The New Codgers

“Good morning Jay,” Carl greeted as I sat down at our usual table by the front plate glass window in the Cyber-Café with my porcelain, not China (but made in China) or stoneware Codger Collectible Mug™ filled precariously full of organically & shade-grown, fair trade, Guatemalan-Roast coffee, “I hear you’ve been running around with that new camera of yours shooting things.”

“Why yes,” I answered, “yes I have.”

“Do you have that dangerous weapon with you?” Harold asked, and then continued, “I hope you’ll leave it in its case, ‘cause the sign on the door says ‘No Weapons Allowed’.”

“It’s new,” Medford, as usual stirring cream & sugar pollutants into his coffee said, “he doesn’t want to take your pictures.”

“Are you suggesting,” Fred asked, looking up from his ever-present Pioneer Press newspaper, “that we are not worthy of being photographed?”

“Nope, not at all,” Medford replied with a wide smile, “you coots a just flat too ugly, and would terrorize our Gentle Readers.”

“Not only that,” I added, “it might actually break my new camera to so much as point it in your direction!”

“OK then,” Carl said, “now that you’ve established that you don’t want to share our god-like handsomeness with our Gentle Readers, do you have any photos to share?”

“Take a peek.”

Jay, Medford & the Codgers 

…and Other Ramblings:

As Medford, the irrepressible Daisy Dog, and I (“Boomer” is, as always, inside, glued to his computer), gather on the deck of Boomer’s 148-year-old back porch, it is +26ºF, with a light breeze making it feel like +20ºF, snowing—ever so lightly, it is comfortable enough for us to enjoy our porcelain, not China, but made in China, Codger Collectible Mugs™ (this month’s limited edition of the mugs disappears on Wednesday) of organically & shade-grown, Fair Trade, French-Roast coffee—for about 5 minutes.

The big news over the weekend was the long-anticipated “weather-event.” The snowstorm that was supposed to dump 12-16” of snow, left us with a meager 8.5”! Some parts of the state received as much as 22” of the white stuff—but not us. I think Lenn Harley in Northern Virginia received more than we did. Now that’s embarrassing!

We can handle that much snow pretty easily hereabouts—especially when it occurs over a weekend. The city, county & state, are very effective at getting the main arteries cleared (the residential streets were started last night about 9pm). We help each other dig out, as well. The sound of snow-blowers and the scrape of shovels and private snow plow trucks could be heard throughout the neighborhood all Sunday afternoon.

Here are several photos taken from the comfort of this back porch after the storm:

Medford & I were FLABBERGASTICATED Sunday when we found that somebody of some influence on the ‘Rain must have been reading the deeper cuts of the LP (um, okay, for you young-uns: CD) that is the “Cyber Café & Back Porch Conversations” blog, so that this post, launched on February 20^th, would become featured four days after the fact. Four days on AR is usually archive-stuff (I ripped this from a comment I made yesterday to that post—why re-write the darn thing?). What’s really cool about this, is in that post we sorta trolled for a raingod to comment—and it worked (you’ll have to go and look at the comments to see which raingod descended from the impossible height of Mount Bloggious to comment—heh-heh).

On Saturday, we decided to post multiple times to our blog, in part to crack the 60,000 point threshold, and in part to expose our Gentle Reader to some of my practice “Windshield” photos. Posting “A Codger’s Lazy Saturday Photo Phun (Foto Fun?) Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3. This made us oh-so-guilty of: “RainBinging” As listed on TLW’s fun post: “The Active Rain Speak...Cheat Sheet...Get Ready To Laugh...ROAR!”

Now as we launch this post, in time we hope, for our early-rising & reading Gentle Reader, we’ll refill our porcelain, not China, but made in China, Codger Collectible Mugs™ (did I mention that this month’s limited edition of the mugs disappears on Wednesday) with organically & shade-grown, Fair Trade, French-Roast coffee, and kick back until it is time to depart for the café.

Jay & Medford

That is a question we’ve pondered more than once. We’re not real estate agents, lenders, stagers, appraisers, closers, or trainers (but we did sleep in a Holiday Inn last night). We used to help homeowners prepare their houses for sale, and new homeowners remodel their new homes—but age crept up on us, and we finally, regretfully had to retire from that as well.

Why do the Raingods tolerate us? (Do you reckon a Raingod will read this post and offer an opinion?) We can’t offer any direct insights into improving your sales and marketing. We’re not blogging experts, and can offer no opinions as to the best blog-platform, key-words or any of the other falderal that might improve your web standings. We can’t offer any opinions on how to stage that difficult listing to make it irresistible. So, the question remains—why are we here?

