NEWTON, Wis. — The needle on the Jeep Grand Cherokee was pushing 75 as I rushed up I-43 in Eastern Wisconsin to get to the Newton Firefighters Park for the Lakeshore Two-Cylinder Antique Tractor Pull.
It had been quite a few years since I raced up that section of interstate, dating back to when I was working as a roofer during my summers off from college. I was home last weekend for my brother-in-law’s wedding — which was a good time and great to see the family once again.
Sunday, however, I relived part of my teenage years by flying up the interstate once again because I wanted to get to the pull as soon as I could. It was my only chance that weekend to see my folks and I had to shoot the breeze with Dad seeing Father’s Day was the weekend before.
As soon as I pulled in to the yard, I walked over to the scale where my father was weighing in tractors for the 5,700-pound stock class and measuring hitch heights to make sure they were between 18 and 20 inches. Before I could say hi, Dad hollered at me, “Get on your tractor. You’re up soon.”
Sure enough, the John Deere 60 — that tractor my late grandfather gave my dad and I all back at Christmas before he passed away — was standing in line ready to pull. I found out later on that Dad had planned on me pulling ever since I was going to be there that Sunday morning.
I jumped up on the steel seat of the Deere and waited my turn to hook up to the Eliminator, every once in a while turning around to listen to instructions from Dad about staying in first gear, stay in the middle of the track and how to slide up in the seat if the front end started lifting off the ground.
All I could think of was, “If I would have known I was pulling, I wouldn’t have worn my Badger red ‘Sconnie’ shirt to the pull. I would’ve worn my green Packer shirt instead; it matches the tractor better.” Trust me, I wasn’t the only person who thought that. I was wearing the wrong colors, but that was forgiven soon after.
My turn finally came up. I backed the tractor up to the Eliminator sled, had old man Harold hook the sled up to the clevis on the hitch of the tractor and walk away. I put the Deere in first gear, throttled down and pulled the chain tight, then threw the throttle all the way forward.
Now antique tractor pulls are not fast-moving affairs. In all honesty, it moves pretty slow — especially in first gear. Nonetheless, I was moving quick to do everything I could to help the tractor down the track. I pushed the throttle forward a few more times to make sure it was at the stops, turned the front wheels to keep myself out of the soft spot on the side of the dusty track and waited patiently for the front end to start lifting off the ground so I could slide forward in my seat and hope my 160-pound frame could help keep the 5,700-pound machine closer to the ground.
Finally the red flag flew in front of me, signaling my pull was over. It was pretty early in the class, but I thought the 60 had a good pull. Dad was all smiles after I pulled off the track and shut the tractor down.
His smiles only got bigger after it was announced that the 60 won the class, the first time in four years we won. It was the first time I won a tractor pull and holding up that trophy I guess was just what Dad wanted for Father’s Day. What made the day even better was when he got a trophy of his own — a second-place trophy — pulling the 720 a few classes later. Both trophies stand on top of the beer fridge in the garage back home, along with the other first-place trophy Dad won with the 60 in 2005.
Months after Dad lost his father and I lost my grandfather, this seemed like a fitting way to celebrate Father’s Day. It was one I will never forget.
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Luck of the draw
OLD TOWN — As I sat down in a booth at the local Dairy Queen last Thursday night, I thought about just how poorly I’ve been hitting to start our softball season and how much I would enjoy the two chili dogs and Reese’s Piece Blizzard that was coming soon after.
As I was digging in to the second chili dog, a friend handed me his phone and told me it’s for me.
The first thing I heard was, “You’re going to have to get a bigger freezer.”
The line confused the living daylights out of me. Why would I need a bigger freezer? I can barely fill the one I have now and …
That’s when it hit me. Somehow I got a tag in the annual Maine moose hunt on my first try, with just one $7 chance entered in to the lottery. If I would have known better, I would have bought a MegaBucks ticket that night and truly tested my luck.
The next two phone calls I got proved to me just how unlikely that feat was. The first call came from a friend who has applied for a permit for over 15 years now, has acquired the most amount of points possible to help his cause and still has come up empty, and who was not amused with the fact that I landed a tag on basically a whim and a prayer.
