The Great Minnesota Get-Together

Candy: We spent this afternoon and evening at the Minnesota State Fair and it really lived up to its name as a great get-together for Minnesotans.

The fair is held each year for about 10 days at the Minnesota State Fairgrounds in St. Paul, just off Snelling and Como.

On our way into the fair, we saw the travel stables for the widely-known Budweiser Clydesdales and had the unique experience of seeing one of the groomers shaving just about every part of the horse, including its boy parts. Yeah. That was compelling.

From there we headed down food alley (my term for it) and Tim began jonesing for anything he could find that was free. As many of you know, he loves to collect free samples of anything. It doesn't matter to him whether it's a pen, hotel shampoo, plastic bags, lotion, or caps. He is non-discriminatory in his approach to freebies and is definitely an equal-opportunity-collector.

Today he set his sights on locating a free writing instrument if at all possible but unfortunately, after five hours of searching he was still without a company logo pen.

We started our gastronomical experience with a vanilla ice cream cone. You can't go to a Midwestern fair and not eat something made of dairy products. It's just not right.

Then we toured some of the livestock barns, starting with the horse barn. We saw some unusual breeds of equines, including the Norwegian Fjord (photo from the web below) and miniature horses, as well as the standard breeds like saddlebred, appaloosa, donkey, and quarterhorse. I grew up with horses, but haven't really been around them since high school, and it was fun to join the other fair-goers in oohing and ahhing over each horse. The sheep barn was next. As we walked through the barn, they were judging some of the animals. Man, the way those sheep owners trim their animals was pretty cool. Imagine a plush rug that is shaped similarly to a hedge (squared off on the sides and rump) but on a living, breathing, baa-ing sheep. It was pretty neat. Also, nearly all the sheep were wearing hoods and blankets. This sheep looked pretty bored with the whole thing, even though the hood brings to mind a modified version of The Silence of the Lambs. I know, bad joke. Afterwards, we headed over to the cattle barn. It was filled mainly with dairy cows, including guernseys, holsteins, and my personal favorite, brown swiss cows. No, they aren't the ones that produce chocolate milk.

While we were in the cattle barn, the MN State Fair Milking Parlor was in operation, and we watched through the glass as cows were led in, put in their stanchions, and milking machines were attached. I didn't know this, but most cows produce about 6-8 gallons of milk each day. Got milk? We saw lots of temporary tattoos with that saying today.

After that we stumbled across the Miracle of Birth exhibit. It was a barn filled with all kinds of incubators, display pens with bleachers, etc. for viewing recently-born animals and poultry. This newborn sheep was especially cute.

There were several sows with 8-10 piglets each. Boy, were they cute. We also saw ewes that had given birth to one, two, or three baby sheep, several newborn calves, some baby bunnies, and even turkey chicks.

It was probably the most-packed exhibit of the fair with tons of baby strollers everywhere. It was like toddler alley, with baby humans (and adults too) watching baby animals and baby animals watching back. We walked for quite a while just looking around at things and trying desperately to find something else free for Tim to put in his (free) U of Minnesota backpack with his (free) WCCO bag. Finally, we came across the Promos on Patch section of the fair, supposedly packed with freebie goodies.

Unfortunately, the only freebie they were passing out while we were there was Spam on a pretzel stick. Tim, so eager to have anything free that he would even eat "spiced ham" as the promoter optimistically called it, happily enjoyed his (free) sample. The other souvenir Tim collected today was a sample of Udderly Smooth balm from the cattle barn. Yep. It was free.

We then rode the sky ride across the fairgrounds. It's a cable car system that you can ride one-way or round-trip, and provides the best view of the fair possible.

We decided it was about time for some more food on a stick. That's something that the fair is known for. You can find just about anything on a stick. Some of the more exotic things we saw today included teriyaki ostrich on a stick, spaghetti & meatballs on a stick, deep-fried candy bars on a stick, of course pickles on a stick, fudge puppies-belgian waffles dunked in chocolate on a stick, and the State-Fair-famous Pronto Pups, (you guessed it-corn dogs on a stick).

Of these items we sampled the pronto pups (as good as I remembered them from my college days) and the fudge puppies, then headed to the Pet Center in hopes that we would find lots of cute puppies and maybe even some kittens.

