Kudos to my Commenters!

September 26, 2020September 27, 2020 / mariezhuikov / 8 Comments

I would like to thank everyone who reads my blog. I so appreciate your attention and time. I often tell my friends that blogging is like having pen pals who live all over the world. I love you all!

I’d like to recognize those who have consistently liked and commented on my posts and photos throughout the years. I particularly would like to thank the five most-frequent commenters over my blog’s seven-year lifespan.

Please take a look at their blogs and consider following them if you like what you see.

The Coastal Crone, a.k.a. Jo Nell Huff, hails from Corpus Christi, Texas. She’s a writer who has grown her muse from working on a few newspaper articles and poems to writing a novel that involves a Texas Ranger. Her blog features stories about life in Texas. I think I “discovered” Jo Nell from comments she made on somebody else’s blog. Her comments on “Marie’s Meanderings” are always so thoughtful and kind. She even won a photo caption contest I ran and received a copy of one of my novels as a prize. I always worry about her when a Gulf hurricane is brewing.

Sharon Moen doesn’t have a blog, but she does have a website about her nature-based pottery creations: Falcon Fire Pottery. Sharon is my BFF from Duluth. We met decades ago through work. Our lives have intertwined ever since. In addition to her talent with clay, Sharon is a writer, poet, and chicken-mama.

WriterInSoul, a.k.a., Colette, hails from Pennsylvania – or at least I think she does. She’s rather mysterious. Her blog is about as old as mine and she’s “still here because I have things I want to say and things to share.” She’s a writer who produces a combination of longer posts and short thoughts. Colette is on short thought #280, she’s that prolific! I also especially enjoy her posts about “Things Men Have Said to Me.”

Jennifer’s Journal, a.k.a. Jennifer Kelland Perry, lives by the sea in Newtown, Newfoundland. I’ve been following Jennifer since she was an aspiring young adult novelist. Now, she’s published two novels and is working on a third. One of her posts inspired me to write this post. She writes about her life in the Great White North and her writing accomplishments. Sometimes her cats write posts for her.

Yeah, Another Blogger, a.k.a. Neil Scheinin, reports from suburban Philadelphia. His blog chronicles “An arts-filled, tasty and sometimes-loopy jaunt through life,” complete with sarcasm, mild vulgarity, and some good photos. Along the loopy line, Neil documents imaginary conversations with psychologists and famous musicians. I appreciate his sense of humor and off-kilter views.

Bog Birding Bust

September 19, 2020September 19, 2020 / mariezhuikov / 5 Comments

I have heard about the Sax-Zim Bog in northern Minnesota for years, decades even. During winter, it’s a birding mecca – home to many rare owls and other species that visit from the arctic when food and weather conditions get too dicey up there. Birding is good during summer, too. The bog is a place where birds can nest in their natural habitat, relatively undisturbed.

Russ and I had a chance to visit the bog over Labor Day weekend. I’m getting back into birding and was excited to finally be seeing this place I had heard so much about. It’s even mentioned twice in “The Big Year,” a 2011 movie that stars Rosamund Pike, Jack Black, Owen Wilson, and Steve Martin. However, no filming was done on-site, so viewers never get to see the bog. The closest is when Owen Wilson’s character spends Christmas at a Chinese restaurant in Duluth, which is about fifty miles away. I suspect even the restaurant was fictional because it didn’t look like any I’ve ever seen in my hometown.

Anyway, so I was psyched to visit the bog. I thought since migration season had started, we might have a good opportunity to see birds moving through the area. We pulled up to the visitor center (which is closed now, opens mid-December through mid-March) and hiked the trails that go out from it. There’s a loop trail that starts at the parking lot and a Gray Jay Way that begins at the visitor center.

After all these years of anticipation, maybe I was expecting too much. We only saw a thrush (probably a Swainson’s), blue jays, and the chickadees and nuthatches found everywhere in the north. I was disappointed.

But it was neat getting a close look at a bog and learning the history of the area from the interpretive signs near the welcome center. For instance, I never knew that Jeno Paulucci, famed creator of Pizza Rolls and Chung King foods had a celery farm near the bog.

Gray Jay Way ends with a viewing platform where visitors can see the remnants of ditches that were dug in the early 1900s to drain the bog land for farming. Russ and I pushed through the undergrowth for a better look at the ditch junction. The dark bog water lay acidic and still on the landscape, lending an eerie air to the place.

On our way home, we stopped at one of three boardwalks in the bog: The Warren Woessner walk. We marveled at all the work that must have gone into its construction. We had a pleasant walk but didn’t see any more birds.

