Sunday, September 23rd, 2007

Welcome to the wonderful world of GrandpaHoward's Chronicle. Why you probably wonder is it so wonderful, well, when I was a little boy in the early 40's, that is 1940's, we would read Dick Tracy magazines, and he had this wristwatch he could talk into like a telephone, and he could transmit pictures to someone else with it.

We were also treated to the space age, when someone built a rocket and sent man to the moon and the vista's beyond. Does this sound anything at all like what is happening today? So, its no wonder that I say wonderful! wonderful!

Not a whole lot has happened since my post on the 17th, or say earth shattering, except for some major earthquakes in Indonesia. A typhoon off the coast of China, that my son said they felt the effects of there. He and wife and two sons are picking up grandchild #7, Grace and should be home a week from now. She is a cutie and as soon as she is safely home, will post a picture of her.

It was a beautiful cloud cover this morning, as I took my mile walk before breakfast, well before my first cup of coffee and Bible reading. The sun was up and highlighting the edges of the clouds even though you could not see the sun. If you wonder why this is exciting to me, its because I read from Gods Word that He is in the clouds, He is in the wind, and He put into space the sun, moon and stars. As I gazed into the night sky back in Iowa, the Big Dipper was exactly where it was 70 years ago when I used to look to the North where I was sure to find it. It hasn't changed its position. However viewing it from Portland, the stars appear to be in a different place, and of course that is because I am 2000 plus miles West from the Iowa viewpoint.

Would like to read somewhere what the Big Dipper looks like from outer space, say the space station. If anyone has a answer for that, please let me know.

Another thing I'd like your help on, when or if you print out my blog, are any of the letters at the end of the line cut off? When I read Michael's blog (see Aug 16th, for blog address) and print it out, there are times that the letters are missing on the right edge of the post. I don't know that I am doing anything different than what they do. Any solutions? You can email me at Howardonna@aol.com just put in the subject line, Blog answer. And I will thank you in advance for your help.

I see in my last Blog that I kept referring to Rottenburg, Germany, my error, it should have been Rothenburg. I find that my dictionary gets used quite a bit as I come upon a word that I haven't spelled before or not quite sure of. The word on my last blog was plaque, and because I was trying to spell it with a "placque" I could never find it in the dictionary, so I substituted the word picture for the example. I needed my brother Harold to proof read these little missals. And if you look up that word, you'll see that it is improperly used, I need a different word such as epistle, and its not exactly the word I want there either.

I mentioned in the last blog the hummingbird moth, will put a picture of it on his blog, so you can see how similar it looks to a bird. Well, there you have it, and if you enlarge it, you can see its antenna sticking out of his head.

See in today's Oregonian that they are looking for writers for their opinion page. Now I always have an opinion, and sometimes express it in ways that you might not want to know about, but I think I'll apply and see if I am accepted for a 3 month trial period. My vocal grammar isn't always the best, but when I put something down in writing, print it out and make changes, the written grammar seems okay, at least to me. Will try it and see what happens.

I have written several articles that was published under the title of "Saurberries", I have some 25 stories written out that could be published someday in a little book, titled, "saurberries". Want to know why that title, ask me.

Am going to close for this Sunday afternoon. Will try and get back before the week is out.

Cherrio.

Gpa Howard

Friday, September 14th, 2007, and here I am way behind in my post. Daily, as I open my e-mail, read it, either save it, print it or delete it, I also go the the Blogs that are posted periodically to read the latest from my friends. And, when there are no new post posted, I'm disapointed, so with this post, I hope to bring you up to date on what I have been doing.

As you can see in this picture, I've been with a lot of very fine people. This is my family, brothers and sisters, cousins, and friends of my fathers family that I love and enjoy being around. We gathered 40-50 strong on Labor Day, and this picture was taken the next day right after a hearty breakfast, and just before we seperated to go our way back home. I'm that guy with my head almost in the tree branches on the top left. Its an okay picture and captures the faces of my kin.

We spent nearly 10 days away from home, and this time in Iowa had bearable weather, not like we encountered 2 years ago, when temperatures and humidity was high. Only one day this time that was uncomfortable. One day was spent with my kin traveling up towards Dubuque to eat at a family restaurant in Balltown, called Breitbachs Country Dining. To my amazement, over our table was a picture of a famous spot in Rottenburg, Germany with this familys name under it.

After questioning the waitress, who didn't know why this picture was there, a few moments later a very nice gentleman came to answer my questions. I find out he had just returned from Rottenburg that week, and his family has owned land around 10 km from Rottenburg since around 1560. Wow, that blows me away. I shared that it is one of our favorite towns in Germany and hope to see it again next summer. As we left, he reached over and shook my hand warmly. I hope to see him again some day in Balltown.

On the way to Balltown we stopped at a fish hatchery, and there among the thousands of trout were several large fish which I took to be catfish, only to learn a few minutes later from the htchery personnel that these big fish were sturgeon. I thought we had them all here in Oregon and Washington. Another stop at a Botanical garden, where I saw, I thought some baby humming birds. Showed one of my pictures of it to Donna who informed me it was actually a hummingbird moth. Sure enough, a search of Google turned out the same type creature. And, if you think about it, when ever did you ever see antenna on a hummingbird? Moths have them and fly just like a hummingbird.

Well, its now well into the morning, better see if there isn't something outside that needs my attention, hope all is well with my many friends who I hope are reading this. Tonight is a womens soccer game at the Univ of Portland, which I'll attend with my granddaughter Breanna and neighbor Laura. Then another game Sunday afternoon with Breanna, a friend and Sue. Should be fun.

So, till later, I say "Cherrio"

Howard