Upstairs At The White House

 J.B. West was the head usher at the White House. He wrote about his occupational memories with the help of Mary Lynn Kotz in the book Upstairs At The White House; My Life With The First Ladies. The author started as an assistant usher when Eleanor Roosevelt was living at the White House. He worked with Bess Truman, Mamie Eisenhower, Jacqueline Kennedy, Lady Bird Johnson, and Pat Nixon before he retired. He handled odd requests, planned events and dinners and directed state functions such as weddings and funerals. He helped to redecorate the rooms over the years. He handled the budget and informed each First Lady how much she could spend on redecorating. I enjoyed this fascinating behind the scenes look at the families who lived in the White House.

The Heartbreak Of Trees

 Being a tree hugger I decided to listen to the audiobook translated from German to English called The Heartbreak Of Trees: Embracing Our Ancient Bond With Forests and Nature by  Peter Wohlleben. I learned much about trees including their ability to angle their roots toward water underground and transfer memories to their offspring.  He also claims that in the spring and summer, the trees take up a sudden upflow of water every 3 or 4 hours much like a heartbeat. The author is knowledgeable but his style is rambling and unorganized. Throughout the book he talks about the oldest tree on the planet in Sweden, the Polish forests near Belarus, the Black Forests in Germany, and trees in British Columbia.

Wildflower Garden

 Today I met three other friends who are also Master Naturalists at the Eloise Butler Wildflower garden in Minneapolis. We spent a couple of hours slowly walking through the garden, forest bathing, identifying birds and trees and wildflowers and mushrooms. We identified plants on I Naturalist. We enjoyed the scenery and each other's company. I am so grateful to the woman who organized this meeting of four friends from Northfield, Duluth, Minneapolis and Ramsey. Afterwards we had lunch at a Thai restaurant. We plan to see each other next may at the conference in Detroit Lakes.

Aunt Poldi And The Sicilian Lions

I think I enjoyed Aunt Poldi And The Sicilian Lions so much because I have traveled to Sicily and have been through the towns that line the sea between Catania and Palermo. Mario Giordano is the author and J. Maxwell Brownjohn translated the book into English. Aunt Poldi decides to move to Sicily at the age of 60. She sells her parent's home in Germany and buys a new one on the sea next to Mount Etna. Her husband has died but he has three sisters living in Sicily. Her nephew is the narrator of the story. He lives in Germany but he comes to spend a week with his Aunt Poldi once a month while he works on writing a novel about their family. A young handy man named Valentino doesn't show up for Aunt Poldi so she goes out looking for him. His parents don't know where he is. Three days later Aunt Poldi finds his body on the beach when she goes to take an early morning swim. She vows to find his murderer. This book has many quirky characters, funny situations, and quite a lot of drinking alcohol. I wish I had an aunt like Aunt Poldi. 

Audubon Speaker

Tonight Kim Eckert spoke at the local Audubon meeting at the Unitarian Universalist Church up the hill from my house. He has the fifth edition of his book. The first edition was written in 1975. He had to change a lot of directions because roads change frequently. He is a self deprecating speaker who advised us to find out own birding spots. In the southern part of the state where corn and soybeans grow he suggests taking crooked roads where you will find a lake or a wooded creek. In the northeastern part of the state he suggests taking straight roads that probably go through a bog where you can find black backed woodpeckers or great gray owls. He pokes fun at some counties and he pokes fun at people who list birds in each county. I didn't realize he studied at St. John's University and taught English at the high school in Ashby. He strongly suggests that one can have fun even if they don't see any birds on a birding trip.

 

E Coli and Cyanobacteria

Tonight the staff from NRRI (Natural Resources Research Institute) gave us a zoom meeting about the results from our water sampling that we did last summer. I collected water from Chester Creek and grew E Coli in my house. After 48 hours I counted the E Coli, documented the results, and photographed the results. The hypothesis going in was that if a stream like Chester had significant amounts of E Coli, the beach where the stream emptied into Lake Superior would have more bacteria. That turned out not to be true. Another hypothesis was that Amity creek would have less bacteria because it has fewer roads and fewer houses near it. That also turned out not to be true. The fact that we did this study during a drought year was significant because the bacteria would be more concentrated. Another hypothesis was if you had more E Coli in the stream the more likely you were to have cyanobacteria and/or toxic algae blooms in the lake. That turned out not to be true. Cyanobacteria were correlated however with more phosphorus and turbidity in the water. This information had already been released to the Minnesota DNR and the city of Duluth so that they can decide where further study is warranted. 

Munchkin

Weather has been cool in Duluth for the past five days. On Friday I tried to turn my heat on because my apartment was at 60 degrees with no luck. I tried many times all weekend. I put in a work order and felt glad to be a renter instead of a homeowner. Yesterday the maintenance man came out. He looked at the boiler and said it was fine. He thought the problem was my thermostat. He didn't fix the problem but he brought two space heaters because by now the temperature inside the apartment was 59 degrees. I also learned that Comfort Systems would be out to service both boilers today between noon and four.

This morning before I left I made sure the basement door was unlocked. I left a note explaining the problem. After my classes (Ukraine and the Cossacks/Genetics) I walked home at 4:30 hoping to enjoy a warm apartment. No luck. Comfort Systems did not come by. I informed the owner. At 6 p.m. I get a call that Comfort Systems is here and wants to get it. I let the man in and help him find the boiler. He is a talkative guy and he is explaining what he is doing and why he is doing it. He resets the boiler and it starts to work and then goes out. He cleans off the piece that tells the boiler to ignite and the piece that tells the boiler to shut off and tries again. This time it does work. The boiler still needs a thorough overhaul and that is now scheduled for November 1st. Boilers and furnaces need yearly overhauls. I learned a lot today; not only about Ukraine and the Cossacks and genetics but also boilers.