However, there were only a few dogs around and our favorites (of course) were the two beautiful yellow labs, Banker and Breezer. We decided to sit for 20 minutes or so and wait for the St. Paul Police K-9 unit demonstration. The demonstration included eight beautiful, well-trained German Shepherds and their police partners. Each dog was brought and put through one of four tests that included attacking on the arm, the leg, and general obedience behavior.

It was fun to watch even though the policeman who was on the microphone for the entire demo was impossible to understand. After the demonstration, we decided to support the K-9 foundation by purchasing one of their lovely dog collars for Chase.

On our way out of the fair for the evening, we we trying to determine the best thing to eat to encapsulate our fair experience, and suddenly saw numerous people enjoying roasted corn on the cob. We found out where it was being sold and got an ear each. I think that might have been the best ear of corn I've ever tasted.

"It was good," said Tim.

The last thing we saw before leaving the fairgrounds were the famous Minnesota Dairy Princess butter carvings. Sounds funny, right? Well, it is, kind of.

Somebody sculpts the head & shoulders likeness of each of the dairy princesses from around the state in a 90-pound block of butter. Each likeness is put on a rotating dais kept in a 38-degree-cooled glass booth so that people can observe these temporary dairy sculptures. Only in Minnesota.

All in all, it was a really great day, from the food to the people watching to the walking to the drive home.

Tomorrow, I have a phone interview with that University in Maine and need to try to finish the website I'm helping to develop for a friend back in Ohio.

Tim says, "I'll probably wash and clean the car out for the 3rd time in the past 6 days." He's probably right. Maybe he'll even want to mow the yard.

I've teasesd him a lot in this post, but you all know how much I love him and how much fun we have together. Today was no exception.

If your state has a state fair, we definitely recommend joining the get-together.

Have a great Wednesday.

A Day of Rest

Candy: Today was truly a day of rest. We hung around the house until mid-afternoon or so, then drove to St. Cloud for some much-needed internet time at the B&N.

We're definitely web junkies, and not having access at the house these days is very difficult for us to handle.

One note of interest today: I got an email from the hiring manager at Bowdoin College in Maine. I had applied for their Director of Media Relations position and they want to do a phone interview with me this week. For those of you who aren't familiar with Bowdoin, it's a private liberal arts college to which many of America's best and brightest young academics go for their undergraduate education. The job would be incredible.

I haven't taken many new photos in the past few days, so I went through my files as far back as 2001, when I had my first digital camera, a 1MB Sony Mavica. It was so much fun to use back then, but those files are not really usable at all these days. That's why some of the pictures on today's post are smaller than usual. Oh well, it's fun to go back and look at them.

I love the fireworks photo at the top of the post. It's from a fireworks show at Hiram last summer after the golf outing. I was testing our (then new) pocket point-&-shoot Sony.

This photo is one of my favorite old photos too. I took it in the rundown yard at our Mantua rental house in Ohio. I love the juxtaposition between the garbage barrel and the plethora of flowers surrounding it. This is a really old picture from 2001. I spent a few days that spring driving around Virginia with Chase, visiting places like James Madison University, UVA, and the home of Thomas Jefferson while Tim was at the Division III Final Four in Salem. This is a shot of the blossoming tree-lined drive near James Madison.This next picture is a really old photo, too. During Tim's Fall Break while we were at Grove City in 2001 we made a camping trip to Vermont. This covered bridge with the sumac in the foreground really caught my eye.The last picture in this post is a train parked on the tracks that I used to see every day we drove back and forth between Grove City, PA and Hiram, OH during Tim's first year. I always meant to stop and take a really great photo of it, but we were always either in a hurry or I didn't have the camera with me. Something. At any rate, one day I hurriedly pulled over the side of the road and hopped out to snap this photo.

Something about the worn-out colors of the freight cars, the not-so-pretty pond of water in the foreground, the power lines that are reminiscent of prison bars, and the barren trees really symbolized how we were feeling about working at Hiram and driving so much. Well, as I sit here sipping my Starbucks Strawberries & Cream I have to admit I'm out of material. Guess that's it for tonight. Enjoy your week!

