Lowell is getting an Action Auto. It is going to be located right next to the NAPA auto parts store which is just down the road from the Showboat auto parts store.

I wonder if Lowell is big enough to support 3 auto parts stores? While Lowell is growing, the people moving out here are not the type to spend their weekends working on their BMWs. So, I suspect that one of the auto parts stores isn’t going to make it.

Time will tell.

For as long as I have lived in Lowell, there has been a lumber yard on main street. When we first came to Lowell, it was Erb Lumber. A few years ago, the Erb family decided to get out of the lumber business and sold the lumber yard to Stock Lumber.

While Erb catered to the contractor business, they also catered to the public in general. Stock, on the other hand, seemed to cater mainly to contractors and ignored the public. So, I guess that it was no surprise that they decided to move out of Lowell.

What was a surprise is that they didn’t tell the public that they were moving. In fact, I don’t even know where they moved to.

I suspect that they moved to Caledonia but I don’t know. I imagine that they told their contractors about the move and the location of the business, but they didn’t tell the general public. I guess they figured that no one was going to drive all of the way to Caledonia just to buy a box of nails.

So, now the lumber yard is empty. The only thing left are some pallets. I kind of wonder what is going to happen to the property. Will another lumber yards take over the place or will they just sell the property? Time will tell.

A few weeks back, Kathy and I went to the rodeo here is Lowell. It was a full featured event including calf roping, bronco busting, bull riding, etc. But the most entertaining part was watching them trying to round up the savvy rodeo seasoned animals after the contestants failed to complete their events.

The calves weren’t so bad as they automatically headed for the gate back to the pens. It was the horses and the bulls that proved to be difficult.

Unlike the calves, they were enjoying their freedom and weren’t interested in being cooped up again. So, they did their best to allude their captures. For the next 10 minutes, they managed to evade horse mounted riders and rodeo clowns. Eventually, it took the skilled rodeo riders to force the animals back into their pens.

Actually, this was the most entertaining part of the rodeo!

A new restaurant is scheduled to open soon here in Lowell. It is named the Mynt Fusion Bistro. No, I didn’t make a typo. That is the way they are spelling it. Either that or the sign company had to give them a fantastic deal on their screwup.

Mynt Fusion Bistro resides in the old Seven Eleven building, which closed and became Wolf Doggies which closed and became Big Dish which also closed. In all actuality, Wolf Doggies, featuring hot dots and an assortment of breaded deep fat fried stuff, lasted the longest of any of the former occupants.

Now according to the paper, Mynt Fusion Bistro’s claim to fame is Asian food with Thai as their main focus. Unlike most Chinese restaurants which offer only buffet tables of hours old food, their food will be prepared fresh for each customer.

Now, when I think of a bistro, I think of French Onion soup and Cog Au Vin and not Gang Gai. And while I love the rich flavors and pique of Thai food, I wonder how well it will be accepted here in Lowell.

In particular, I wonder how many people are going to be lured by the word Bistro only to discover that there is no steak there. And by the people who love good Asian food but are deterred by a bistro.

When it opens, Kathy and I will have to check it out.

Our local True Value hardware store is having a grage sale or at least that is what it says on the marquee.

So what could have happened here?

1. They misspelled garage and didn’t notice it.

2. They ran out of “As” and tried to make the best of it.

3. Its a publicity stunt to attract attention to their garage sale.

4. It is a psychology experiment to see how people process information.

5. They really do sell grages and they are on sale this week.

Assuming that 5 is the correct answer, I have to wonder what exactly is a grage? It kind of sounds like it might be some sort of a tool. Perhaps a special power grinder of some sort.

Now, since I don’t know what a grage is, I can probably get along without one even though it is on sale. Besides, how would I know if I am getting a good deal with this sale? I don’t know what a grage is let alone what they cost at full price.

But then again, what if it is a magical tool that would come in handy? If they are still on sale this weekend, maybe I will stop in and check them out. After all, one can never have too many grages. Maybe I should get one for the kids for Christmas.

Last week, they exhumed the body of George Gipp, aka the Gipper, and the people in the area around Laurium MI are pretty upset about it.

