Echoes from the Loafers’ Club Meeting      

Do you notice an offensive smell?

No.

Good. Then it must be you.

Driving by Bruce’s drive

I have a wonderful neighbor named Bruce. Whenever I pass his driveway, thoughts occur to me, such as: The weather forecast had been for a high of 86°. Hot, hot, hot.

I didn’t need to worry about it, as the thermometer in my car said that it was already past 90°.

Road construction had put a crimp in the road’s cherubic personality. Trying to outsmart a detour, I found myself alone on a rural road. As I approached a stop sign, I decided I wanted to experience something from the past that my parents had talked about. It was from a time when most cars had no turn signals or brake lights. Hand signals were given for turns and stops. To signal an intention to turn right, you rested your left elbow on the door and raised your forearm so it formed a 90-degree angle with your arm while keeping your hand open. To make a left-turn hand signal, the left arm was thrust straight out with hand extended past the side mirror. To let other drivers know you planned to stop or slow down, the left arm was extended from the window, hand pointing down with the palm facing back. I rolled down my driver’s side window, put my hand out and signaled for a stop. It didn’t slow me down at all.

Keeping the gardening skills sharp

I visited with a fellow in Bloomington who had a native prickly pear cacti garden. He was weeding his garden with tweezers that one might use to feed pet lizards or snakes. The tweezers were nearly a foot long and he also used them to remove fallen leaves from the cacti plants. He’d tried using a leaf blower for that job, but it proved incapable of performing the task. The reason he gardened might have been to keep him on pins and needles. There was only one thing that kept me from pitching in and helping him weed his cacti garden. That was self-preservation.

It was on a Wednesday

Wednesday is hump day. That’s because Wednesday is the middle of the five-day work-week, meaning that a worker has made it “over the hump” towards the weekend.

I drove over a speed hump, raised pavement. It was meant to be driven over at a slow speed and that’s the way I went over it. A glacier passed me. It gave me time to think about other humps.

Contrary to popular belief, the humps of camels don’t hold water. The odd protrusions are mounds of fat — allowing camels to travel a long time through deserts without needing to eat and minimizing heat-trapping insulation on the rest of their bodies.

Cherry Humps was once the 16th best selling candy bar in the US and was made from 1913 to 1987. Two cherries and fondant covered in a couple of coats of chocolate made a gooey treat meant for the sweetest sweet tooth. Boy, Howdy! It was made by Schuler Chocolates in Winona before being bought by the Brock Candy Company. It went the way of the Golden Nut Cluster, a pecan cookie covered in caramel and a discontinued Girl Scout Cookie.

My wife and I stopped at a Russell Stover Chocolates Shop to get something for her mother for Mother’s Day. The store offers more candy than anyone would ever need. A couple and their two young children were shopping there. They posed for a photo as the father said to the kids, “Is this the best stop ever or what?”

And in local news

The Annual Prunefest Parade, in order to keep things moving, has prohibited the throwing of candy from floats. Only kale can be tossed to the teeming throng of spectators.

Nature notes

Keith Radel of Faribault maintains 170 bluebird nest box sites. He said there is no need for vent holes in nest boxes in Minnesota. Keith stated that if he had to pick between a state park and a golf course for his bluebird trails, he’d take the golf course. The bluebirds like mowed grass. The entrance hole doesn’t need to face any certain direction, but should face a tree. Bluebird fledglings can fly up to 300 feet when leaving a nest and landing in a tree is safer for them than landing on the ground. He added that chickadees use moss and rabbit fur in their nests.

Meeting adjourned

“What I want is so simple I almost can’t say it: elementary kindness.” —Barbara Kingsolver