Occasional introspection is good, and Med & I spent a good deal of time last night indulging in just that.

What we’ve learned about why we maintain a blog here on Active Rain is simple, at least from our point of view—it is fun! We offer our readers a wide variety of topics for discussion. We provide a gentle place for folks to speak their mind without fear of harsh responses from us. We offer a little satire (which sometimes miss-fires), and some humor (which also miss-fires from time to time). And finally, we offer opinions from our perspective in our fine neighborhood of our beloved St. Paul. As long as the Raingods, from their impossible heights on Mount Bloggious, deign to tolerate our presence, we will continue to do what we do.

Oh, we almost forgot! Yesterday the high temperature was a fantastic +42ºF (shirt-sleeve weather, to be sure)! And this morning as we enjoy our porcelain mugs of organically & shade-grown, fair trade, French roast Coffee on the back porch, it is +22ºF, with NO wind, allowing us to enjoy those first few sips actually on the porch!

[Our image of "Mt. Bloggious" is hereby declared to be free to any member to use--a gift of the Codgers™]

Medford & Jay

This is the last of three photo essays, with no real purpose except, perhaps to make our warm state Gentle Readers shiver! So far, our “weather event” has been a dangerous mix of rain, sleet, and a little snow. The heavier snow is expected tonight into tomorrow.

It must be a quiet day on the ‘Rain, as there does not appear to be a lot of activity. It is certainly quiet here—just watchin’ the snow, which seems to have finally begun its assault.

I am using my new little camera to chronicle the storm as it changes the view from the back porch (What? You thought I’d actually go out in this stuff?).

These are shots taken along US 61 from south of Hastings, MN to just north of Red Wing.

Jay

This is the second of three photo essays, with no real purpose except, perhaps to make our warm state Gentle Readers shiver! These winter-driving photos were taken on different days, and with CRS (Can’t Remember Sh*t) setting in today, I’m unable to identify the locations of the last three photos.

Jay

So, round 1 of our “weather event” came through last night. This round was not supposed to be severe, and it wasn’t. A little sleet, and high winds, nothing extraordinary. Tonight 4-6” of snow predicted with high winds. Tomorrow, more of the same.

Today I will share some “Windshield Photographs” I’ve shot over the past several days—while practicing the technique.

These shots were all taken along Dakota County Road 46 in Rosemount, MN, located about 20 miles south of St. Paul:

Jay

At 11:28 PM Saturday night Bonnie Erickson announced her right and proper ascension to the ROYAL THRONE as the QUEEN of MINNESOTA Active Rain Blogdom! Word spread quickly across the realm, and by midnight, the Codgers™ were each in turn, awakened from his slumber by the loud pronouncements of the Royal Town Crier.

An emergency meeting of the sleepy Codgers™ was called; and all in the cold darkness of a Minnesota winter night went to an undisclosed location—safe from the bolts of potato chip dregs that might be hurled by the Once and Former Blog-Queen of Minnesota, “Bloggoddessbroker” Teresa, from the unimaginable heights of “MOUNT BLOGGIOUS” where she now resides—and pondered the situation.

A unanimous and rapid decision was made, with little debate—we wanted desperately to return to our interrupted slumbers—to cast our lot with the Right & Proper Queen.

Today's episode has been modified at 4:50pm CST due to our inability to find a consistent layout for our trademark graphics. We removed our usual Cyber Cafe banner and our "advertising."
We begin with our cast of characters already in the coffee shop:

“Hey Molly,” Medford called, “please bring us another round of
that fantastic organically & shade-grown, fair trade, French-Roast
coffee.”

“Yeah, Molly,” Jay added, “our Collectible Codger™ porcelain
(not REAL china, but made in China) Mugs need refilling!”

“KEEP YER BRITCHES ON,” Molly yelled in her usual outdoor
voice, “I’LL BE THERE IN A MINUTE!”

“So exactly why are we here so early?” Carl asked, looking into
his now empty mug.

“It’s Friday!” Medford exclaimed.

“You gotta know what THAT means, Carl,” Jay added, helpfully.

“I’m RETIRED,” Carl replied, “it means pretty much the same as
any other day of the week.”

“It means,” Medford said, as Molly FINALLY came by with the
coffee re-fills, “it’s deadline day.”

“Deadline?” Carl asked, “deadline for what?”

“It’s the deadline for submissions to the ‘CODGER™ CARNIVAL
of CURB APPEAL,’ tonight at midnight,” Jay replied.

“Oh sure,” Carl said, just a little derisively, “exactly which one of
you two will stay up that late to close the contest?”

“Good point,” Jay replied, “I guess the deadline will be
submissions received before I fire up my computer on Saturday
morning.”