The next came from my subpermittee, who told me to get ready for the October hunt.
After talking to a number of other hunters since then, I’ve come to one simple conclusion: I am fairly certain I’m a hated man.
I say that because, when I tell hunters who have put in for the lottery for over 10 years, have the maximum amount of points tallied up and who paid $22 for six chances to get one moose permit that I got a tag on just one measly chance and no points helping me out to speak of, they get fairly upset.
And rightfully so, I might add. Hunting moose is one of Maine’s finest outdoor traditions, yet residents that have tried to get one tag for nearly a quarter-century still come up short. It seems like a broken system considering the fact that they were told when this lottery was started decades ago that they would only have to wait 10 years at the most to get a permit.
I feel bad that those who have put hundreds of dollars for numerous chances into the lottery have come up empty year after year. There’s got to be a better system to dole out the permits than this, because a 25-year wait for a moose tag is far too long to make any hunter wait.
Then again, I’m thrilled to get what will likely be the only chance to go moose hunting. Actually, October will be the first time I ever go hunting since I’ve moved to Maine, let alone hunting for moose. Growing up in Wisconsin, deer hunting is a state pastime that lasts just nine days — starting the Saturday before Thanksgiving and going until the Sunday after. Ever since moving out this way, I’ve been itching to take to the woods again with my Remington .30-06 rifle and get back to my roots.
I just hope I can bag a moose in October. Otherwise I’m going to have a hard time looking those hunters in the eye that didn’t get chosen and tell them that my tag was wasted.
As I was digging in to the second chili dog, a friend handed me his phone and told me it’s for me.
The first thing I heard was, “You’re going to have to get a bigger freezer.”
The line confused the living daylights out of me. Why would I need a bigger freezer? I can barely fill the one I have now and …
That’s when it hit me. Somehow I got a tag in the annual Maine moose hunt on my first try, with just one $7 chance entered in to the lottery. If I would have known better, I would have bought a MegaBucks ticket that night and truly tested my luck.
The next two phone calls I got proved to me just how unlikely that feat was. The first call came from a friend who has applied for a permit for over 15 years now, has acquired the most amount of points possible to help his cause and still has come up empty, and who was not amused with the fact that I landed a tag on basically a whim and a prayer.
The next came from my subpermittee, who told me to get ready for the October hunt.
After talking to a number of other hunters since then, I’ve come to one simple conclusion: I am fairly certain I’m a hated man.
I say that because, when I tell hunters who have put in for the lottery for over 10 years, have the maximum amount of points tallied up and who paid $22 for six chances to get one moose permit that I got a tag on just one measly chance and no points helping me out to speak of, they get fairly upset.
And rightfully so, I might add. Hunting moose is one of Maine’s finest outdoor traditions, yet residents that have tried to get one tag for nearly a quarter-century still come up short. It seems like a broken system considering the fact that they were told when this lottery was started decades ago that they would only have to wait 10 years at the most to get a permit.
I feel bad that those who have put hundreds of dollars for numerous chances into the lottery have come up empty year after year. There’s got to be a better system to dole out the permits than this, because a 25-year wait for a moose tag is far too long to make any hunter wait.
Then again, I’m thrilled to get what will likely be the only chance to go moose hunting. Actually, October will be the first time I ever go hunting since I’ve moved to Maine, let alone hunting for moose. Growing up in Wisconsin, deer hunting is a state pastime that lasts just nine days — starting the Saturday before Thanksgiving and going until the Sunday after. Ever since moving out this way, I’ve been itching to take to the woods again with my Remington .30-06 rifle and get back to my roots.
I just hope I can bag a moose in October. Otherwise I’m going to have a hard time looking those hunters in the eye that didn’t get chosen and tell them that my tag was wasted.
Flashback to a twisted childhood
Ed. note: This did not run this week. Instead of losing it, however, I figured I'd post it online.
OLD TOWN — This column is brought to you today by the letter E and the number 9.