It's Getting Interesting

Candy: Wow. It's been a long time since I've written anything on the blog.

Well, in an effort to catch up, here's what's been going on.

We're still in Albany, Minnesota, and have been here since early July. We never imagined when we set out on this "Pause on Purpose" tour that we'd spend two months in this state. However, that's the reality of our situation.

We are happy in the present and excited about the future.

Tim had an interview for a head coaching position at a junior college in Kansas this week. They decided to offer it to someone else, and Tim had decided after the interview that he would turn it down if offered to him. It just didn't offer enough for us as a family. He is doing really well and is actually getting excited about the possibilities that lie ahead of him outside of coaching.

I took the pictures on this post just outside Highland, Kansas, while Tim was interviewing.

He has had a couple phone interviews with a national company for a position based in Cincinnati and it looks like they're going to fly him out there early next week for a final interview. The company is a great company with lots of offices around the States, and lots of opportunity for both advancement and lucrative earning power.

He has also had a phone interview with another national company for a recruiter position based in the Midwest. His potential boss is flying to Minneapolis in the next 7-10 days to interview Tim for a day, and that position is also interesting.

I have a phone interview for the Director of University Relations position at the University of Maine-Machias next Wednesday.

So things are beginning to move a little bit on the job front. It will be interesting to see what happens and where we end up.

Here are some of the things that we've been doing to keep busy this month:

• Having Monday night "The Closer" parties at my brother Jim's house
• Applying for jobs
• Spending lots of time at the St. Cloud Barnes & Noble
• Walking around the St. Cloud mall
• Spending bits of time with my Mom in Fergus Falls
• Applying for jobs (did I mention that already? :) )
• Driving around between Albany, St. Cloud, Alexandria, Minneapolis/St. Paul, and Fargo
• Taking pictures
• Applying for jobs :)
• Going to movies

It's been a good month, though challenging at times as we've been hammering out some changes in our life philosophies. It's been beneficial, though, because we are both at ease, happy, and excited about whatever lies ahead.

This afternoon we're going to see the movie Invicible. It looks like a really good one with Mark Wahlberg.

Here are some things that we're hoping to do while we're here in Minnesota:

• Spend a day at the Minnesota State Fair. It's one of the best state fairs around, and is known locally as "The Great Minnesota Get-Together"
• Have an end-of-the-season "The Closer" party at Jim and Katy's on Monday
• Interview for and secure two great jobs
• Spend a day with my brother Clint and his family near Fargo
• Take Chase swimming in the Sauk River again
• Avoid the heavy thunderstorms and tornadoes that have been rolling through this part of the state lately
• Spend an afternoon with my grandpa in southern Minnesota (he's having some health problems)
• Eat some great food and sleep in as long as possible every day that we have left on this "tour"

That's about it. Our internet connection has dribbled off into nonexistence, so we're relegated to hanging out at the Panera or Barnes & Noble.

Have a great weekend.

Nature, Time, and Patience: Five Months Later...

Tim: The other day, Candy and I went to the local Panera Bread location to have a bowl of soup and a sandwich for lunch. Candy ordered a Jones Soda to drink and under the cap of the soda was a quote that struck us both. The quote is from H.G. Bohn, a famous British publisher from the 19th century:

Nature, time and patience are the three great physicians.

In addition, I thought the picture above fits the journey we have been on since March 13th.

Nature: During this “Pause on Purpose” trip, the places that struck a cord with us most were the places out west that were naturally beautiful. Places like the Rocky Mountains of Colorado, the ancient ruins of the Chacoan people of New Mexico, the Hill country of West Central Texas, and the Oregon coastline and forests are just a few of these incredible natural wonders.

These areas inspired us to continue on this journey called life knowing that something great could be around the corner awaiting us. We can certainly understand what Bohn meant by nature being a great physician.

Time: As of today, we have been out on our great adventure for five months. In this time, we have logged over 20,000 miles in our 2003 Honda Element, been to 19 states, and spent a lot of time thinking about each other and the future.

