We're outta here. Honest.

Trailboss, shown above in the sun beside the Grand Canyon, says: Thanks so much to everyone for all the kind words and support. It has been even more fun closing down the blog than running it! Here's the deal. Me and the missus are driving south to Tucson today to stay there for a month or so. After we get there, we'll continue to post anything that shows up in the trailboss@swpub.com mailbox. So there will be a brief hiatus (Dad taught me that word) before we start posting stuff here again at the rate at which it arrives.

Also, while we are in Tucson, we post regularly to a family blog, www.Rolfsruds.blogspot.com and if you are really bored you are welcome to look in on that, but it is mostly more personal stuff about our extended family, etc.

So, really, don't be looking here for a while, we're on the road now and it doesn't matter if you get a picture of Mrs. Obert on Governor Pawlenty's knee, it won't get posted! I really mean it this time!!!!
Stan

Despair in Glenwood over blog loss

Photo submited by Mr. Al Grundei, Class of '67!

In the meantime, back in Alexandria, the mayor has somehow continued to elude the cub reporter seeking a comment and photo. Said reporter even went to the community meeting "Help Shape the Future of Alexandria" last night in hopes of finding him. Needless to say, it was an emergency meeting called in response to the possibility of being "Blogless in Alexandria."

Blog blues spread to Chicago

John Herdan writes: What, no blog? Even Bob McGrath from Sesame Street stopped me in Chicago during the Midwest Band Clinic and told me how much he enjoys reading the blog. See photo. He also said Big Bird is a big fan of the Cardinal Girl's Hockey Team. Can we disappoint Big Bird????

Then I checked with my dog about the blog. You see her reaction.

John.

More repercussions to imminent blog closure

By Tom Obert
Cub Reporter

The mayhem continues all over Alexandria as the town speaks with one voice: Where is the blog? Tuesday the "government" returned from its holiday (tomorrow, maybe, the mayor!) and members had this to say:

Fire Marshal Dennis Stark (Class of '68 and admitted relative to Charles Stark, Class of '65), above with Alex fire engine from 1917, had no problem reporting that, "We often receive requests to burn down old houses for training purposes. Since the blog, however, whenever we receive a request to burn down a house previously occupied by a member of the Class of '65, we put the home on the Federal Register for Historic Preservation instead."

Bonita Gilbertson (Class of what else? '65, of course), Alexandria's Number One recycler, reports, "The cub reporter has included me on his list of people to whom he emails stupid jokes. Can anything be done about this?"

Mike & Lynda Geiser have enjoyed the trip

Greetings Stan,
I just checked out the blog on the advice of my daughter, Lisa. She also was religious about checking every few days to see what was happening with her father's classmates. Imagine that! Anyhow, I meant to let you know that I also have eavesdropped for the past three years. I felt that I was a part of the Class of '65 too. Actually, I was from the Class of 1966 only because of a birth date falling after Sept. 1.
You have done an excellent job and I have enjoyed the journey the blog offered. Tom Obert, the man about town, has been fun, too. Now if I could have gotten the husband to contribute something . . . but he was the quiet one, so what can I say.
I see that my nephew, Griffin Sonstegard, has decided to do a blog as a way of communication while he does his global study in Norway. I have another source of reading material at least for the next six months. Now, if Mary can figure out how to access the blog, she can follow his travels too.
Take care and enjoy your time in the sun. Thanks again, Stan, for the trip down memory lane!
Lynda Geiser

Hey Paul, I found it

The trailboss located the old photo of Paul Nokes with his prized Bricklin motor car that was featured on the blog a couple of years ago. Unlike the old days when you had to pile through a mess of desktop clutter, we just used the search engine for "Bricklin" Son of a gun, there was only one Bricklin on the blog data base and here it is.

Paul writes: Thanks Stan. This is the one that I thought I had sent but did not see it as I went through the items for each month.

We had 4 inches here on Sunday and it is 5 below right now..... still warm here in Omaha compared to home.

We have a Minnesota Transplants Reunion every Feb here in Omaha so I will get to see Bob Watson again. There are about 350 known Minnesotans living in the Omaha area so it is always a good time. Again, thanks for everything that you did..... keep in touch.

Bye, Paul

Blog closure has profound implications

By Tom Obert
Cub Reporter

[Dateline: Alexandria]
Word of the "temporary" shut-down of the Class of '65 blogsite hit this small midwestern city on the edge of the plains like a wildfire. Anxious citizenry responded spontaneously and without solicitation with one voice asked, "Where's the blog?"

First, the local media:

Echo Press editor Al Edenloff said, "Goodness, we rely on the blog for background on many of our stories. After all, who else really knew what went on at Seeger's?"

Echo Press sports editor Larry Holverson (Class of '66 -- above, right) lamented, "The Goose was my childhood idol!"