Childhood memories can be fickle things sometimes. Little things, like trips to the zoo or little league baseball, are remembered as being a lot more important than they were. Cartoons and children shows, meanwhile, are somehow remembered as being so much better than you originally thought too.
It was a notion that hit me like Stretch Armstrong slapping me across the face the other day as I watched episodes from the first season of Fraggle Rock on DVD. I remembered that show being one of my favorites growing up, and I thought watching them again I’d get a good laugh out of it.
Instead, I wondered how my generation made it to adulthood without any semblance of sanity remaining after watching these shows— and how I never noticed until now how the Fraggles must have been located in Minnesota given their thick Fargo-styled accent.
I was seriously concerned. I kept asking myself, “What did I learn watching my childhood TV shows?” This thought flooded my mind as I kept watched those goofy looking puppets bounce along the screen during the pilot episode of Fraggle Rock. It was supposed to be a show about world peace. That’s what the DVD box stated, at least. I’m not sure if that was what anyone got from it though.
It appeared that the show taught me only to eat construction pilings and to swing from vines from one cave to the next with no consequences whatsoever when you crashed against the far wall of the cave other than a nasty case of being cross-eyed.
Oh, that, and to always take advice from a singing trash heap.
Add to that, I grew up on cartoons like G.I. Joe, Voltron, Thundercats, He-Man and that strange show Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers (I always was the red one when my friends and I played Power Rangers on the playground) — shows that basically coupled fantasy-like battles with teamwork (and sadly, overly-tight clothing). At least there were those public service announcements at the end of G.I. Joe episodes telling kids not to play next to downed power lines and don’t drink poison that taught me something useful or those hours in front of the TV as a child may have been a complete waste.
Granted not all the cartoons growing up were as strange as this. There were truly educational shows like Sesame Street that went a long way to teaching us about our ABCs, numbers and crabby people only live in garbage cans.
The cartoons helped keep us innocent as children as well. They shielded us from the troubles our parents were going through, like Cold War fears, tough economic times and those 1980 trends that would have seriously stunted our mental growth.
However, I always thought I got more from all those hours of TV cartoons than just a good laugh and getting the Fraggle Rock theme song stuck in my head. After watching the show again 20 years later, I’ve come to the conclusion that maybe I’m wrong.
Then again, I did make it out of the 1980s with only good memories and few mental scars. So maybe the shows did their job after all.
Now if I could only get the Fraggle Rock theme song from getting stuck in my head again.
“Dance your cares away/Worries for another day/Let the music play/Down on Fraggle Rock.”
OLD TOWN — This column is brought to you today by the letter E and the number 9.
Childhood memories can be fickle things sometimes. Little things, like trips to the zoo or little league baseball, are remembered as being a lot more important than they were. Cartoons and children shows, meanwhile, are somehow remembered as being so much better than you originally thought too.
It was a notion that hit me like Stretch Armstrong slapping me across the face the other day as I watched episodes from the first season of Fraggle Rock on DVD. I remembered that show being one of my favorites growing up, and I thought watching them again I’d get a good laugh out of it.
Instead, I wondered how my generation made it to adulthood without any semblance of sanity remaining after watching these shows— and how I never noticed until now how the Fraggles must have been located in Minnesota given their thick Fargo-styled accent.
I was seriously concerned. I kept asking myself, “What did I learn watching my childhood TV shows?” This thought flooded my mind as I kept watched those goofy looking puppets bounce along the screen during the pilot episode of Fraggle Rock. It was supposed to be a show about world peace. That’s what the DVD box stated, at least. I’m not sure if that was what anyone got from it though.
It appeared that the show taught me only to eat construction pilings and to swing from vines from one cave to the next with no consequences whatsoever when you crashed against the far wall of the cave other than a nasty case of being cross-eyed.
Oh, that, and to always take advice from a singing trash heap.
Add to that, I grew up on cartoons like G.I. Joe, Voltron, Thundercats, He-Man and that strange show Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers (I always was the red one when my friends and I played Power Rangers on the playground) — shows that basically coupled fantasy-like battles with teamwork (and sadly, overly-tight clothing). At least there were those public service announcements at the end of G.I. Joe episodes telling kids not to play next to downed power lines and don’t drink poison that taught me something useful or those hours in front of the TV as a child may have been a complete waste.