We have also thought about the things/places that made us unhappy in the past. Ben Stein, who we have spoken about before in the blog postings, quoted in his book “How Successful People Win” the following about taking time: “when you’re wounded, let it bleed for a while. Even the hardiest cowboy cannot just spring to his feet after he gets knocked down by a crazed bronco.” We were hurt, have bled for a while and time has healed our wounds. We can certainly understand what Bohn meant by time being a great physician.

Patience: During the past five months, we have gained some patience and openness to a new experience, although I would say Candy is way ahead of me in both of these areas. We have been blessed with the opportunity to start over with our lives right now and that is something that most people never get to do. Like it or not, we have to be patient because something good could be just around the corner.

However, it has been tough to be patient when so many resumes and job applications have been sent out with little or no effect; when a job gets ripped from your hands for reasons we still do not understand; or when you look to transition into another career field and you have to start over at ground level despite the experience you gained in your other career field.

We have read a ton during this trip. I read a book on visualization while we were in Pueblo and came across the word Satori, a Zen term for enlightenment. The word literally means "to understand" or deep, lasting enlightenment. Satori can be found in every moment of life; it is wrapped in all daily activities with its goal to unwrap them to truly understand.

It is sometimes loosely used interchangeably with Kensho, but Kensho refers to an "awakening", a clear glimpse of the true nature of creation (example: we may think of a baby when it first walks. After much effort, it stands upright, finds its balance and walks a few steps (kensho), then falls). Then an example of satori: after continued effort the child will one day find that it is able to walk all the time (satori).

What I want from our lives is to be “enlightened” like a child. They never think about falling, they just barrel through their life, learn as they go, and do not even think about failure, just enlightenment. Patience would not be issue for us as adults if we just lived life in this way. Maybe, to an extent, Candy and I have been looking for this for nearly 11 years of marriage. I believe most people look for it their entire lives.

Personally, I think what Bohn said about patience being a great physician may not be felt by us for some time, but it will be felt. Even in the toughest of situations, I have learned through this experience that patience might be the greatest trait to have (other than faith, of course).

What the future holds for us we really can not be sure. However, we do have goals and dreams still and with those you can go almost anywhere.

Five months ago, we left on a trip that we thought could be a very short trip. Instead, I believe that we will continue on this “Pause on Purpose” trip for the rest of our life. We stopped our other trip to begin another one on March 13, 2006. I don’t think that we have ever made a better decision in our life.

As has been the case since we started blogging, we will keep you informed about where we are heading. We hope you had a great weekend!

Parades and Candy and Fireworks, Oh My!

Candy: Today Tim conducted a mock interview to help a colleague and friend prepare for an interview in New Mexico.

The interview took place in Mayer, Minnesota, which is about 30 miles due west of Minneapolis, and approximately an hour and 45 minutes from Albany.

As Tim says, "it was a lot of winding roads!" However, the "interview" went well and Tim said he definitely would have hired the guy if it had been a real interview.

Today was Heritage Day, the town's annual festival, in Albany. We took our camping chairs and set them up on the main street through town, which is almost a block from our house.

The town was packed. Usually it's a sleepy little town with very few people around and even fewer cars, especially in the evenings.

Not tonight.

We estimated that several thousand people turned out for the parade, which started at 7pm (in my mind, the perfect time for a parade...beautiful light, great temperatures).

The parade was really good and lasted an hour and a half. You have to understand. Albany is a small town of 1,818 residents, and we usually don't see many of them until late at night when they head to one of the three bars in town (our favorite is Paul's Par-o-dice, because of the name).

The theme of the parade was "Movies and More!" and we saw floats featuring the Pirates of the Caribbean, Field of Dreams, and at least three floats featuring the Wizard of Oz (hence the not-so-subtle reference in tonight's title).

At any rate, the parade was really fun, especially the loads of candy thrown out from each float by little boys and girls with strong arms who usually managed to pelt someone sitting on the curb with handfuls of Tootsie Rolls, Super Bubble gum, and Mr. Freezies.

Of course, the Shriners on their little go-karts were great, and Tim kept saying to me, "I don't know how they don't run into each other. I'd crash if I tried to do what they do!"

Additionally, it seemed that the royalty from each of the towns in a 20-mile radius of Albany were present at the parade, riding on the backs of top-down convertibles (of course) and each waving with what appeared to be a very painful motion at the crowd lining the streets.

