Friday, 2/9

Since I have to go and shoot the (gasp) next to last episode of ”High School Bowl” for the season I'm going to leave you with one of those history videos I make. Even though I originally made it two years ago, I'm sharing it for two reasons, the first being that it's “remastered”. It has a few new pictures, and I wanted to see just how much better I could make it with new video editing software.

The other reason it's remastered? Well, it 's one of five “Pieces of the Past” that WNMU-TV, the fine people who air “High School Bowl”, will be showing over the next few months when they need a little filler between shows. So if you think I'm not on TV enough now, just wait.

I haven't even begun to peak yet.

8-)

Have a great weekend. Enjoy the video. See you Monday!

(jim@wmqt.com)

Thursday, 2/8

Hopefully, three months from today will be better than it is today.

Three months from today Loraine and I are hoping to head to Germany, where we hope to spend ten days flying into Frankfurt, taking a train to Kaiserslauten, another train to Freiburg, and then a train back to Frankfurt to fly back home again. I say “hope” because, as I write this, both airport security & ground crew workers, as well as train drivers are on strike in Germany, along with the people who run the tram systems in each city.

And there doesn't seem to be an end in sight.

It's been like this for a while now; people in one of the fields will strike for a day or two and go back to work, followed the next few days by another group hitting the picket lines. As with all workers, they're looking for better pay and better conditions, and they do have the support of a majority of the German people. But then Europeans take the quality of their work life a lot of seriously than the rest of the world, so the support they're receiving doesn't surprise me, nor do the strikes.

I just hope they're over in three months.

At one time Loraine & I were thinking of renting a car while we're over there, as we usually do. But when we discovered that the car rental would be almost as much as a plane ticket over there, that changed. Besides, the two places where we hope to go are very-pedestrian and public transportation friendly, at least when the public transportation workers aren't on strike, so we figured not having a car wouldn't be that big of a deal.

We'll see how that turns out.

This will be the first non-soccer trip we've taken over there since 2018, and our first jaunt at all since the fall of '22. We're hoping it works out, if only because I love Freiburg and Loraine really wants to see Kaiserslauten. And while we realize there are some things out of our control, it really WOULD be nice if they called off their strikes for just a short period.

You know...like May 8^th through the 19th?

8-)

Here's one of the places we're heading, Freiburg. I can't wait to see it again. And hopefully, I'll have the chance.

(jim@wmqt.com)

Wednesday, 2/7

This is kind of a big day in the Koski family.

It seems like there are a lot of big days in the Koski family; much, I'm sure, like in every family everywhere on the planet. But I could not let this day go by without wishing a “happy birthday” to my favorite old guy in the whole world. That's right; it's Chicky-Poo's birthday.

When I mailed my dad's birthday card a couple of days ago and actually addressed it to “Chicky-Poo Koski”, someone asked how I had gotten into the habit of referring to him as “Chicky-Poo” instead of something normal like “Dad” or “Father” or “Sir” or “You know, that guy”. And in all honesty, I have no idea whatsoever. I don't even know when it started. I just know that one day, probably as a joke, I must have called him “Chicky-Poo” and, for some strange reason, it got stuck in my brain. I started referring to him in that manner. Not all the time, and certainly not when I'm actually having a conversation with him, but I address his mail to him that way, I refer to him that way when he wants me to tell Loraine something, and when talking to my Mom on the phone, I'll ask her to tell “Chicky-Poo” I said 'Hi”.

I know...great way to treat one of the two people without whom I wouldn't be here typing this, right?

Anyway it's Chicky-Poo's (excuse me, my dad's) birthday today, and I couldn't let the day go by without making sure that everyone else knew it was his big day, too. Since he's in Florida, I'm guessing he'll either be playing (or teaching, believe it or not) pickleball or going for a long bike ride (or both) before my Mom takes him out for dinner. So have a great day, DAD. Enjoy the weather, and enjoy all the attention for a few hours!

And one of these days I might even start referring to you the way a son normally would. I mean, I wouldn't lay money on it, but you never know. Your Lions almost made it to the Super Bowl this year, proving miracles CAN indeed happen, so we'll just have to see what the future holds.

8-)

Love,

(jim@wmqt.com)

Tuesday, 2/6

Better than anything I could ever write, the two pictures show just what a wacky, wacky winter we've had.

I know I've written a bunch in here about just how non-winter our winter has been, and at the risk of driving the subject into the ground and causing you to run from your computer, tablet, or phone screaming, I want to show you two pictures, taken a year (to the day) apart, that show just HOW insane it's been.

The first is from Saturday afternoon, where Loraine and I were able to go out and play soccer on a snow-free pitch in Marquette in February---

That's right. We played soccer—in shorts—in the snow-free 50 degree sunshine on February 3^rd in Marquette. I know I've been saying it a lot, but this IS a weird winter, isn't it?

I'm just saying...

If that isn't enough proof, here's the second picture, taken last February Third (2/3/2023, to be exact). Notice the difference?

And last year was a year where we had such a low total of snow that several things, including the UP200, were canceled a week or so after I took that picture.  So if it seems like I keep referring to a “weird winter”, it's not because I'm fixated by it (well, okay, maybe I am a little). It's just because this really IS a weird, weird winter.

(jim@wmqt.com)

Monday, 2/5

It seems like forever ago that Jack & I did “Legends & Lore” at Kaufman, yet the spectacular was held but a mere ten days ago.