Granted not all the cartoons growing up were as strange as this. There were truly educational shows like Sesame Street that went a long way to teaching us about our ABCs, numbers and crabby people only live in garbage cans.
The cartoons helped keep us innocent as children as well. They shielded us from the troubles our parents were going through, like Cold War fears, tough economic times and those 1980 trends that would have seriously stunted our mental growth.
However, I always thought I got more from all those hours of TV cartoons than just a good laugh and getting the Fraggle Rock theme song stuck in my head. After watching the show again 20 years later, I’ve come to the conclusion that maybe I’m wrong.
Then again, I did make it out of the 1980s with only good memories and few mental scars. So maybe the shows did their job after all.
Now if I could only get the Fraggle Rock theme song from getting stuck in my head again.
“Dance your cares away/Worries for another day/Let the music play/Down on Fraggle Rock.”
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Hurry up and wait
DOVER-FOXCROFT — Maine, like any northern state, can tell the change of the seasons by two things: the leaves begin to bloom on the trees, and the bright orange construction barrels return to the streets.
Nowhere has this been more evident in Piscataquis County than on the .75-mile stretch of West Main Street in Dover-Foxcroft, where construction crews are working to replace the water main, the services to the houses and businesses, as well as replace the crumbling street with a new road bed.
When this project finishes in October, it will be a welcome sight for motorists in the area (that being said, motorists will be left to contend with the other side of Route 15 — from Foxbrook Variety to the Charlotte White Center — being torn up as well).
However, until West Main Street is finally repaved, people will have to deal with long waiting lines on either end of the construction as flaggers dictate who is going through the obstacle course. Does anyone else find it odd that flaggers have become the most powerful people in Dover-Foxcroft in a matter of mere months?
On any given day, it is these flaggers that can have logging trucks, cars, buses and semis backed up from the Foxcroft Academy tennis courts all the way to McDonalds and beyond. That alone is the same length of the construction zone, if not longer.
Yet, I’ve noticed during my multiple trips through there that everyone seems to be taking the construction in stride. No one is ever yelling at the flaggers, honking their horns or being downright irritable and making an unpleasant time even more unbearable.
Last Friday on my way back into Dover-Foxcroft, I got stuck in the backed-up line at 3:25 p.m. at the east entrance of McDonalds and was forced to wait my turn to meander my way past the yellow and gray Volvo front-end loaders and excavators. Here were the rest of my thoughts as I waited.
3:28 p.m.: West Main Street turned into a three-lane road as a car decided the right shoulder would now become the second eastbound lane. Where it ended up is beyond me. I was hoping to see it slid into the ditch and stuck.
3:31 p.m.: A white Chevrolet pick-up truck is turning the old video game Frogger into a real-life event, as he hops from the McDonalds driveway to Brothers Chevy, and from there to A.E. Robinson’s gas station in between on-coming traffic. Out of nowhere, another truck pulled out of A.E. Robinson shortly before the white Chevy got there. No collision, but the second driver looks none too pleased at the ignorance of the driver in the white Chevrolet.
3:32 p.m.: Line moved for the first time. I made it up to the eastern entrance at the A.E. Robinson gas station. The truck is now back in park.
3:34 p.m.: I don’t know how an emergency vehicle would make it through the construction, even with the lights and sirens. And what about the volunteer firefighters in the surrounding towns that might be stuck in that mess? If a call goes out that they are needed at the station, how do they get through that mess?
3:36 p.m.: The white Chevrolet makes another move, this time from A.E. Robinson all the way to Foxcroft Academy. It’s people like that, the impatient ones, that make me the most irate. Just wait in line people and take your time.
3:37 p.m.: Movement yet again.
3:39 p.m.: I was four cars away from making it through the construction. Instead, the flaggers stopped the line just short at the FA tennis courts. The truck is yet again back in park.