When I got home, I asked the executive director of the Friends of the Sax-Zim Bog what was up with the lack of birds. Was this just a bad time to look? Sparky Stensaas said this is the worst time of the year for birding in the bog. Just my luck!

Sparky and I go way back to when we used to be on the board of the local Audubon Society chapter. He took over editing the chapter newsletter from me a loooong time ago. Or did I take over from him?

Sparky also said that the visitor center is only open during the winter because that’s when 90% of the visitors come, but that they probably won’t be open this winter due to COVID. Guess I’ll have to content myself with watching the videos Sparky made this spring and summer, which show there really ARE birds in the bog.

So, don’t be like me. Don’t go birding at the Sax-Zim Bog in September.

The Many Faces of Buddy

September 5, 2020 / mariezhuikov / 13 Comments

Today would have been Buddy the Wonderdog’s eleventh birthday. I am sorry to say that our beloved companion died on August 21^st. It’s taken me a while to be able to write about it.

We had hints of the end five months ago when Buddy had two grand mal seizures, the first in the middle of the night. I had never witnessed a seizure before, so I wasn’t sure what was wrong. Was he just acting out a dream?

In the morning, I made an appointment with the vet who explained what they were. We decided to wait to see if another one happened. If it did, I would put him on anti-seizure meds. She said he could have epilepsy, or he could have eaten something that triggered it, or it could be cancer.

Buddy had a cancerous tumor in his ear, which easily could have spread to his brain or vice versa. I had chosen not to have it taken out previously (along with some skin cancer spots) because Buddy had a heart murmur. There was a risk that if we put him under, he might never wake up. I felt like he would have a better, longer life if we did not do any medical intervention.

His seizures did not return and during the five extra months we had, Buddy got to enjoy summer – swimming in lakes, riding in boats, two walks a day, playing with neighborhood doggie friends. And as you know, he discovered his true passion: fishing. He acted like the seizures never happened. Buddy also got to enjoy having his people with him all day, since I was working at home due to COVID-19 and Russ is retired.

On August 21, Buddy was fine until early afternoon. He was laying on the living room carpet, drifting to sleep when his first seizure happened. The event seemed to scare him more than before, and he stuck with me, wanting to be pet and comforted.

The second seizure happened a couple of hours later as he was drifting to sleep again. After this one, I called the vet’s office and got some anti-seizure meds. I gave him a pill right away, but it takes time for the medicine to build up to effective levels.

Buddy had two more seizures, each more severe. By that time, it was 8 p.m. on a Friday night. The vet was closed, so I called the emergency vet. They told us to bring him in.

Buddy was excited to go for a car ride and happy to hear we were going to the “doggie doctor”—one of his favorite places. He stumbled getting into the car and we noticed during the ride that he seemed to have trouble swallowing or he had a hitch in his breathing.

Due to the virus, we couldn’t go inside the office, but Buddy went without protest. The vet examined him and then called us as we waited in the car. He was pretty sure Buddy had a slow-growing brain tumor. He could treat the seizures with intravenous meds, but that would not fix the underlying problem of the tumor. He also said that Buddy’s bark did not sound normal – as if something in his throat was paralyzed by the seizures.

Things had already been ugly, but I knew they were about to get a lot uglier if we started hooking Buddy up to tubes. Russ and I made the hard decision to euthanize him.

Before the procedure, they brought Buddy out so we could see him one last time. I told Buddy that we loved him and would miss him. I explained what was going to happen. I cried. But Buddy seemed distracted, like he was eager to go back inside. So after a short time, I let him go. He knew what was best, too.

As one of my friends said, “To know Buddy was to love him.” He was such a large, exuberant presence in our lives. I’m still getting over the shock of having him here one day and gone the next. Of course, I’ve second-guessed our decision — should we have spent more time and money on his recovery? Ultimately, I feel like we did the right thing by him. We plan to spread his ashes along his favorite walking trail and his fishing spot in northern Minnesota.

My last photo of Buddy, taken between seizures.

One of my former colleagues recently wrote a story describing a University of Wisconsin-Madison study about the monetary worth of a dog’s life. The researchers surveyed hundreds of dog owners to see what they would be willing to pay for a hypothetical vaccine that would protect their dog from a fatal dog flu. Incorporating additional factors, they were able to come up with the value of $10,000.

We did not spend nearly that much during Buddy’s last day. But if some sort of procedure was available that could have reversed his brain tumor and cured his seizure damage, I would have considered it.

We are still dealing with the emotional cost of his absence. There’s no way to put a monetary value on grief.