KXRA personality Patty Wicken (Class of '67), the "voice of Alexandria" and "Erc Aga wannabe" said, "I love reading the blog! However, the cub reporter's elevator doesn't go all the way to his pilot light!"

KXRA personality and all-around wild and crazy guy, Lonnie Wing, reportedly uttered, "What's a blog? And does any know the right way to put on these earphones?"

Other Alexandrians express similar concerns:

Dave (the voice of the Cardinals) and Evie Harris, with his mall walking "reporters," Bob and Vivian Annen, and Dave Hoyme, added this:

Dave Harris, from 3rd and 4th-hand accounts, said, "I don't know what these guys do for a life, but I do rely on them for reports about the Little Darlings."

Evie Harris, from similarly untrustworthy sources, stated that, "Until the blog, the girls hockey team only had three fans - Obert, Annen, and me!"

Bob Annen, whose sources are decidedly right-wing, noted, "The cub reporter is just slightly to the left of Karl Marx, but nobody takes more delight than me out of watching Our Little Darlings whup-up on those big city private schools!" Vivian Annen, from first hand sources at the games, "What the heck are the words to the fight song again?"

Dave Hoyme, in a moment of reflection, noted that, "The Trailboss never would have made it through confirmation without my inspired guidance!"

But wait, there's more. . .

Jim Hafdal (Class of '70, I believe), past president of and still member of the school board, and son of the school superintendent from the Class of '65 era, allegedly mumbled, "Are any members of the Class of '65 still alive?"

Jerry Van Kempen, noted mall walker and genuinely hilarious individual, seemed to recall that, "Wasn't Ellen a member of that class? Thank goodness she was able to overcome that handicap and ultimately became a functioning member of society."

Linda (Class of '68) and Tom Akenson, far left and far right, respectively, with friends, realtors extraordinaire, wondered, "Shouldn't those people be retiring and buying property from us by now?"

Mark and Mary Weston, proprietors of the world famous Weston Station, pleaded, "Since Old Broadway closed, we have more business than we can handle. Please tell those people to stay in the Cities!"

Kevin Klimek, winter entertainer at Carlos Creek Winery, politely offered, "If Ruthie requests 'Perfidia' one more time . . . however, I would be delighted to perform at the next reunion."

Carlos Creek Winery cat, "Meow! Maybe now I can get some rest."

Watch out for Serie's house on No. 7!

Stan- I've been so busy over the Holidays as well as with with Sarah's basketball and Matt's wrestling that I didn't realize that the BLOG was shutting down. It feels like I'll be losing a good friend!!

I'm disappointed but I understand it's hard for everyone to utilize it enough with our busy lives but it will be back up soon.

I really want to sincerely thank you for supporting and managing it as well as Tom Obert the Cub reporter. ( I like Kathy S. comment about turning it over to Tom for a while. How about it Tom??)

The Reunion itself ( thank you again all committee members) and the contact before and after with many of my old friends like Harland and Carolyn Hoffland, Kathy S. and Sara S. ( thanks for the golf experience) you and Tom O. and McPhee etc. has been fantastic. It's been a highlight for me as friends have always been so very important in my life.

As 2007 rolls through into 2008 we can remember that it will be only a couple of years until the 2010 Reunion. I'll be looking forward to it as I did this past one.

I'm inviting all who wouild like to keep in touch to call me or visit when they are in the Mpls./Brooklyn Park area. We can golf or have a soda or something stronger and sit on our deck and watch and hear the golfers cuss a bit as they tee off and try to stay out of the pond behind our house on hole no. 7 at Edinburgh!

Take care Stan and Thanks a bunch!

Dave Serie

16 and One -- Tom's hockey report

By Tom Obert
Cub Reporter
Saturday night Our Little Darlings returned home after two weeks on the road . . . and they looked like it. Playing Detroit Lakes, they looked exhausted in the first period - a period that ended 1 - 1, even though they must have had 6 power plays. Nevertheless, as bad as the Cards played, this cub reporter prognosticated to all around him that the final score would be 6 - 1. Kathryn Del Zoppo scored with 5 seconds left in the game to make the final score 7 - 1. I chastised her mother afterwards for ruining my prognostication.

The schedule of playing almost every other day continues this week - for local attendees, the big game is Tuesday, a 5:00 p.m. start, against perennial conference power St. Cloud Tech; then we have a home game again Thursday @ 7:00 against Little Falls, which should be a breather. The Detroit Lakes game showed that we need to make a lot of improvement on the power play - I think we do better when we're short-handed. And we haven't been terrific on winning face-offs this year either. I guess when things are going good, you look for weaknesses to improve upon - afterall, we're still ranked 4th in the state.