3:45 p.m.: I take that back. There’s three signs to summer. Blooming trees, construction cones and the sound of a Harley Davidson roaring down the street.
3:47 p.m.: More movement!
3:49 p.m.: I made it to the three-way intersection of Main Street and North Avenue. Total time in the construction was 24 minutes.
4:13 p.m.: In the same amount of time it took me to go 1.5 miles from McDonalds to the Main Street/North Avenue intersection, I traveled 23 miles to the intersection of Routes 221 and 43 just north of Hudson. Hopefully I remember not to take Route 15 home this fall when construction starts up on the east side of town.
Nowhere has this been more evident in Piscataquis County than on the .75-mile stretch of West Main Street in Dover-Foxcroft, where construction crews are working to replace the water main, the services to the houses and businesses, as well as replace the crumbling street with a new road bed.
When this project finishes in October, it will be a welcome sight for motorists in the area (that being said, motorists will be left to contend with the other side of Route 15 — from Foxbrook Variety to the Charlotte White Center — being torn up as well).
However, until West Main Street is finally repaved, people will have to deal with long waiting lines on either end of the construction as flaggers dictate who is going through the obstacle course. Does anyone else find it odd that flaggers have become the most powerful people in Dover-Foxcroft in a matter of mere months?
On any given day, it is these flaggers that can have logging trucks, cars, buses and semis backed up from the Foxcroft Academy tennis courts all the way to McDonalds and beyond. That alone is the same length of the construction zone, if not longer.
Yet, I’ve noticed during my multiple trips through there that everyone seems to be taking the construction in stride. No one is ever yelling at the flaggers, honking their horns or being downright irritable and making an unpleasant time even more unbearable.
Last Friday on my way back into Dover-Foxcroft, I got stuck in the backed-up line at 3:25 p.m. at the east entrance of McDonalds and was forced to wait my turn to meander my way past the yellow and gray Volvo front-end loaders and excavators. Here were the rest of my thoughts as I waited.
3:28 p.m.: West Main Street turned into a three-lane road as a car decided the right shoulder would now become the second eastbound lane. Where it ended up is beyond me. I was hoping to see it slid into the ditch and stuck.
3:31 p.m.: A white Chevrolet pick-up truck is turning the old video game Frogger into a real-life event, as he hops from the McDonalds driveway to Brothers Chevy, and from there to A.E. Robinson’s gas station in between on-coming traffic. Out of nowhere, another truck pulled out of A.E. Robinson shortly before the white Chevy got there. No collision, but the second driver looks none too pleased at the ignorance of the driver in the white Chevrolet.
3:32 p.m.: Line moved for the first time. I made it up to the eastern entrance at the A.E. Robinson gas station. The truck is now back in park.
3:34 p.m.: I don’t know how an emergency vehicle would make it through the construction, even with the lights and sirens. And what about the volunteer firefighters in the surrounding towns that might be stuck in that mess? If a call goes out that they are needed at the station, how do they get through that mess?
3:36 p.m.: The white Chevrolet makes another move, this time from A.E. Robinson all the way to Foxcroft Academy. It’s people like that, the impatient ones, that make me the most irate. Just wait in line people and take your time.
3:37 p.m.: Movement yet again.
3:39 p.m.: I was four cars away from making it through the construction. Instead, the flaggers stopped the line just short at the FA tennis courts. The truck is yet again back in park.
3:45 p.m.: I take that back. There’s three signs to summer. Blooming trees, construction cones and the sound of a Harley Davidson roaring down the street.
3:47 p.m.: More movement!
3:49 p.m.: I made it to the three-way intersection of Main Street and North Avenue. Total time in the construction was 24 minutes.
4:13 p.m.: In the same amount of time it took me to go 1.5 miles from McDonalds to the Main Street/North Avenue intersection, I traveled 23 miles to the intersection of Routes 221 and 43 just north of Hudson. Hopefully I remember not to take Route 15 home this fall when construction starts up on the east side of town.
The dusty guitar in the corner
At one time in my life I told myself I was going to learn how to play the guitar. I was all fired up about the idea after I got an acoustic Alvarez guitar — with that classic light-colored wood look on the outside — for Christmas three years ago.
