On 2017-10-08 13:36, Gene Heskett wrote: > On Saturday 07 October 2017 22:09:43 Zenaan Harkness wrote: > >> On Sat, Oct 07, 2017 at 10:18:51AM -0400, Gene Heskett wrote: >> > On Saturday 07 October 2017 07:33:17 Zenaan Harkness wrote: >> > > Well I had to reboot that computer with cackling hyenas in the >> > > background saying things like “well you should know not to launch >> > > an indefinite number of processes in the background”. >> > >> > But yer poking around in my stomping grounds with yur old fart >> > characterizations. Uphill 2 miles in several feet of snow each way >> > to school etc etc. >> >> 2 miles of snow? We were -lucky- to have snow ... >> > You could easily have come and taken a few trainloads that winter, 1941 > IIRC, and we would have been thankful. I did ride an old mare about > halfway, when it was blizzarding but had to walk the last mile because > that was where the only barn I could leave her in for the day when it > went below zero F. One thing we always did on the farm in central Iowa > was take care of our work animals, and this barn was nice & tight. I > don't recall now that I ever noticed the manure was frozen. The little > boy got cold, but never frostbit, so we survived. Out on vacation, I > took my present wife back down those roads about 20 years back, finding > grandpa's house, but all the land around it had been sold & all the farm > outbuildings burned, so it was just a 4 room clapboard being rented now. > Even found the schoolhouse I went to, but it was just a rubble walled > shell by then. Thatched roof long gone, but the big "Warm Morning" > heating stove was still there. I was amazed to see those 2+ foot thick > cemented rubble walls had stood the test of time. > > I also took the missus over some of the covered "Bridges of Madison > County" that Eastwood and Streep made the movie about, and I've been > twice in the little cottage in Winterset where a movie actor named > Marion Morrison was born. You might know him as John Wayne. > > Its been a long, and interesting ride so far.
Had the odd winter like that. Somehow it would work out to every third or fifth. We'd know when it was coming, because all the farm animals would start making their way in under their house: they knew when it was on the way. All the rest were pretty easy, and we'd walk down to the road in bare feet, stopping to step in fresh cow-pats for a while to warm feet up we couldn't feel any more, then catch the bus to school, where we'd drive ourselves mad with the chilblains once we got inside. -- "It is the duty of the patriot to protect his country from its government." -- Thomas Paine Registered Linux User: 554515