Marleen and Rich Braun came to a game for the first time - Ruthie said it was Marleen's first hockey game ever! We hope they'll join us for more games. After the game we went to Weston Station - the place was standing room only. Mary Weston said it has been that way since the first of the year - hastened even more recently with the demise of Old Broadway.

Oh, and the fund raiser is this Friday @ 5:00 @ the Eagles.

Correction

Fortunately for the class president, I know that can't be him snorkeling on Lake Darling.
We haven't had that much snow on Lake Darling for years. So, it must be some other lake . . .-- Cub.

That's the problem with running this blog. At my age, the details keep getting mixed up. Maybe it was Le Homme Dieu. . . . TB

So now you start sending in material

News that the '65Roundup will be shutting down for lack of interesting material has prompted all sorts of irrational activity around Alexandria. Friday evening Tom Obert snapped this photograph of the President of the Class of '65 attempting to snorkel on Lake Darling.

Sorry Paul. We're still shutting it down.

The long goodbye. . .

Scandinavians are notorious for their "long goodbyes," you know, standing in the entry, not wanting to be the first to open the door. My friends, this is not a death. We're doing just fine. At least now everyone finally has something to write in about. Ha. :)

Here are today's goodbyes:

Aging Cardinals
After missing a day or two on the blog, I see it's going away. You've done yeoman (electronically) work and entertain any number of aging Cardinals. Thanks a lot.
How's your mom?
I hope to see you soon---at least when the golf courses open. With this weather, we maybe could golf in January.
Best to Kathleen and the grandchild.

Paul Strandberg


Continues to check
Just wanted to add my thanks for the job you have done with the blog. I will look forward to it resuming in 2010. Even though you posted the closing of the blog a couple days ago, I continue to check it each morning - not sure why, but it has been interesting reading all the goodbye postings. Take care and enjoy Tucson.

Paula Hanson



I, like Patty Bratton Wicken, am from the Class of '67 but I loved reading the stories, enjoying the pictures, like everyone else. You guys did an excellent job on this blog. I also checked it almost daily.

Gretchen Obert

But wait, there's more. . .

Withdrawal
Thank you, Stan, for an excellent job with the '65 Blogspot. I have enjoyed it very much. Like hundreds of other non-65'ers who eavesdrop, I have checked it almost every day since I found out about it. Cubbie & Ruth...well, I see them often, so I will continue to live vicariously through their active and entertaining retirement.
But the rest of the crew (Lorlee, Herdan, etc.)....well....I think I'm going to need some help through the withdrawal........maybe a support group of some kind. Once again, thanks. For the memories.
Patty Bratton Wicken
- Class of '67

Huge shoes
Hi Stan,
What would be your time and fee for training your cub reporter to take over?
You did a wonderful job and have HUGE shoes to fill but maybe Tom could give it a go while you vacation for awhile?
Your job would just be to sit back, watch and LOL.
Kathy Skadsberg

Guilt trip
Dear Stan and Kathleen,
Sure going to miss you guys.....Loved the blog, it had sports, art, and news and some good memories joggers..... Now how will we find out how Emily's doing? and what about Tucson? you even did restaurant reviews.......Ok it's starting to sound like a guilt trip......

You did a great job, your reporters included.....Tom with hometown sports and news, Lorlee with Art and gardening , Kathy with pictures, the around the town, travel tips, the grannie that barely keeps her feet on the ground.
Thanks for it all...you'll all be missed.

Diane O'Brien

ps....my daughter even reads the blog

Will still check it
I can't think of anything that hasn't already been said. I loved checking the blog daily and will miss seeing pictures and reading what others are doing. At this point, we're still planning on having a golf tournament this summer so if anyone is interested, please let me know by e-mailing me directly at ssevey@yahoo.com.

Thanks again for all you've done and I bet most of us will still check the blog periodically.

Sara Sevey


From: Tom & Ruth
Sent: Wednesday, January 10, 2007 8:47 PM
To: Rolfsrud, Stan
Subject: OK . . . the blog is probably a pain to keep up

But just tonight I received a call from Pat Osterberg in response to solicitations for nominations for an Alex Alumni Hall of Fame. With Pat's, and his family's background in this town, he gave me the names of four people whose stories, to me, sounded really interesting and were unknown to me. I asked Pat to fill out nomination forms for all of them. It should be interesting to follow this story as the Hall of Fame gets established - famous medical researchers, WWII aces, raptor center founder, and on and on, of course. I didn't know Bruce Phelps was considered a god in the choir community of Minnesota!

Missing you already?

I guess I should have announced the closing of the blog earlier. Never got so much input in a day! Here's some notes that were nice to receive:

Dear Stan and Tom,
Thanks for all your work on the blog!!! Really hate to see it go but 2010 will be here before we know it!
Best,
Kathy Skadsberg
+++++++
I check it every day. Can you just leave it up and if someone sends something in… you will put it up?
Heck I even love the hockey reports.
Lorlee

++++++++
From the cub:

I know the blog is on hold, but just some more Alex stuff for the totally and semi-interested.

