became of our pet rock, although my son, who has a degree in geology, started collecting rocks at a very young age so it may have gotten merged into his collection, minus the box.  One really good thing about pet rocks was that they were much less expensive than the next big craze, Cabbage Patch Dolls, that started in the early 1980s.  Those babies were cute, very popular, expensive and every little girl (including my daughter) wanted one.  A friend of mine worked for JC Penney's during that time and he said it was the worst time in sales of his entire life.  He went on to become a top real estate agent, which he claimed was much easier.  Lucky for me, my best friend (who only had sons) had a brother living in Germany who was able to send her several Cabbage Patch Dolls which she provided to her friends at cost.  Much easier that battling the lines at toy stores, and my daughter didn't mind at all that her little 'Elsa' had German adoption papers.