As I think I mentioned back those long ten days ago, we had to cut a bunch of stories. Most of them were for time, but one was cut because Jack's granddaughter was going to be at the show. When we were first putting it together he saw the topic--”Hookers”--and brought to my attention the fact that an eight year old would be present. So there went both my hooker stories. One of them ended up being the video we shot at the History Center and I posted here a few days before the show, and the other?

Well, here 'tis—and it's about Seney, of all places.

In the 1880s, Seney actually had a national reputation as a center of sin. It wasn't entirely warranted; in fact, most of it was trumped up by a highly sensationalized story (written by Nellie Bly) in the 19^th century magazine “The Police Gazette”. But there was vice in Seney last century. In the 1880s, the town consisted of 2,000 residents, 22 bars, and two really big brothels on the edge of town, where loggers and railroad workers often fought over women, alcohol, and money that they lost gambling.

Yup. Seney was one of THOSE places.

Most of the prostitutes who worked in Seney actually came from elsewhere. There was money to be made, and unlike in Marquette, where the police had this almost unhealthy obsession with the “ranches” that lined Lake Street, the law in Seney didn't care. Of course, it probably helped that there wasn't really much (if any) law in Seney, but what there was didn't really care.

Anyway, here's the (short) story I didn't get to tell. There wasn't really a bank per se in Seney; instead several large merchants would instead hold money for people and even pay them a little interest on it. One day, a young woman who had just moved into town a month prior came into the store with almost $1,500, which would be worth almost $40,000 these days. When asked where she got it, she was quite honest about it. It came, she said, “from pants that weren't being worn at the time”. As it turns out, she had just gotten engaged, and she and her fiancee had set out in different directions, trying different ways to come up with the money they needed to get their lives started.

I'm guessing that, after a single month, she did quite a bit better than her fiancee.

That's one of the stories I didn't get to tell at Kaufman ten days ago. A few others may end up being turned into videos, but this one? Probably not. I didn't want to let it go to waste. After all, when's the next time I'll get to talk about prostitutes?

Well, I'll actually more hooker stories in June when I do my “Walk on the Wild Side” tour for the History Center. But, I mean, before then?

8-)

(jim@wmqt.com)

Friday, 2/2

I'm pretty sure it's not my fault. But these days, I can't be 100% sure.

No more than an hour and a half after I posted yesterday's entry about the weather's impact on events like the UP 200 came news that for the second year in a row the UP 200 race itself had been canceled due to a lack of snow, to be replaced by the “Festival of the Sled Dog” for the second year in a row. Now, I know I had nothing to do with it; all I did was point our that the weather REALLY hasn't been conducive to winter events up here.

But after my TV piece this past Monday, I'm starting to wonder.

In case you didn't see it, the piece was a joke apology about a prediction I made at the beginning of the year. That prediction was that we wouldn't get any snow and our major winter events would have to be altered, which caused Sarah to (jokingly) say that it would be all my fault if said major winter events were indeed altered or canceled. It was a joke on my part and a joke on her part, yet that prediction still came true which means, if you look at it a certain way, that it's all my fault.

Oops.

Yes, I know I'm not to blame, at least not anywhere as much as El Nino and climate change. But still, these are important events, not only to the area in general but, as I said yesterday, also to the merchants who depend upon them. I feel for them, and like I said yesterday, I hope it's not the start of a run like this.

Because that would suck, not only for them but for the UP in general, as well.

On that note, have yourself a great weekend. It's only supposed to be sunny & 15 degrees above average here the next few days, which means that our “winter” doesn't appear to be coming back any time soon.

(jim@wmqt.com)

(ps—the TV spot, in case you didn't see it? CLICK HERE).

Thursday, 2/1

For once, I wasn't exaggerating.

Yesterday I made the off-handed comment that we had our two weeks of winter this year. And that prompted daily blog reader Jennifer of Madison to accuse me of, perhaps, going off on a flight of fancy, as I sometimes do when I try to make a point. That's something I'll cop to; after exaggeration is a great way to get a point across.

Only Jennifer, in this case I wasn't exaggerating. Here's a picture from downtown Marquette at just after 1 yesterday afternoon, when we broke a record high temperature for the day (and the fourth highest temperature ever recorded in Marquette in January--

See? It looks more like March 31^st than January 31^st. It's symptomatic of our “winter” so far, in which we had snow on January 12^th and 13^th and since then...

Zip. Zilch. Nada.

I was speaking with someone yesterday about how some major UP winter events—the UP 200, in particular—might have to deal with the lack of winter. No snow last year led the UP 200 to be cancelled, and unless something happens that's not in the forecast, and happens soon, it might not occur for the second year in a row.

Stop for a second to take that in—there's a very good possibility that for the second year in a row a major UP event might not happen because there's just not enough snow on the ground or in the forecast..

And there are still people who believe climate change isn't a thing?

Maybe what happened last year—the fact that we received 100 inches of the white stuff AFTER the UP 200 will occur, and occur before the race, allowing it to be run. But if it doesn't, the toll on not only the race but the businesses that depend upon visitors to it—or heck, just depend upon snow in general—could be tragic.

Jennifer, what I'm about to say is also not an exaggeration. Even though I'm someone who doesn't like snow (or winter in general)—I'm pulling for some of it to actually fall from the sky someday soon.

Because if it doesn't...

(jim@wmqt.com)