Get thee to Free Range

In honor of the late Estelle Getty: "Picture it: Wrenshall, 2008. A group of film buffs walks into a vintage barn in the open countryside. There, they find three movie screens, haybales and folding chairs for seating, popped corn for sale, and a film experience like none other."
If you've never been to the Free Range Film Festival in Wrenshall, it's about time you got in the car and went. It's year number five for the festival, which goes on starting at 7 p.m. tonight and starts at 2 p.m. on Saturday. Good people. Good independent films. And a sweet-smelling hayloft location that's unlike any other. See you there.

Posted by: Janna on 7/25/2008 at 11:12 AM | Comments (0) | Permalink

Buckwheat, buckwheat, buckwheat!

If there's one farm animal that makes me screech to a stop on the side of the road, it would be guinea fowl. They are fascinating to me; just look at that skinny naked head and plump body. So of course when I saw four of the birds milling about Ben and Marlene Kettner's home outside of Esko, I had to inquire.
The couple started out with a few guineas about 25 years ago, and they have been multiplying themselves ever since. A lot of people don't like the birds because they tend to be loud, but the Kettners find them amusing.
"They're just crazy, that's all," Ben said. They are fearless -- they'll stare down the Kettner's rambunctious and very large puppy, and in their native Africa, flocks of guineas have been known to drive hippopotamuses towards the safety of a river -- and independent. Some have described a guinea's call as a high, shrill, "Buckwheat, buckwheat, buckwheat!" Marlene said their call is just indescribable.
Every year, the Kettners' guineas get together and lay a big pile of 30 to 40 eggs, Marlene said, and they take turns setting them. They chicks grow, some get nabbed by mink or other predators, some stray too far on to the highway, and others grow up savvy and noisy and bold.
And tough, Ben said. Once, he found a guinea that had been hit by a car, and was lying motionless but still warm on the road. The Kettners had heard that guineas are a delicacy, so Ben carried the bird up to the garage and went to put a kettle of water on, so he could scald and pluck the guinea. By the time he returned though, the bird was gone. It had picked itself up and walked away.

Posted by: Janna on 7/17/2008 at 4:57 PM | Comments (0) | Permalink

But now where will I get my opinions from?

If you drive Highway 53 through Cotton, surely you have seen the signs. They've been there for a long time; I remember them from when I was in high school. It was wondrous, how they sprouted up -- an ever-increasing mountain of plywood squares painted with messages railing against (to name a few) feminists, the Cotton area post office, and Kofi Annan. Thank you, first amendment! The signs were all surrounded by snarls of barbed wire, most likely to prevent any enraged mail-carrying international women from ripping them down.
But last week, along came a windstorm that sent the whole thing tumbling to the ground. I'm curious as to whether the bringer of the opinions will put them back up again, or take the storm as a sign. I'm kind of hoping for the former. The signs always gave me something to think about on the drive home.
Oddly enough, another infamous Highway 53 billboard recently blew over -- the hot pink mama painted with a single high-heeled leg in silhouette, advertising an Eveleth strip joint. That one is still down, too.

Posted by: Janna on 6/23/2008 at 4:16 PM | Comments (1) | Permalink

Things you can do while riding a scooter

You can: save money on gas. Enjoy the extra sunshine. Work on your sense of balance.
And savor a good pipe.
I've seen people smoking cigarettes while they rode their two-wheelers around town, and it always seemed pretty stupid. What if the wind blows that ash tip right up your nose?
Mr. Jones, however, seemed like he had the pipe + scooter combination under control. I followed him on the way in to work Monday morning along Highway 53, from somewhere in Pike Lake until Arrowhead Road. I tried to catch a whiff of pipe tobacco as I tailed Mr. Jones (I'm assuming, unless he borrowed the jacket), but no luck. Just north of Arrowhead Road, as he was motoring along, Mr. Jones tapped out his pipe, presumably tucked it in his pocket and turned west through Hermantown, out of my life forever.

Posted by: Janna on 6/09/2008 at 11:32 AM | Comments (2) | Permalink

Oh, nuts: The return. Some kid thought this was funny.

Ask Garrett Niska what his job title is at Iron Trail Motors in Virginia, and he struggles for words. Head of car care? Assistant manager in charge of automotive appearance? Or, in his humble words, a grunt? However you parse it, Garrett is responsible for making sure the cars on the lot look nice and shiny. On Thursday morning, that meant ridding a few SUVs of a coating of silly string.
It didn't take much work; the string either pulled or patted right off. Garrett said he'd have to wash the cars again -- notice how glossy they are beneath the gunk -- and anyway, it could have been worse. A few years ago, he said, someone let loose with a paintball gun on a few cars.

