Dinner in Appleton

Yesterday, Travis picked me up and we drove to Appleton to meet up with his sister, Katie, and her boyfriend, Pete, and Travis' best friend's mom, Marla, for dinner. Marla is basically Katie and Travis' second mother; they all have a long, goofy history together.

Marla has recently relocated to Peru, but had to come back this past month due to the passing of her mother. Travis and I had helped sort through some of her parents' house (they were sort of hoarders) and Marla gave Travis her old car as she had inherited her mother's basically brand new one. She leaves on Tuesday, and this was sort of a farewell dinner.

We went to an Indian restaurant called Sai Ram in Appleton, where Katie and Pete live. It was very good food, and I think all of us went home weighing 10 pounds more than when we had come in. After we ate, we had a bit of a photo op (I had brought my camera, figuring Marla would like some pictures of her with Travis and Katie to have with her in Peru,) and the ensuing 15 minutes were full of laughter and tears.

County Fair

Just got home from the Marquette County Fair volunteer orientation dinner!

I will be the clerk for a whole mess of categories grouped into one, having to do with people and social development (similar to what I study in school). You can see the list of all the categories here, I will be working with #17, 29, 32 and 33 I think. Basically, I will check-in every entry, and then record the place/ribbon they receive. Should be an interesting time, and I will be able to meet all kinds of people!

Wildlife

Today, while out on a short bike ride, I suddenly saw a BLACK squirrel! I slowed down as I approached the tree he was climbing and took out my phone to take a picture. As soon as I got off my bike and started looking up the tree, he had vanished. I didn't hear the smallest rustle nor see the faintest hint of a black squirrel tail. I spent a good two or three minutes looking around for him, but gave up. So, unfortunately you do not get to see the awesome black squirrel I saw today (although you can see what he sort of looked liked here, but he was a bit fatter, more like this one.)

This reminded me that I had not uploaded the pictures of the giant snapping (maybe?) turtle I rescued! Here he is:

He may not have actually needed rescuing, but I did him the honor anyways. I was driving off after volunteering with the historical society, when I saw this guy crossing the road! You can see by comparison to the cigarette butt, he was not small cookie, and he was just strolling along in the middle of the oncoming lane. I pulled over, fearing his untimely demise by someone texting whilst driving (tsk tsk!) Unfortunately, another person had seen him as well, and he stopped in the middle of the lane, waiting for the turtle to "cross". What a dummy, as soon as the car was there he stopped walking entirely because the car was all loud and giant. Seeing that the other driver was just going to wait around all day, I scurried across traffic and picked him up by his very rear shell area so as not to get snapped. I ran him across to the sidewalk, and he had to sit through a short photo op (which he was clearly unhappy about...) I wish I had gotten a photo of his tail, however, it was huge and I got a Jurassic Park feel just by looking at it!

Aside from this turtle incident, there have been many turtles wandering around the campground and I have had to move several tiny (as in the size of a quarter) ones off of the mini golf course and into the safety of the trees (only after they had suffered the wrath of my leaf blower, however...) A boy came to show me a turtle he found the other day as well, but unfortunately it was a dead baby painted turtle, it's shell still soft from recently hatching.

Moving away from reptiles, we have a bit of a frog problem at the campground swimming pool. Yesterday morning Kathie (one of the owners) scooped out 10 little green frogs from the pool, and I later removed another 7 (6 still breathing) from the pool skimmers. It was the same story this morning too, I guess they like the warm water at night. They say the chlorine will kill them, and unless they get to the steps they can't get out, so we can safely say that we save lives every day :)

At any rate, all kinds of fun critters up here! Hopefully Kansas will offer more of the same.

Long time no see!

It has been a busy couple weeks, and sadly I haven't posted for awhile! A lot has happened that I need to write about, and as I have time available I will.

Travis and I have been planning and getting ready for our move down to Kansas, and Dad and I took a road trip down there Monday-Thursday this week. We found a place and sent in our applications, and I will write more about that once I know for sure whether we will be living there.

In other news, I made it into the local paper! The Marquette County Tribune, a weekly paper, featured the bell raising I mentioned in one of my other posts about the historical society. My name and a picture of us raising the bell pole is now posted on the bulletin board at Kilby Lake Campground (my workplace) for all to see. I guess there isn't enough going on in the area if they needed to post a big picture of us raising a pole...

As for upcoming events, I have been asked to volunteer with the county fair, and will be a "clerk" who records fair contest entries. There is a dinner and orientation next Monday and I will be working there July 6th and 10th. Should be fun, and I will take some photos since this post is clearly lacking in that area.

