WE SAY GOODBYE TO AN OLD FRIEND
Weather Watch
We’ve had a little taste of what is to come, and I don’t like it. Last week Tuesday, we had severe thunderstorms pass through the area, dropping about an inch or so of rain and enough hail to make the ground white for awhile. In fact, three or four hours later there were little drifts of hail that hadn’t melted between some of the houses. Highly unusual for August. Then for the next couple of days, the morning temps were downright chilly, with readings in the upper forties and lower fifties. Fortunately, we’ve returned to more summer like readings. After all, we still should have three more weeks of summer and maybe a late fall with lots of Indian Summer.
Right about now, some of you may be wondering what has got into old Ken Peters. He writes a weather column for the paper, and he is actually talking about the weather. Well, sometimes things happen that make you look at life a little differently. One of those things was the passing of my cousin, Stan Peters. He was a good guy and had lots of friends from lots of different walks of life. My brother Herm and Stan spent many an hour on the river and lakes in this area catching about any thing that swims. The sign on the highway going west out of Wagner by ‘Doggers’ read, “The fish in heaven have met their match”. R.I.P. Stan Peters.
Another thing that happened was the end of summer Duffer’s Golf Playoff. I was looking forward to the day. My golf game had slowly improved and I was still getting lots of handicap strokes. I figured that all I needed was to shoot a little bit better than average, and I would be hard to beat. I started by taking an eleven on the first hole and an eleven on the second hole. That pretty much made me a spectator for the rest of the day, but you know what? I still had a good time. My playing partners, Dean Rettedal and Frank Behl played great golf and hit some spectacular shots that you might have once seen only on TV. It’s especially good to see Frank back on a semi- regular basis. The course is so nice and we could use more golfers.
I mentioned that my golf game had improved, and it has, but it is still not very good. I tend to lose my balance when trying to hit the ball hard. I thought if I could visit with a neurologist or some other doctor specializing in curing nerve pain that my game could get better or at least be more fun. With that thought in mind, I went to Dr. Carrie. “Hmm,” she said. “I think I’ll contact Dr. Boyle to see if he can help.”
“Wait a minute,” I said. “It sounds like Dr. Boil is a dermatologist.”
“Good one, Ken,” she said. “Now let’s see what we can do to cure some of your maladies.”
I thought, “Boy, if I don’t have any melodies, how can I sing Karaoke?” but I didn’t say it out loud. You just can’t trust people to think you are as funny as you think you are.
A quick look at what we can expect during the last few weeks of summer. We’ll have a gradual cooling down as temperatures slide down toward the frosty mark. I think we may have prospects for a killing frost on or about the 13th. Marianne and I have already hired a man to keep the snow off the driveway this winter. I fear the harvest season may be short and the winter long. Well, Dummy (I’m talking to myself now) why don’t you get out the onion forecast and see what it says? Now that’s not so bad. The onion calls for a drier than normal September and October with a wet November and December to follow.