Posted by: Janna on 6/05/2008 at 11:51 AM | Comments (1) | Permalink

Oh, nuts

You know the feeling -- you park on the shoulder of the highway and suddenly one edge of the gravel gives way, setting your three ton truck on edge and leaving you stuck.
Or maybe you don't. But two MnDot contractors did on Monday morning. Russ -- he's the one with his back to us -- and his partner were doing some survey work for a big resurfacing project on Highway 53. They parked, they went down, they called a Smokey's towing company.
But things are never as easy as simply hooking up to the tow truck and getting back on solid footing, are they? No, not when the shoulder is soft and the ditch is both steep and muddy. The MnDot truck ended up more in the ditch than out, Russ kept waving passing traffic through, and then the State Patrol came by, and then traffic was very briefly blocked on the highway as Smokey tugged on the truck. It finally came free, with no apparent damage, and Russ and his partner drove on.
What a way to start a Monday.

Posted by: Janna on 6/02/2008 at 11:42 AM | Comments (1) | Permalink

Flag-eating baby alert

You really can't top a cute baby picture. And when said baby is trying out her emerging teeth on the American flag on Memorial Day, well, really, there's nothing like it.
Year-old Madelyne Boben and her mother, Melodie, were at the Proctor Memorial Day observance on Monday morning at Proctor City Hall. And Madelyne was nibbling away on her flag for most of the ceremony, oblivious to keynote speaker Maj. Scott Rohweder, oblivious to the city band banging away at "God Bless America," oblivious to the mayor and the town newspaper publisher and everyone one saying their piece. And when you're a baby, hey -- that's all OK.

Posted by: Janna on 5/26/2008 at 6:30 PM | Comments (3) | Permalink

Bob Dylan the Bozo

If you go to "Tangled up in Ore," the new exhibit at Ironworld in Chisholm opening next week, you'll see Bob Dylan (when he was still Robert Zimmerman) boyhood bedroom window, plenty of Dylan concert posters and art, a pristine program from the 1964 Newport Folk Festival, and Connie Sabetti's 1964 Hibbing High School yearbook.
Ironworld curators are thrilled with that last item, because it contains the only true Dylan signature in the entire collection. The story goes that Dylan wound up at a party in Hibbing sometime that summer -- he was already a folk hero, and had changed his name by then -- and ended up signing about five yearbooks. Connie's was one of them. Dylan wrote, "To Connie Agen, from your friend and mine - Bob Dylan." And then Dylan drew an arrow pointing to Thomas Chapin's picture, who knows why.
Connie's husband briefly outlined this story when I called the couple's Eveleth home. "There's a little more to it, but not much," Steve Sabetti said. And then he sighed. "Yeah, what a Bozo."
Tom Chapin, who grew up to be DNR conservation officer and author, had never heard this particular Dylan story.
"Huh," Tom said. "Of course, I was good friends with his brother."
Tom and David Zimmerman graduated together, and Tom admired David's musical talents.
"David was a terrific guy," Tom said. "He was absolutely the most talented guy in our class, as far as music goes."
And as for Dylan's music? "I could give it or take it," Tom said. "I've never been into that kind of music."

Posted by: Janna on 5/16/2008 at 9:57 AM | Comments (6) | Permalink

What's that truck eating?

From a distance, it looked like the blood-red Chevy Chyenne truck engine had a taste for humans. A man was practically buried in the engine, with only his head and shoulders poking out.
As I drove closer, I could see that the presumed truck owner had chosen to wriggle entirely under the hood, instead of his truck pulling a Christine on him.
Derrick Hatfield was trying to fix the distributor on his '92 Chevy in Virginia on Tuesday, and he found it more comfortable to sit in the engine rather than lean over it.
"Most people don't sit in their truck engine," Derrick said. "I do."
He also claims to be a direct descendant of that legendary a-fussin' and a-feudin' Kentucky Hatfield family, of the Hatfield and McCoy rivalry. But Derrick didn't seem to have that kind of temperament.
He had taken his last class for the year at the Mesabi Community College just the day before, and now his engine had gone kerflooey, indefinately stalling his ride home to Hill City.
Oh, well. If Derrick couldn't get the truck going again, he had a back-up plan.
"I'll call my dad," he said.

Posted by: Janna on 5/14/2008 at 8:05 PM | Comments (1) | Permalink

I'm feeling...thirsty...so, so thirsty

I've been watching this giant inflatable Corona bottle make the rounds around Duluth lately -- it was parked outside the Radisson late last week, and now it's up at the Tejas Texas Grill & Saloon in Hermantown to whet people's appetites for Cinco de Mayo.
And, according to co-owner Jamie Wilson, that 164,752-oz. (my estimate) bottle is mighty effective.
"It works," Jamie said. "Those people know what they are doing."
The bottle is a loaner from Rohlfing beer distributors of Duluth, Jamie said. When he last rented the Corona bottle, about two years, ago, sales of the Mexican import jumped. Last year, Jamie rented a Miller Lite inflatable bottle, which also, oddly enough, inspired people to order more beer.
"Anything to get people to turn that corner," Jamie said.

Posted by: Janna on 4/29/2008 at 5:46 PM | Comments (0) | Permalink