Bye bye, big guy.

Buddy, the door-to-door salesman. Image by Amanda Jo Dahl-Sales.

Biking the DWP

August 29, 2020 / mariezhuikov / 1 Comment

20200815_151705 If you are a Duluthian or just want to be Duluthy, and you are tired of biking the Munger Trail, try its wild, more adventurous twin, the Duluth, Winnipeg and Pacific Railroad Corridor Trail. I call it a twin because, like the Munger Trail, it follows an abandoned railroad line and passes over a similar geography. But the DWP is wilder and more adventurous because it’s gravel, less developed, and fewer people use it.

20200815_154215 We accessed the DWP from Spirit Mountain’s Grand Avenue chalet. If you go up the ski hill about 200 yards from the chalet, you will run into the trail, which crosses the hill. You can also access it from a gravel road and trail system to the right of the chalet, but those are technically closed this season due to COVID-19.

Take a left, and you are on your way to new vistas, a couple of updated trestle bridges, and a tunnel. The 10-mile trail will take you to Ely’s Peak, Becks Road, and eventually to Proctor. When we arrived at Ely’s Peak tunnel, rock climbers were scaling the outside walls, testing their nerve and equipment.

We turned back at the tunnel. Later, while resting on a bridge, we had the chance to speak to a family who said they biked to the Buffalo House and had lunch before biking back to the parking lot at the chalet.

We hope to do the rest of the trail next time!

20200815_161259

A Little Chaos in the Garden

August 15, 2020 / mariezhuikov / 4 Comments

DSC02361 (2) use this one In the movie, “A Little Chaos,” which is about the creation of the gardens at the Palace of Versailles, one of the gardeners says gardening is, “an act of faith . . . .God put us first into a garden, and when we lost Eden, we were fated to search and reinvent it again.”

The story is about two gardeners with different approaches to their craft. One (who is a man) wants to dominate nature and instill order on the landscape. The other (who is a woman) wants to work with the landscape and thinks a little chaos is more interesting and natural.

In terms of the flower garden in my front yard, I have tried for years to be like the first gardener – instilling order in my plantings and symmetry in their placements. My garden has a theme of purple flowers: lupine, allium, coneflowers, night sage, iris, phlox, crocus.

My garden’s composition has changed due to my varying degree of attention and the severity of winters, watched over by a statue of a little naked boy who is sitting and reading. Even the statue has faced challenges. I’ve reattached his foot twice and even his head once after various misadventures and mishaps.

Weeds are a never-ending battle. My attempts to recreate an orderly Eden where humans have prime dominion has given way to a philosophy more like the second gardener who welcomes chaos and nature. And who’s to say that Eden didn’t have chaos? I like to think that we come from nature. What is nature if not chaotic?

My garden now sports a mix of cultivated and wild flowers. Some white flowers have crept in with the purple, although the white ones bloom after most of the purple ones are done. I don’t even know the names of the wildflowers, they just started growing with no help. I rather like not knowing their names. This makes me look at these flowers more deeply. If I knew their identities, I would say their names in my head each time I saw them and then immediately look away. Now there is mystery and wonder.

Patches of grass intersperse with the flowers. I could continue to spend time trying to dig up all the grass, but I’d rather spend my time writing or playing. It’s freeing to have given up trying to instill order on the landscape. My garden does not have to be “perfect.”

In the “chaos” movie, the lead gardener at Versailles hires the chaotic gardener because “the gardens are large enough to contain more voices than just my own.” The movie ends with a scene from the woman’s completed garden, which is an outdoor ballroom. The king of France and his court dance in a space where order and chaos intermingle in a triumph of design.

I’m not sure what my neighbors think of my garden. No doubt, some wish I would spend more time controlling it. Perhaps others who drive by simply enjoy the colors. All I know is that, with its colors and a little chaos, it’s Eden enough for me.

Fruit Pizza Recipe

August 10, 2020August 10, 2020 / mariezhuikov / 2 Comments

20200707_073742 I first had this confection at the baby shower for my second son. My office coworkers organized the event and one of the highlights was this tasting this fruit pizza for the first time. Our venerable administrative assistant, Judy Zomerfelt, baked it and kindly gave me the recipe (and permission to feature it here).

Since then, I’ve become sensitive to wheat and corn, so I have modified the recipe. Most recently, I made it for the 4^th of July – if you top the whipped cream with blueberries and strawberries, it makes a patriotic red, white, and blue dessert. Enjoy!

