MURPHY'S LAW

FIRST OFF I WAS RAISED IN THE RURAL AREAS OF THE MID-WEST WITH THE FARMERS. VERY EARLY ON I LEARNED TO PISS’N MOAN JUST LIKE THE FARMERS. I SWEAR THEY COMPLAIN WHEN IT’S RAINING AND THEY COMPLAIN WHEN IT ISN’T.

WE BACKED UP THE TRUCK TO THE ROAD READY TRAILER AND THE ELECTRIC FRONT JACK WOULDN’T WORK. NOW WHAT? TURNS OUT THE BATTERY IN THE CAMPER WAS DEAD. OVER THE WINTER IN THE DESERT CLIMATE THE WATER IN THE BATTERY EVAPORATES RENDERING THE BATTERY WORTHLESS.

OH WELL WE’RE ON THE WAY TO MOHAVE RV PARTS AND SERVICE TO HAVE THE WHEEL BEARING REPACKED, WE’LL HAVE THEM INSTALL A NEW ONE.

THE WEATHER FORECAST IS FOR WIND IN THE AFTERNOON INCREASING TO 40 MPH. SO WE TOOK OFF EARLY FROM LAUGHLIN TO PAHRUMP. WE MADE OUR REGULAR PIT STOP IN SEARCHLITE.

BY 10:00 AM THE WINDS IN VEGAS WERE ALREADY ROARING……. IT WAS A SLOW TRECK OVER THE HUMP TO PAHRUMP IN 3RD GEAR AT 40 MPH DUE TO THE MOUNTAIN PASS AND THE HIGH WINDS, AND JUST AS SLOW ON THE DOWN HILL SIDE.
WE DID SUCCESSFULLY ARRIVE AT TERRIBLE’S LAKESIDE RV PARK, SITE OF THE GNRVA, A COUPLE OF YEARS BACK. IT’ A BEAUTIFUL POND SURROUNDED BY GREEN GRASS, TREES, DUCKS, AND DUCK SHIT, ALL IN THE MIDDLE OF THE DESERT.

DURING THE SET UP OF THE CAMPER, FIRST THING WAS A NEW SEWER HOSE TO ATTACH THE OLD ENDS TO. UP TO MY REGULAR LUCK WITH TOOLS THE FIRST THING I DID WAS POKE MY HAND WITH A RUSTY WIRE ON THE SEWER HOSE, JESUS, HAVE I HAD A TETANUS SHOT SINCE I WAS 12? HEY UNCLE HANS CAN YOU E-MAIL ME A TETANUS SHOT?

WHEN I WENT TO HOOK UP THE NEW SEWER HOSE AND REMOVED THE OUTER CAP I GOT A FULL SHOT OF SHIT…… LITERALLY…… THE BLACK WATER TANK WAS OPEN. HOLY CRAP, HOW DID THAT HAPPEN?

TURNS OUT DURING THE TRIP FROM LAUGHLIN THE VIBRATIONS CAUSED THE BLACK WATER TANK VALVE LEVER TO COME DISCONNECTED. SO IT’S UNDER THE CAMPER ON MY BACK, WITH TOOLS IN HAND, TO FIX THE DAMN THING. AFTER TWO HOURS ON MY BACK I GOT IT TO WORK, IT’S BYE NO MEANS A PERMANENT FIX…….

DESPITE THE FARMER LIKE COMPLAINING, WE’RE BACK TO “SUNNY & 80” WEATHER, RUNNING BAREFOOT IN THE GRASS, AND SUNBATHING BY THE POOL……..

Grantsburg Hospital Addition

By Uncle Hans


.............another weekend of crappy weather, punctuated by an over-night snow---and it's nearly May!! I am so tired of winter and"spring" that I am blogging another ho-hum event: the dedication of a new hospital facility. It's no typo. Of the six hospitals I work at in the region, two have just completed new additions, one is in an 24 month renovation and one breaks ground this spring for a whole new hospital. Spooner would be building as well, but we are land-locked and "negotiating" with our neighbors, the DNR (optimistically speaking) for a small slice of land that would let our project go forward. I retire in a few years, so.........

This is today's project, Grantsburg, as of last summer. It rose out of the center of a golf course, raising no small complaint from the golfers and tree-huggers. The hospital won the dispute because, well, the hospital OWNS the golf course.