Tim and I both found ourselves hoping that we could be a part of a small community again just so that we could fully participate in the neighborly activities that we witnessed tonight.

The pictures on tonight's post are all from the parade, and I guess you can tell I was experimenting with motion and angles. They make me smile, and I hope they make you do the same. This one is a heavily-Photoshopped photo of the back of an old lawn chair.
After the parade, we packed up our chairs and walked back to the house, where we hung out for an hour or so before walking back through downtown to the Seven Dolors Catholic church to see the fireworks promised to begin at dusk over the golf course.

The show was good, lasting 15-20 minutes, and we saw some fireworks that we hadn't seen before, particularly one that seemed to drape down and down through the night sky toward the ground before finally being extinguished. The finale was very good, too, and it was a nice finish to the Heritage Day activities.

Our own finale to the night was a stop at Applebee's in St. Cloud for appetizers and dessert. Well, maybe that's not today's final finale (how's that for redundancy?), but at least it's one I can mention on this blog.
Tomorrow it seems Albany will put on a town-wide bazaar and so we will probably venture out into it for a little activity and sightseeing as well.

This past week or so I read several books that belonged to my sister-in-law's mom, mostly out of desperation for something to do while we're at the house and when Tim's on the computer.

I read two books by Minnesota author Lorna Landvik (Angry Housewives Eating Bon Bons and Patty Jane's House of Curl), a little Walt Whitman, of course Anne Morrow Lindbergh's Gift from the Sea, and am now wading through Russell Baker's book titled Growing Up (kind of boring in my opinion--and you'll see if you click the link that people are now trying to sell their used copies for 1 penny!).

Well, that's all for today.

Here's hoping that you have the chance to get out and see a small-town summer parade. Enjoy the rest of your weekend.

Enough, already!

Tim: As we walked again tonight in Albany, it occurred to us that maybe we should just say enough and let it all go…”We give up, Lord! Whatever happens let it happen!” We've tried everything else...what else is there to do?

We believe in ourselves and have worked hard to make it in our career paths; for me, it has been in teaching and coaching, while for Candy, it has been a lot of varied things. We have sacrificed a lot for this crazy dream of mine to be a coach. We have both picked ourselves off the floor many times in the last 11 years and tried again. Sometimes I feel like we are one with the floor.

I guess we have finally come to grips with what the reality is for us. Candy and I feel that we need to move forward with our lives and find other opportunities for employment.

I often read this poem that the great coach, John Wooden, got from a teacher in school growing up in Indiana:

At God’s footstool to confess,
A poor soul knelt and bowed his head.
"I failed.” He cried. The Master said,
"Thou didst thy best, that is success.”

The bottom line: if you’ve given all you can, that is all you can do. No one can or will ever take anything away from us; we truly gave everything we could and that is all anyone ever asks of a person.

I have been fighting for something better for so long and have made a lot of mistakes along the way. I want to believe that hard work and dreams make things possible. However, lately everything I have tried has gone unnoticed or has been ripped from my clenched fists. I feel as though I could apply for any job in this world and not be considered.

What do I know about anything outside of sport? Not a whole lot. However, I think a few of my skills will transfer over to whatever I have to do. We have struggled to achieve since we both graduated from college, but the one thing we have always done is survive. We will survive again.

What it really came down to (giving up on the dream) was an opportunity to be something more than what we have been- content with our situation no matter what. The ultimate challenge now is to make the attempt to improve and be the best we can be in the existing conditions.

Who knows? Tomorrow could be a day of absolute jubilation for us both. In the past, I thought only about the future, not the present. As for me now, I will stick to the present. The future is just that and, as we both found out through the Academy disappointment, it certainly is not guaranteed. If tomorrow brings great news or if we have another incredible adventure (I have a feeling that is coming up very soon, whether we like it or not), you will know on the blog.

Thanks to those of you who have been reading these postings. Today, as we headed down to the Twin Cities area, we drove by two truckloads of piglets. I took the photo at the beginning of the post and Candy did her Photoshop magic to make it really come to life. You can get this shot and many more at http://blog.candyrice.com/ or by clicking the "Seatbelt Sign is Off" link at the right.

Have a great day and pray that we live in the present.