Fruit Pizza (wheat- and corn-free)
Inspired by Judy Zomerfelt

1 cup powdered sugar (Be sure it doesn’t contain cornstarch. I use one that substitutes tapioca starch.)
1 cup cane sugar
1 cup butter
1 cup canola oil
2 eggs
1 tsp wheat-free vanilla extract (I make my own with potato vodka)
4 cups flour (I use a mix of white rice flour and Bob’s Red Mill gluten-free all-purpose flour, 2 cups each)
1 tsp sea salt
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cream of tartar

(For people without food allergies, simply use 1 package of sugar cookie dough instead, and cook accordingly.)

Cream the sugars and butter together. Stir in the oil, eggs, and vanilla. Add the dry ingredients and mix well. Pat the dough out on a nonstick cookie sheet or a greased rectangular baking pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 25 minutes. Let cool.

Filling:

1 8-oz package of organic cream cheese
1 cup cane sugar
Fresh fruit (I use strawberries and blueberries)
1 pint organic whipped cream

Mix the cream cheese and sugar. Spread on the cooked cookie dough. Cover with whipped cream. Top with fruit.

If you can’t find fresh fruit, you can use a can of fruit cocktail, drained well.

Refrigerate leftovers.

The Dog Who Fished

August 4, 2020March 19, 2025 / mariezhuikov / 6 Comments

Buddy has a new favorite pastime: fishing!

He’s had the chance to spend extra time on a clear northern Minnesota lake. It’s easy to see the young fish and bluegills against the sandy bottom. He was so excited when I pointed out the “fishies” in the water that now he whiles away many an hour wading and chasing them.

He hasn’t caught a fish yet. I don’t think he’d know what to do with one if he did. But that’s why they call it “fishing” and not “catching,” right?

I know that Garrison Keillor of “Prairie Home Companion” fame has fallen out of favor these days, but he told a great story about Bruno, the fishing dog, during a Lake Wobegon skit a few years ago. Bruno could catch fish, and caused a memorable panic during a baby’s baptism reception.

I am hoping that Buddy does not follow suit.

It’s just fun seeing Buddy excited about fishing. I am hoping it doesn’t stress out the fish too much. They probably know by now that he’s not a major threat.

I hope you all are having a summer as good as Buddy’s.

A Mini-Minnesota Vacation: Lake Vermilion State Park

July 24, 2020 / mariezhuikov / 5 Comments

A vermilion sunset on Lake Vermilion. Night One of our stay.

Since nobody wants Americans in their countries right now, Russ and I decided to take several local camping trips. For mini-vacation #1, we trailered our thirteen-foot Scamp to Lake Vermilion State Park, a newish development in northern Minnesota.

20200716_130318 I’ve spent some time on Vermilion Lake before but had not been to the park yet. This large lake is reminiscent of the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness – same rocky shorelines, scraggy spruces and towering pines – but development is permitted (outside of the park) so lots of cabins and lake homes line the shore.

There’s also an historic iron ore mine located in the park. When viruses aren’t running rampant, underground tours are offered, which are an interesting way to learn about the importance of Minnesota’s Iron Range.

We spent two nights in the Vermilion Ridge Campground. We brought our kayak, paddleboard, and bikes, and used them all, even though the weather wasn’t that good. We went during the week because all of the weekends for the summer were booked already – apparently, everyone else had the same idea to travel locally.

Here are some pros and cons we discovered.

PROs

A nice boat launch. You can use it if you have a state park sticker, otherwise, I think there’s a daily fee. (Staying at the campground requires a state park sticker, which you can apply for at a self-service kiosk when you enter the park.) We found that the boat launch dock was a good place to watch the sun set. That’s where I took some of the photos that accompany this post.
Close to the Mesabi Trail. This is a bike trail that spans 135 miles across the north. It’s not all completed yet. The section near the campground seems new. We were able to bike to it from our site and ride 4-5 miles toward Ely before the pavement stopped. Someday, the trail will reach Ely.
There’s wifi! If you need to keep in touch with friends, family, or social media while you’re in the woods, you can.
Quiet. The campground was quiet at night and there’s a good screen of trees between sites, which affords some privacy.
New pavement. The campground was constructed about ten years ago and work is still being done on the roads. All the pavement (including the bike trails) is smooth and new – a dream for longboarders, bikers and inline skaters.

Sunset on Lake Vermilion, Night Two.

CONS

No swimming beach. There’s no good place to swim in the park. A drive is required to reach local beaches on the lake.
Hard to get a reservation. Like I mentioned, we had to go in the middle of the week because summer weekends were filled already. Plan ahead to get the dates you desire.
The campsites aren’t on the lake. They are farther inland. I suppose this is better for the health of the lake, but it would’ve been more scenic to be near the water.