...........Here is the finished building, minus landscaping and decent weather. It is a new Emergency Room, records department and attached clinic. You can just barely see the old hospital from this angle, which is behind it........

.......Wendy standing in the doorway between the ambulance garage and the ER......

....the new ER, which is 4X the old and 2X what is needed.............

........the trauma room. Who cares? I hate trauma anyway. Are they expecting a 747 crash? It is nice though........

............The lobby of the new clinic........

............the clinic lobby has this neat sandbox under glass with magnets to move the toys inside. Wendy registered for a free splenectomy so she could play with this baby for a while........

..........someone carved a melon into this swan in a futile attempt to get Wisconsin people to eat healthy fruits and veggies. It didn't work. Not a piece of those fruits and veggies moved until the meat balls and drummies were gone........

........In a realistic twist, the track lighting fixtures in the lobby looked suspiciously like mosquitoes.......

.........this is the building they were replacing. It was not attached, meaning we all had to brave 20 degree weather to run across the street to get from hospital to clinic. It is not that old, but you could easily fit this whole building into the lobby of the new facility and still have enough room for the mosquitoes. Note the snowflakes. F**king beautiful?.........

.........Sadly, we did not proceed to the bar after the ceremony to dance on a pole like last week. The Grantsburg staff is more sedate (or sedated?). The next night, however, we went to the Spring party for a national motorcycle club (ABATE) whose sole goal is the freedom from helmet laws. We don't belong, but always attend because we are bikers and brain damaged people can be so entertaining.

In this late-night picture, which is not digitally enhanced but may be under the influence, Wendy appears to have grown some beautiful hair. Actually, she is playing with the hair of the seemingly detached woman next to her. Her hair is lush and wavy and goes to the floor when she lets it down. Needless to say, it is not compatible with a helmet....

Uncle Hans

READY, SET, .......

READY, SET, GO !!!!! WAIT , WAIT, WAIT A MINUTE. WHERE THE HELL DID ALL THIS STUFF COME FROM? AND IT HAS TO FIT IN THE BACK OF THE TRUCK?



I REMEMBER WHEN MARY AND I COULD HOOK UP AND MOVE IN 45 MINUTES FLAT. THAT'S JUST NOT THE CASE TODAY. SITTING IN ONE PLACE FOR SIX MONTHS, THE ADDITION OF DIRECT TV, AND ALL THE STUFF IN THE PICTURE ABOVE MADE IT AN ALL DAY EVENT.

THEN THERE IS THE ROOF TO CHECK OUT. OH YA, AN ANTENNA FOR THE WI-FI.........

JEEES.... I HATE HEIGHTS........

MONDAY IT'S A TRIP TO THE RV SHOP, FOR WHEEL BEARING PACKING, AND BRAKE ADJUSTMENTS. WE HAVE AN INTERNET CLASS AT 1:15 PM, A LAST TRIP TO HOOCH'S FOR MONDAY TACOS, THEN IT'S BACK TO BLACKSTONE RV AND A TUESDAY DEPARTURE FOR PAHRUMP, NEVADA.

NO SINCE HURRYING, THE RENTS PAID HERE UNTIL MAY 1ST, AND THE MAINTENANCE JUST MAKES GOOD SENSE, AS WE'RE PULLING THE CAMPER 7000 MILES IN THE FALL ON BB'08.

BE PREPARED, IS THE MOTTO OF A TRUE SCOUT!!

"SUNNY & 101"

AZ CAR HIBERNATION

"FREE, FREE, GOD ALMIGHTY, FREE AT LAST !!!"

SURE FEELS GOOD TO BE DONE WITH WORK FOR THE WINTER SEASON AND ON VACATION FOR A MONTH!!!

FIRST LITTLE JOB, IS PUT THE ARIZONA CAR INTO STORAGE FOR THE SUMMER MONTHS WE ARE GOING TO BE GONE. WE MADE ARRANGEMENTS WITH SOME FRIENDS TO STORE OUR CARS TOGETHER.

HERE IS A PICTURE OF THE AZ. CAR'S BUNK MATE FOR THE SUMMER. YOU CAN'T TELL, BUT IT'S A VERY SPORTY KARMIN GIA BY VOLKSWAGON FROM THE '60'S.

GOOD THING IT'S SUCH A SMALL CAR, AS TWO REGULAR CARS WOULD HAVE NEVER FIT INTO THE 30 FOOT GARAGE.