“NICE TO SEE YOU STICK TO YOUR OWN RULES!” Molly
said, as quietly as she can, thus ending this episode.

Jay & Medford

This Episode of “Old Men & Coffee Shops” is brought to you by:

“Olde Codger” Organic and Shade Grown Potato Chips “They’re ALL THAT and a bag of Chips!”

...and by:

 Merton, Boardman, Ambrose and Company, For all your Codger wanna-be needs.

“Yet another +1ºF St. Paul morning, Med,” Jay said as they entered the Cyber-Café for their morning porcelain, not china OR stoneware mug of organically & shade-grown, fair trade, French-roast coffee, a little conversation, and if they are particularly daring—breakfast!

“It’s getting a little old,” Medford replied, “we’re more’n half-way through February, should be getting warmer.”

“QUIT YER WHINING, Y’ OLD GOAT,” Molly greeted them, “AND GET YOUR SORRY SELVES OVER TO YOUR TABLE!”

“Speak up, Molly,” Jay said, “quit mumbling. You know we hate it when you mumble.”

“Mornin’ fellas,” Fred greeted, looking up for the first and last time this morning from his ever-present morning edition of the Pioneer Press, “nice weather were having.”

“So as I was saying,” Harold said, “before you interrupted me, Fred, I went into the supermarket to pick up a few things for dinner…”

“You actually shop?” Jay interrupted, “I’m amazed you have the time for that, with all your sitting around in the barber shop telling your son how to cut hair!”

“…anyway,” Harold continued, “when I got to the check out, there was only one line open, and just one person in front of me.”

“Sounds exciting,” Boomer interrupted (in one of his rare cameos at the café), “I’m all a-twitter with excitement.”

“Oh got to work, willya?” said an increasingly irritated Harold, “Just as I thought she was done, and after I had my basket-load of stuff on the belt, she said ‘Oh and I want four lottery tickets, and a Gopher-five ticket and five of those odd and three of those even Fast-Draw to Win tickets.’ And so the cashier went over to the service counter to get her gambling supplies. Meanwhile lines were forming, and two more cashiers opened up.”

“So you moved to a different line?” Carl asked.

“Too late,” Harold continued, “all my stuff was on the counter, so I waited. The cashier returned, but she didn’t get the lady’s request quite right, so she had to go back. At the service counter a line of cashiers were waiting their turn to get gambling tickets for their respective customers.”

“Cut to the chase, please,” Medford said, smiling, “I’m old, and you need to finish this story in my lifetime. How long did it take for you to get checked out?”

“Twenty-five minutes,” Harold said, “they oughta have a ‘Gambler’s Counter’ just for those folks who think they might actually win something, who waste my increasingly valuable time with their obsession.”

“Don’t hold back Harold,” Boomer said, “tell us how you really feel!”

“I really feel like your next haircut," Harold smiled, “might just not be what you were expecting. Now got to work!”

Jay & Medford 

As Medford & I walked up the steps to “Boomer” Jack’s back porch, I glanced at the old replica “Pruett’s Pig Powder” thermometer mounted on the porch pillar. The temperature this fine St. Paul morning, according to “Pruett” was a rather balmy +13ºF, the Exel Energy stack’s plume told me the wind was light to non-existent, thus making it feel like a rather balmy +13ºF.

“Y’didn’t need to look at the thermometer then,” Medford said as Boomer let Daisy out to greet us, with her tail about to wag off her little beagle-body, “I coulda told you that, dontcha know.”

“Now cut that out,” I replied, “that ‘Fargo’ accent is not how you speak!”

“OK then, I’ll stop.” He said, as we each grabbed a porcelain mug and filled it with organically & shade-grown, fair trade, Guatemalan-blend coffee, Medford, as is his disgusting custom, polluting his with cream & sugar.

“How many entries to the Carnival have you received?” Medford asked.

“None, so far,” I replied, “but it’s early yet. We have ‘til Friday. Hey, check this out, I’ve been having a little fun with “Photo Shop’.”

“Is that what you spent your weekend on?”

“Not much of it,” I answered, “I baked a cake, made a few comments on the ‘rain, cleaned house and did my wash.”

“Now that’s an exciting weekend!” Med replied with an obvious hint of irony in his voice.

“Well, if it’s excitement you want,” I offered, “Our shop sold a mug!”

“Now that is exciting!” Medford exclaimed, “Which kindly and discerning person had the good sense purchase a ‘Codger™ Collectible’?”

“Medford!” I exclaimed, “You know we don’t sell and tell!”

“OK,” Med continued, “can you tell me how much we’ve made since our shop has been open?”

“$8.00,” I answered triumphantly.