A building at the Tower-Soudan iron ore mine.

Another thing to know before you go is that you can’t bring your own firewood or gather it in the park. You’ll need to pay a fee to use wood the park provides. I think this has to do with not spreading the emerald ash borer beetle.

An idyllic scene from the Mesabi Trail.

If you go, we hope you enjoy the park as much as we did. Buddy liked it, too!

Buddy, a goldendoodle naturally highlighted by a golden sunset.

Paddling into Deep Summer

July 9, 2020July 10, 2020 / mariezhuikov / 7 Comments

DSC05846Fixed I awaken at 6 a.m., roll over and look at the lake outside the window. The water is smooth as a scrying mirror. The sun peeks over the spruces, encouraging a lake mist to form.

If I were more ambitious, I’d be out paddle boarding right now. Instead, I roll over and shut my eyes, lulled into a doze by the trills of hermit thrushes deep in the forest.

An hour later, I open my eyes to the same scene — the lake still calm, mist still rising.

Although in my book, 7 a.m. is still early to rise, I succumb to the siren call of my standup paddle board. It is early July and the temperature is already 70 degrees outside – one of those days that Minnesotans dream of during February. It would be criminal not to enjoy it.

Russ and the dog are still sleeping, so I quietly get out of bed and don my swimsuit. I tiptoe out into the dew-wet grass toward the boat house – feeling like a teenager headed for an illicit rendezvous. However, I am responsible enough to leave a note on the kitchen table: “Gone paddleboarding!”

Opening the boathouse door, I inhale. There’s nothing like that old boathouse smell – decades of damp, mixed with a little mustiness and a hint of worn wood.

I heft my board and paddle, carefully closing the door so I won’t wake those in the cabin. On my way to the dock, I pass a bunch of blueberry plants covered with small blue sapphires – berries ready for picking. I can’t be distracted, though. They’ll have to wait.

As I settle my board into the water, I giggle inwardly. Hardly typical behavior for someone nearing retirement age, but a quick glance at the lake has told me it will only be me and the loons out there this morning. Life cannot get much better.

I head out in a clockwise direction around the lake. This just seems natural. The night before, a small parade of pontoon boats were all going counterclockwise. We’re living in the northern hemisphere. The toilet water spins clockwise. I figure it’s better not to go against the spin.

My board skims the surface easily. In the clear water below, bluegills rush to hide in the reeds. Water plants stand still and straight as trees. As I paddle, the mist seems an elusive dream. I know I’m in it, but I can’t see it when I arrive. The mist is always just out of reach ahead, playing tricks with my senses.

All of the other cabins are silent, still shuttered for the night. I only see a couple of other ladies, each sitting on shore, enjoying their morning coffee. I wave and they wave back.

My morning idyll is shattered by a pain in the middle of my back, between my shoulder blades. A horse fly or deer fly has found me! As I struggle to paddle into position so that I can safely use my paddle to scratch it off my back, I marvel at how these flies know exactly where to bite where they can’t easily be swatted. It’s like all the babies attend Fly Biting School were the teachers point out the safest places on people and animals to chomp.

Board in position, I carefully balance while lifting my paddle to scratch my back. Success! I don’t fall off my board and the pain disappears, along with the fly. Although a nuisance, these flies need clean water to live. Their presence is an indicator of a healthy environment.

The rest of my paddle is uneventful, if you can call relishing every summer sight and sound uneventful. I arrive back at the dock feeling like I’ve paddled into deep summer.

I am so thankful to be able to enjoy this morning, especially since there are so many people gone from this Earth due to the coronavirus, who will never have the chance to experience such things again. It was worth getting out of bed early.

Now, where are those blueberries?

Kingsbury Creek Trail, Duluth

June 30, 2020 / mariezhuikov / 2 Comments

A view from the Kingsbury Creek Trail, Duluth, MN.

Prepare to be confused and impressed. Russ and I checked out the Kingsbury Creek Hiking Trail near the zoo in Duluth recently. We were confused because so many trails intersect in the area. There’s a mountain bike trail, and the Superior Hiking Trail, a gravel trail, and a footpath. We were aiming for the footpath, and think we found the right one, but since it was our first time on it, I’m not exactly sure.

Whatever trail it was, the scenery was impressive. Quiet pools in the creek attracted Buddy the Wonderdog. Huge white pines evoked awe. If we have to be quarantined, Duluth isn’t such a bad place for it.