George Gipp was born and raised in Laurium which is in the northern most part of Michigan. Upon completing high school, he attended Notre Dame hoping to play baseball. But, instead, he was recruited to play football.

As a football player, he excelled and went on to set many records for the school. His mastery of football increased Notre Dame’s reputation as a major sports contender.

But alas, one night, at the end of the season, poor George stayed out past curfew and found that his dorm was locked for the night. Since he had no place to go, he spent the night outside in the cold. The next day, he developed pneumonia and died a short time later in December of 1920.

While few people know of his football records or even when he played football, they will never forget those words immortalized by Ronald Reagan: “win one for the Gipper.”

Now, having said all of that, why would anyone want to exhume his body 87 years later? What could they possibly be looking for? Do the suspect foul play?

Rumor has it that they are doing DNA testing on him but why? Did he father a child out of wedlock? Maybe he was part Indian and his relatives are heirs to some of the casino money. Who knows. But for the people of Laurium Michigan, this is big news! Stay tuned.

The Mayan calendar ends on December 21, 2012. Should we be concerned? After all, this calendar has been ticking along for about 2300 years so why does it stop on the winter solstice in 2012? Did the Mayans get bored calculating these astrological events or does something else happen? Maybe they stopped because there was no reason to continue.

Supposedly, there is a major astrological event that occurs on that day. Something about the alignment of our solar system with the milky way. I guess it happens every 26,000 years.

I suspect that there will be a bunch of sky watchers in the Yucatan on that day. After all, if people will fly all over the world just to view a total eclipse of the sun, think of what an event like this will draw. In fact, telescope prices are likely to soar in 2012 so this might be a good time to buy one.

The Mayans believed that the world gets reborn on that day. In fact, they believed that the world has been reborn 5 time already and that the rebirth that we are presently living in is the last. So, in 2012, everything ends.

When the Spanish arrived in the 1500s, the Mayan civilization was gone. Even the remnant that remained did not know about the lost city deep in the jungle. It is as if the whole Mayan civilization disappeared off the face of the earth.

Well, while I am not too concerned about 2012, I wonder if I should check into that early retirement program?

We have an employee evaluation program here at the state. Every 6 months, we pick the goals that we wish to be evaluated on for the next 6 months. Then at the end of the 6 months, we evaluate ourselves and then pick some more 6 month goals. We have had this program for several years and during that time, no one has ever given themselves a bad evaluation. Go figure.

Now, the absurdity of this program would be funny were it not for several things. First of all, the state paid good money to purchase this program. Then, there is the waste of money on the people who were hired full time to run this program. Then, there is the waste of time by the staff who have to set and evaluate their goals. But probably the saddest part of this program is that the upper management was stupid enough to buy into it in the first place.

We live across the street from a cemetery. It is a quiet place for the most part. But every now and then, we see strange activity over there at night.

Last spring, just about dusk, we noticed two women over there. They appeared to be spreading a white sheet on the ground. This seemed a little strange and I wondered if I should call the police.

Were they getting ready to perform some mystic ritual to summon the dead? Were they going to spend the night? There was a full moon that night so I kept my eye on the spot.

The next morning, the sheet was still there so I went over to inspect. Did I find a slaughtered chicken on the sheet? No. Instead, I discovered that the sheet was covering the flowers underneath to protect them from a late frost.

My hosting site for my blog, provides me with some stats about my readers and their interests.

One of the things that I get from the stats are the key words that they used to link my blog with their search.  And not only does it give me the key words, it also tells me how many times the word was used.

The two words that attracted the largest number of hits were Rachel Aldana and mustangs.

For those of you who don’t know who Rachel Aldana is, she holds the Guinness record for the largest breasts at a 32 JJ. In fact, her numbers are still growing as the hits still keep increasing.

And a mustang is a sports car made by Ford. My article on the Shelby Cobra even landed me a RSS to a mustang web site. I am surprised that I didn’t get a RSS to a horse site.

The runner up is Sears hot water heaters. I got a few RSSs off of that article as well.

So, it will be interesting to see if I get any RSSs off of this posting. We will see!