Finally! A Deer!

I FINALLY captured a photo of a deer today!

I was driving down one of the campground paths on the golf cart, absorbed in the Harry Potter 7 audio book, when suddenly a big mama deer ran out in front of me! I slowed and stopped, and saw her fawn still on the other side of the road! Since I was in the golf cart, he wasn't afraid of any noise and I was able to use my phone's camera. Here are the shots I took!

Hopefully, I will get some better ones as summer progresses.

New Rat Cage!

I can check off one of my summer goals off the list! Yesterday, Dad and I put together the new Ratland!

My original plan was to find some sort of base (plastic or metal) and then design a frame around it. We started at Home Depot in the Wisconsin Dells, and discussed using a big cement mixing pan (plastic) with some rubber coated chicken wire. I wasn't entirely sure of this idea, so we kept looking.

We drove to Baraboo because I needed more pet bedding (and there are no stores near Dad's that carry the right kind) and we found a neat store called Pet Supply. It is run by an older couple, and they had all kinds of interesting critters! The usual hamsters and fish, but also GIANT pythons and tarantulas! They also happened to have a used ferret/chinchilla cage for sale, $75, that would work for that rats. After some deliberation, we decided to keep looking in order to keep costs down.

We went to Farm and Fleet, and stumbled upon a gold mine of pet cage ideas! First, we looked at the pre-made rabbit cages, which are sold separate from plastic bases of various sizes. Then we started coming up with all kinds of cage wall alternatives, including using grill grates or cooling racks. Both of those ideas were a bit pricey, and we kept our eyes open for similar looking products. Eventually, we went to Menards and discovered exactly what we were going to do.

At Menards, we found some Rubbermaid metal shelving units, 4 and 8 feet in length. We decided that we could use two of the 4 foot ones ($15 each) that we would cut in half, and a 24''x24'' plastic base that we saw at Farm and Fleet, all held together by wire cage clips meant for building rabbit hutches. The total cost of this was about $45-$50. The following pictures are the completed project!

Weekend Recap

A lot has happened since I last wrote, and I didn't take many photos so I'll just give a quick recap here.

Wednesday, after MCHS, I drove out to Oxford to the Eyes of Hope animal shelter, where I will be volunteering weekly this summer. I met Kris, one of the owners, and all of the dogs who are currently at the shelter. I walked a good number of them, and was about to take out the cutest little gray miniature poodle when it started to rain and he told us he wasn't interested in walking in that. Kris showed me how to feed the dogs, and gave me a list of times I can come and walk/play with the dogs every week. Hopefully I will be going again this Friday.

On Thursday, my new friend Phil invited me to come with him to his students' end of the year party. We refereed a flag football game, danced around and had a generally good time with some 7th and 8th graders. There were all kinds of yummy treats (cupcakes, brownies, etc.) and some kids were part of a cool whip eating contest that ended with the first to blow a bubble from the gum buried in the cream!

I worked on Friday, then saw the new Pirates of the Caribbean movie at the local theater. It is small, 192-seater that was reopened several years ago. They show one movie a night for about a week (every night at 7 pm!) before switching to a new one. On Friday, On Stranger Tides arrived and the theater was really busy. The ticket was only $5, and I got a medium popcorn and medium soda for $3.50, so my entire night out cost as much as buying a ticket at one of the big multi-plexes. The movie was good! I own all the other Pirates films, and if you liked them you will certainly like this one.

After I got home, Auree surprised me with another mouse. He has captured many of them so far this summer, and I was able to save this one from being killed. I didn't know Auree was such a good mouser! Dad says Auree brought him another "treat" this weekend when I was out of town. This is a photo of the mouse from Friday; he had the cutest big brown eyes.

Travis' Grad Party was on Saturday, so I left work and 1 o'clock and Dad and I drove (separately) out to Sturgeon Bay. Dad was able to meet lots of Travis' family, and despite the misty cold weather, we had a pretty good time. Us young folk spent the evening and night around the fire as it got colder out, and Travis' little brother Avery entertained us all by giving us "Indian names". I was known as White Eagle and Travis was Tiger Fang (and we figured together we made White Fang). Unluckily, I had to work on Sunday morning and therefore had to leave Sturgeon Bay at 8 am since it is a 3ish hour drive from home. Travis woke up late (he didn't get to bed until a few hours after I did, maybe 3:30) and then had to hurry to Madison where he is living for the remainder of the summer.