For the Trailboss: I didn't realize until today, when we were discussing the shut down of the blog, that one of the guys I have been mall walking with for the last couple of years was your (and Mark and Karen Benson's) confirmation instructor at 1st Lutheran. Dave Hoyme retired back to Alex after competing his career as a colonel-chaplain in the military. He said he remembers you guys from his Alex "tour of duty" from 1961 - 64. He also said that Murrae Freng was the music teacher in Brooten when he was going to school there. He goes to more Alex sporting events than anybody.

I set up a meeting with Paul Donley this morning to see if he would be a board member for the Alex Education Foundation. We decided to meet at 8:00 at the Daily Grind. Paul, still relatively new to what's going on in his old home town, didn't know where the Daily Grind was. I explained. So, this morning I was at there at 8:00 - by 8:15 still no Paul. Finally, he came in and said he had been waiting in Raapers, another place he had never been to before. He had called Ruth at home from Raapers wondering where I was - Ruth said I had left home a half hour ago, so that made her nervous. Paul hung up and asked the waitress in Raapers if he was in the Daily Grind. She said no (of course) and pointed him in the right direction. When Paul discovered he couldn't get a full breakfast at the Daily Grind, we went back to Raapers. Meanwhile, Ruth came into town looking for me. When she couldn't find me in the Daily Grind (she saw my car out back), they told her to try Raapers. She found us there, then, exasperated, went back home. I hope it all works out.

FYI, Our Little Darlings have won two road games so far this week (and go to Fergus tomorrow night) - 7 - 1 @ Sartell, and 4 - 2 last night @ Brainerd - and are now 14 - 1 for the season.

++++++++

From: Paul Nokes
Tuesday, January 09, 2007 9:15 PM
To: Trailboss@swpub.com
Subject: The Blog

Thanks for maintaining this for the class of ’65. One thing that I meant to ask you about and delayed for one reason or another is this…… you published a photo of me and our 74 Bricklin in July 05 if I recall correctly. After a couple of days, you took it down and we never saw it again. I just assumed it was an error, but in thinking back on it perhaps you did not realize that it was gone. If you still have the email that I sent it with, I would appreciate having it returned as it is something that my children and grandchildren would like to see again. If you can, thanks. If not, I understand that as well.
As I said, thanks again for doing this for us.

Paul and Jeanne

+++++++

Hi Tom and Stan,

I'm pretty bummed about the blog shut down. I do realize that very few people contributed (thank goodness you did) but it's still a shame. You and Stan deserve a HUGE thank you for your work on it. Kathy too. A lot of people don't know what they have until they lose it. Hey, wasn't there a song that went like that? Hopefully in a few years it (the blog) will reappear.

I hope you keep me on your mailing list. I get a kick out of you and Ruth and your antics. Today's was a hoot. I remember the game "Whisper around the world". We used to play it in girl scouts and at First Lutheran Church at the youth meetings whatever they were called. We also played a game called "Wink" and we could wink at a girl or boy of our choice, kind of a winking musical chairs!?! Anyway, I used to wink at Rich Divine as I thought he was...tee hee.
Oh, I got distracted...anyway, Tom, your morning sounded like a comedy of errors.

Must run, Bonita

+++++++

Stan:

I am so saddened to see that the class of '65 blog is closing shop. It was a "favorite" site that I checked every day, sometimes 2x a day, ever since it's been up and running. You've done a fantastic job keeping it going, and for that I say a huge THANK YOU! Thru the site and the subsequent reunion, I've reconnected with "old" classmates and continue to correspond/visit with them. You will be missed.......hopefully it will be up and running again before we know it. Thanks a million!

Bev Roers Korkowski

The 65Roundup blog has pretty much run its course, it appears. It's been lots of fun, but interest in the topic is waning. Thanks to all who shared parts of their lives with us through their observations and contributions over the past three years. Thanks also to the many classmates who visited but didn't contribute: don't despair, there are still over a million blogs to visit out there in cyberspace.
We'll probably crank up this class resource again prior to the next reunion. We're looking forward to seeing you then. In the meantime, we'll leave the blog up for those who want to look through the archives. -- Trailboss

Look out Lorlee!

Robin Movald Niederfeuhr turned out this fine photograph of Lake Chippewa this year and included it with Christmas greetings. You can just barely see the corner of her home on the lake in the upper right hand corner. Got a good shot? Send it to the trailboss. This one came via snailmail.

Lynn's Christmas card

This is Lynn Dietz with her grandchildren. What a nice bunch!

Travelers send post card

Good to see that Tom and Ruth got their winter vacation after all.