For about a month, I would pick up the guitar pick when I had some free time and strum whatever came to mind. I taught myself how to play the Star Spangled Banner, the beginning to the song “Unforgiven” by Metallica and the intros to a few AC/DC songs.
Since then, the Alvarez has stood in the corner of my living room, collecting more dust than the book shelf does on which the guitar rests upon.
Picking up the guitar isn’t my only failed attempt at expanding my horizons. There’s also that set of roller skates in the back shed that I wore once, the countless non-fiction books I swore I’d read to enlighten myself — only to put them on the shelf and never touch again, and the tennis racquet on the porch that I only recently picked up again. And that’s only naming the things I can think of. Who knows what other projects I tried taking on and have forgotten about.
The kicker with all these bright ideas of mine is, well, they’re not easy things to do. Every time I try to read those non-fiction books on anything from pre-Soviet Russian history to the current Iraq war, I fall asleep within 20 pages. The roller skates force me to use muscles I haven’t used in a long time, plus the roads are so rough around my apartment that I would be better off just running anyway.
Tennis — don’t get me started on that sport. Why is it, if I try to rocket a tennis ball across the net that I end up smacking the tennis ball into the net, but if I lob it over gently just to get the ball over, I get the ball rocketed back at my feet. There’s no in between!
It’s easy in life to fall into a rut and become complacent with how things are. With the long drives to work, long hours at work or everything else, the last thing many of us want to do is pick up a new hobby or learn a new trait.
The thing is, it’s good for us to challenge ourselves every once in a while. Our minds are always looking for something new to dig into, whether it’s a new sport, new book or new hobby.
At least that’s what I told myself when I picked up the guitar the other day and tried to re-tune the guitar and start again with my lessons. Halfway into tuning the B string, however, I turned the tuning key too far and broke the string. Now the guitar is back in its customary place along the wall, this time with a string dangling down from its neck on to the floor.
Maybe it’s a sign the guitar isn’t for me. I wonder what’ll happen when I pick up that Russian history book.
For about a month, I would pick up the guitar pick when I had some free time and strum whatever came to mind. I taught myself how to play the Star Spangled Banner, the beginning to the song “Unforgiven” by Metallica and the intros to a few AC/DC songs.
Since then, the Alvarez has stood in the corner of my living room, collecting more dust than the book shelf does on which the guitar rests upon.
Picking up the guitar isn’t my only failed attempt at expanding my horizons. There’s also that set of roller skates in the back shed that I wore once, the countless non-fiction books I swore I’d read to enlighten myself — only to put them on the shelf and never touch again, and the tennis racquet on the porch that I only recently picked up again. And that’s only naming the things I can think of. Who knows what other projects I tried taking on and have forgotten about.
The kicker with all these bright ideas of mine is, well, they’re not easy things to do. Every time I try to read those non-fiction books on anything from pre-Soviet Russian history to the current Iraq war, I fall asleep within 20 pages. The roller skates force me to use muscles I haven’t used in a long time, plus the roads are so rough around my apartment that I would be better off just running anyway.
Tennis — don’t get me started on that sport. Why is it, if I try to rocket a tennis ball across the net that I end up smacking the tennis ball into the net, but if I lob it over gently just to get the ball over, I get the ball rocketed back at my feet. There’s no in between!
It’s easy in life to fall into a rut and become complacent with how things are. With the long drives to work, long hours at work or everything else, the last thing many of us want to do is pick up a new hobby or learn a new trait.
The thing is, it’s good for us to challenge ourselves every once in a while. Our minds are always looking for something new to dig into, whether it’s a new sport, new book or new hobby.
At least that’s what I told myself when I picked up the guitar the other day and tried to re-tune the guitar and start again with my lessons. Halfway into tuning the B string, however, I turned the tuning key too far and broke the string. Now the guitar is back in its customary place along the wall, this time with a string dangling down from its neck on to the floor.
Maybe it’s a sign the guitar isn’t for me. I wonder what’ll happen when I pick up that Russian history book.
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