(BTW COLE, THAT DENT IN MY BUMPER WAS THERE BEFORE AND NOT FROM SLAMMING INTO YOUR CAR.)

IN CASE I HADN'T MENTIONED IT, IT'S NO LONGER "SUNNY & 80" ON THE LOWER MOHAVE DESERT, BUT MORE LIKE 98 DEGREES. LIKE MARY, I NEED TO START WORKING ON MY TAN FOR BB'08 IN THE FALL.

FOR THE REST OF THE DAY? IT'S PACKING UP THE TRAILER, TRUCK, AND CAR. AND MAYBE 10 OR 20 VISITS WITH THE "BEAST"?

INTERNET CLASSES

AS SOME OF YOU KNOW MARY AND I HAVE BEEN TAKING CLASSES ABOUT THE INTERNET THIS SPRING. WE HAVE LEARNED A LOT !!!

TODAY I'D LIKE TO DISCUSS PAGE RANK. ALL INTERNET PAGES ARE RANKED ON A SCALE OF 1 TO 10, AND I'M KEEPING THIS SIMPLE. FOR EXAMPLE IF YOU GO TO THE HOMEPAGE FOR HONDA MOTORCYCLES, THEIR PAGE RANK IS 5/10. ANOTHER EXAMPLE WOULD BE AMY'S BLOG WHICH HAS A RANKING OF 0/10.

THE HAPPY CAMPERS BLOG HAS A PAGE RANKING OF 2/10. THERE ARE MANY FACTORS CONSIDERED TO COME UP WITH THIS RANKING. THE WEBSITES ARE MORE OR LESS CRAWLED OVER BY INTERNET SPIDER ROBOTS THAT CHECK THE PAGES. OUR RANKING IS DUE TO THE DAILY CHANGES AND 55 DAILY READERS (THANKS TO YOU ALL).

WITH A RANKING OF 2/10 OUR BLOG ACTUALLY HAS SOME VALUE, THEREFORE WE WILL BE EXPERIMENTING WITH SOME INTERNET TRICKS OVER THE NEXT FEW MONTHS LIKE ADVERTISING.

THERE MAY ALSO BE SOME BLOGS THAT ARE KINDA OFF THE WALL, AS COMPANIES WILL ACTUALLY PAY US A FEW CENTS TO BLOG ABOUT THEIR PRODUCTS.

BEAR WITH US AS WE TEST OUT SOME OF THE NEW INFORMATION WE'VE BEEN LEARNING IN CLASS, AND REST ASSURED THAT THE MISSION STATEMENT OF THE BLOG WILL NOT CHANGE.

THANKS FOR YOUR UNDERSTANDING.

AND "THANKS" TO UNCLE HANS FOR CARRYING THE BLOG THIS WEEK. IT'S BEEN A RATHER BUSY WEEK FINISHING UP THOSE ITEMS WE'VE PUT OFF ALL WINTER, PREPARING TO HIT THE ROAD FOR THREE WEEKS, AND STILL FINDING TIME TO STUDY FOR OUR INTERNET CLASSES.

I SAVED THE BEST NEWS FOR LAST........ TODAY IS SATURDAY AND OUR LAST NIGHT OF WORK AT THE AVI!!!!

AS WE HIT THE ROAD INTERNET ACCESS WILL BE HIT AND MISS, BEAR WITH US AS WE WILL CATCH UP THE BLOG WHEN WE CAN.

"SUNNY & 98"

Finally The Ice Goes Out !!!

.................Finally........



.......................iceout..................




.........Cable Lake...............



EDITOR'S NOTE:
TWO DIFFERENT WORLDS........
ONE BROTHER IS CELBRATEING THE ICE GOING OUT OF HIS LAKE............

THE OTHER BROTHER IS MOVING TO COOLER WEATHER IN THE MOUNTAINS........

St. Croix Falls Surgical Center

By "Uncle Hans"


Spring is always touted as such a beautiful time of the year, but I think it is ugly and boring. No water sports, no motorcycling, no snowmobiling, no skiing of any kind--water or snow. The best blog I can come up with is the dedication of our new surgical center in St.Croix Falls, one of my hospitals. This is the outside of the building, which is attached to the hospital....

