Grutz says, "What's better than St. Patrick's Day on the 17th? Carleen's birthday on the 14th!!!!" or "Life is good."

Mornings are good.

Nolan loves his homemade berry waffles.

"It's quite simple, Father.  By using this device called a 'fork', one can eat without dirtying one's fingers.  Even you can do it."

Visits are good.

Carleen's Aunt Mary Jo visited this weekend and it was a blast.

Fun times with Mary Jo!!!

Project with Dad are, well, enjoyable.

I try to get some projects accomplished.  Completion is often elusive.  But hey, it's the trip, not the destination, right?

"Wow Dad!  These shavings are awesome!  But you know what's NOT awesome?  Turtlenecks.  Veeeeery fattering, I mean, flattering.  Ahem."

Lastly, tomorrow is my wonderful wife's birthday.

Let Carleen know how special she is on her 33rd birthday.  Yep, life is pretty good.  When the worst part of my day is putting up with Public Radio* fundraisers, my life is pretty damn good.

* We've given, have you?  Iowa Public Radio and Chicago Public Radio.

Grutz says, "Radio is not dead, at least 'til Sunday."

Remember the local radio station.  When it was local?

Before ClearChannel, Dwight Verne ruled the local airwaves.

As many of you know, I'm a huge proponent of public radio, especially Iowa Public Radio's Studio One (excellent music at night, great talk show during the day, oh and yes, I did donate last week).  It's commercial free and reflects local and regional cultural information.  It's a good thing, check out your local station or find one online.  Of course IPR rules, but I'd like to suggest WBEZ out of Chicago and Wisconsin's Ideas network, too.  Still free of the shackles of big brother media.

But Nick, you mentioned radio's not dead?

Oh right, so I was reading on NPR's sight a great story about the Domino Record label out of the UK.  For one week, June 6th-12th, they're running an entirely free and independent radio station.  That's kind of a big deal in the UK, and to a large extent, the US, too.  It's hosted by musicians and others in the music/radio industry.  The host right now is Bobby Gillespie (of The Jesus & Mary Chain and Primal Scream).  It's pretty refreshing or (just downright interesting) to hear The Sweet Inspirations*, Tim Hardin*, Patty Smith, Marianne Faithful, Crazy Horse, Skip Spence, David Crosby, and Johnny Ace (Thanks Mr. Gillespie for the info on Johnny Ace's demise!  Go on, check it out).  It's like getting a musical education by this particular host, it's great. So get to the website and listen.  And who knows, you might be totally floored or hear something you haven't heard in twenty years, or ever!

*Completely new to me and fantastic!  Tim Hardin will break your heart and The Sweet Inspirations included Crissy Houston (mother of Whitney) and Lee Warrick (mother of Dee Dee and Dionne).  Wow.

Grutz says, "Ya call that a museum? Now this, this is a museum." (In an Australian accent) Pt I.

Looking north along the Mississippi River.

Greetings from Dubuque!  So I'm here to visit with family and friends and to pick up and deliver many household items, currently being stored in Mom's basement, back to 1124 W. 19th St. in Chicago.  I had some spare time so I decided to be Nick Grutz, Chicago Tourist, rather than Nick Grutz, Iowa expatriate.  Next stop, The National Mississippi River Museum & Aquarium!

Before I go into the finer details of the museum, a little backstory.  I used to work at the museum in the early'00, before the expansion.  While subbing at Central Alt. School back in the day, I had the chance to visit the newly expanded museum with a class.  Now there's a second site on the campus.  All in all, it's a top-notch  museum worthy of a visit.  And their association with The Smithsonian Institute and Shedd Aquarium really shows (read:it's not shabby or half-assed).  

                                                                  Picture time!

Channel catfish as big as me.  Really. Gars and pikes, too.

D-d-d-d-duck!

Nick flowin' the Mississippi on some logs. They're springy!

Playing God - I unleash the power of the river on the unsuspecting farm, cue sinister laugh.

So the museum is all about American waterways, primarily the Mississippi.  The history, ecology, biology, and many other aspects of rivers are covered.  Many of the exhibits are interactive or are recreations of actual items or land forms.  Less talk, more pics!

This the only shot I could get of the alligator.  I thought the rock looked a little odd with the ridges.  Until I realized it was an alligator snapping turtle!  The beastie was the size of a vw bug!  Huge!

Interactive exhibit in which, well, you're......the.......pilot.

Mission control.  Yeah, I navigated the barge out of the lock.  It kind of felt like the set of 2001: A Space Odyssey, really stark.  "I'm sorry Nick, but you have to maneuver the vessel into the channel.  Nick....Nick."

All right, it's late and I have to pack a bunch of gear early tomorrow.  I'll continue part II of this post soon.  ALSO We're (Carleen and I) are still waiting for more comments.  Click on the comment button below, enter anonymous and leave a comment.  I'm still waiting for interesting/fun names of places.  Again, some more examples of unique names of Iowa towns: What Cheer and Elkader (named after an Algerian, Muslim (gasp, the only town in America named after a muslim (don't tell Glenn Beck!) war hero.  Here's a link to a piece about Elkader on WBEZ (Chicago Public Radio)). C'mon you know you want to leave a comment.....