PRESIDENT'S DAY

GEORGE WASHINGTON

ABRAHAM LINCOLN

Tuesday, 8:15 AM.  Twenty eight degrees F at the ferry dock, 26 on the back porch.  Wind W, calm with occasional light gusts  The sky is overcast and the humidity 89%.  The barometer is at 29,86" and rising.  We got a surprise 3+" of new snow yesterday evening around dinner time.  It was not predicted, and everything is covered again with a fresh coat of powder.

   I went to the IGA in Washburn yesterday around four o'clock, and noticed that there were at least a dozen vehicles parked at the end of Friendly Valley Road at the beach.  There were also numerous fishing tents out on the ice there, which is near the mouth of the Sioux River.  The ice had not been sound enough on the upper reaches of the Bay for much ice fishing activity.  When I returned a half hour later there was only one vehicle and one tent.  Either the fish weren't biting or they all had strict instructions from their wives to be home for dinner.  They must have been the Holiday variety of fishermen, as Real Fishermen don't pay any attention to either factor.

   On the same trip I spotted a huge bald eagle perched in a tree that overhung Hwy. 13.  By the time I turned back to take a photo it was gone.

   Since yesterday was President's Day, which celebrates both Washington and Lincoln's birthdays, I will comment on two good biographies I have read this past year:  

   Killing Lincoln, by Bill O'Rielly and Martin Duguard, is excellent history, and reads like a fast-paced detective novel.  It is a quick, excellent read, with much historical detail that will be new to many readers.  It is the way to teach history.  

   Washington, a Life, by award winning historian Ron Chernow, at over 800 pages is a rather exhaustive biography, but extremely interesting and detailed, and elucidates all the experiences and traits that made Washington the "indispensable man" that he was to the revolution, the adoption of the Constitution and the establishment of the United States as a nation.

   A number of years ago I had the privilege of spending some time in Washington, DC, for a week  each of  several years on business.  I was still running  early every morning and would run the National Mall, past the Washington Monument, the Jefferson Memorial and the Vietnam Memorial and would stop for a breather at the Lincoln Memorial, where I would sit on the steps and watch the sun come up, its rays reflected in the water of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool. 

   I have never felt more connected to the nation and its turbulent history than at those times, and it filled me with deep emotion to see the lagoon, the mall and all the monuments and memorials in the peace and quiet of a new morning.