Easter, 2011; and School Budget Decisions

Sunday, April 24, 2011. Easter Sunday. It's been one of those spring days that live up to the season's 'flowers that bloom in the spring, tra-la' reputation: clear blue sky, not all that cool, and enough breeze to keep smoke out of my eyes when I grilled burgers this noon.


Palm Sunday in Our Lady of the Angels church. With - what else? - palms. April 17, 2011.

There's been more greenery in Our Lady of the Angels church, where I go, than any other season - except for Christmas. Palm Sunday's the most spectacular, in its own way, with those palm - leaves? fronds? whatever you call those shrub-size things.


Easter Sunday in Our Lady of the Angels Church: Not so much green, but a whole lot of lilies. April 24, 2011.

This week's Sauk Centre Herald's front page story was "Sauk Centre school board hears more public input on budget cut proposals." I gather that, one way or another, there isn't going to be as much money available for the public school: and none of the options are particularly fun. Aside from state and national economics, I gather that there just aren't as many students in the schools as there were a few years ago.

One of the cost-cutting ideas is to cut some administrative positions. My opinion is that I'm glad I'm not the one having to make the hard decisions. One set of folks or another is going to be displeased, no matter what, I suspect.

Also in the online Herald is a short piece about Main Street Gallery - a new business. I haven't been out for, well, a few weeks: so that's news to me.

Now that it's warming up, I gotta get out more.

April Showers: Minnesota Style

Sunday, April 17, 2011. I see I missed last week's entry. Sorry about that. Today is Palm Sunday, the beginning of Holy Week - and snow is off the ground. Again.

I'm not complaining: in a way, we're getting spring twice this year. The first week of April was bright, cheery, warm - and saw the street sweeper roaring by, giving the pavement a good scrub and rinse.


A sign of spring in Sauk Centre: the street sweeper roaring by. April 6, 2011.

Then, this week, we got our April showers. Snow showers: rain, frozen stuff, and finally snow.


April showers - Minnesota style. April 16, 2011.

I like living in Minnesota, where our weather isn't the same familiar routine, year after year.

Not Quite a Foot of Snow, and Why I'm Distracted

Sunday, April 3, 2011. I see in the Sauk Center Herald that we got around eight or 10 inches of snow this week. It looks like more, but that probably has to do with drifting.

The snow won't be around for long. Probably. This is Minnesota, after all: we had no snow in March last year, quite a bit this year, and there was that April 5-April 7, 2008 storm. ("Very Heavy Snow of April 5 - April 7, 2008" (Minnesota Climatology Working Group, State Climatology Office - DNR Division of Ecological and Water Resources University of Minnesota)) Whatever else can be said about Minnesota's climate: it's not boring.

I took some photos of drifts outside my back door that didn't make it into last week's entry. Those are in the Sauk Centre Journal's blog: " 'Spring is Here!' - More Photos," Sauk Centre Journal Blog (March 27, 2011).

That's all for today. I've been a bit distracted: #2 daughter and my son-in-law had a lively time yesterday afternoon, when a car caught fire in their garage.(" 'It was Only a Small Fire'," Through One Dad's Eye (April 2, 2011)) They're okay, and so - thanks to quick thinking, cool heads, and a logging chain - is the house. Still, I've been a bit distracted. Which I wrote before.

Time to stop for the day: goodnight, all!