.....I was intrigued by the story of Dr. Olson, which is a lot like my story. I have nearly 27 years of the same type of work. 21 years of it were 24/7/365 call, now I am every other night and every other weekend. I did my internship at Yankton, South Dakota and part of our duties as residents was to teach anatomy to medical students there, like Dr Olson was. He was a student there in the 50's, I was there in the 70's........

.....the damned building is beautiful, but hard to photograph. This is a nice atrium with trees growing in it where the dedication took place. If the editor (Rex) can lighten it up a little you will see the balding administrator giving the welcome and Wendy in a dark red dress leaning over the railing across the atrium on the second floor........

.........this is the best shot I could get of Dr. Olson giving his talk, which was a collection of old small town surgery stories. He looks good for 83...........

We got together later and swapped some stories. Then he got whisked away by his 7 daughters, all of whom were there for the festivities.........

.......I was struck by the irony of one community that really appreciated it's surgeon and how my community has been recruiting hard for someone to replace me for the last 6 years. Different community or times are changing? I dunno. The last shot is of the OR crew dancing at the local hot spot after the ceremony. I have never seen a public dance hall with a pole that coincidentally appears right in front of the band area. I am sure there have been some pretty memorable amateur performances on this pole over the years.........

....I think I failed to mention that the new facility is named after Dr. Olson in gratitude for his years of unselfish work for the community. The local winery bottled two special wines and had glasses etched for the occasion. Kinda neat. No danger of that happening to me.........

Uncle Hans

Mice Update

Time for an interim report of the mice research. It is going badly!! These are the "Steves". They are the guys who are supposed to live a long time because of the supplements in their diets. You can't see it very well, but many of them have big open sores on their butts. It is from them attacking one another and biting one another. Both "tribes", experimental and control, are aggressive towards one another and there is a fair amount of fighting........

I think the difference may be that some of the supplements they get will thin the blood, supposedly slowing heart disease and stroke. They maybe more susceptible to injury and bleed. That is the only theory I can come up with. It has been suggested that the alcohol (they get a tiny amount in their water-equivalent to two drinks a day for us) is somehow making them more aggressive. But both tribes are aggressive and fight about the same amount. The other tribe has no injury or bleeding. They are slightly bigger and have fuller coats, too. The control mice eat about 10% more as well. Strange. Any suggestions or theories out there?.....

.........It has been about 2 months since I started this project and the first batch of treated food is almost gone. I have photographed the process of treating the food for the blog, since I needed a new batch. This is a one day dose of supplements for a human (namely, me). It has been in water for as long as it took me to find and turn on the camera (about 20-30 seconds). Several of the pills have almost exploded already.......

.....This is at about an hour. Looks delicious, no?. The mice weigh 250 grams (10 mice X 25 grams apiece) I weigh 80,000 grams. (doesn't that sound fat?.......it's 176 lbs). Anyway, 80,000 divides by 250 equals 320 so this gooey mess is enough supplement for 320 days for the Steves................

.........this is the next morning................

........here is Julia Childs pouring it into the blender..........

........this stuff smells so vile that "puree" seems like not enough punishment........

........we dilute it 4 to 1 because a handy sized batch is about 80 days of food............

....here Wendy is pouring it through a jelly strainer to take out any chunks that may clog the sprayer. Surprisingly, there are no chunks in the strainer.............

........now for the food. We use ordinary cheapo dry dog food. Neil did the research and reported it is the most effective for this use..............

.......then we put one quarter of it (and quickly dump the rest down the drain, it stinks!) in an ordinary window cleaner spray bottle...........

.......I am measuring our about 80 days worth of food (15 grams per mouse per day). Notice the bin I am scooping out of looks suspiciously like a 50 lb pig feeder from Fleet Farm. That's because it is a pig feeder. I feed my dog once every 3 months and she drinks out of the lake or the toilet, depending on the season. We call it "low maintenance".......

............then we spread the food out in a thin layer of cookie sheets...............

........The last step is to spray the mixture on the food, usually in 3-4 applications so it is even and not so heavy that it makes the food soggy. Time is allowed between applications to dry. That is the way we get the mice to eat the supplements for the experiment. No one ever complains about the smell or taste..........

.....As a parting shot, you may recognize our Mother about to take her annual ride, Keep in mind that there is still ice on the lake. In fact, Jake was still walking on it yesterday, and ice fishing somewhere as I type this!!.......

Uncle Hans