While at the Minnesota History Center I discovered a recipe for “Raisin Sandwiches” that involved mixing raisins with peanut butter, mayonnaise, diced carrots and cottage cheese. Just the thought of that mixture makes me swallow hard. It seems like a textural and taste mismatch. Shudder.
Also while at the Minnesota History Center, I read about the Starvation Research project at the University of Minnesota during World War II, where conscientious objectors were recruited to undergo a starvation regimen so that researchers could study the effects of malnutrition on the human body and improve K rations for the military as well as develop better forms of food aid to use to help civilian populations in war torn areas recover after the war. I didn’t know anything about this project before, and after leaving the history center I read several additional articles about it. So interesting.
Again, while at the history center I also learned that mules were bound by the legs, placed in a sling and lowered down the mine shafts on the Iron Range to do heavy work underground in the mining process. They lived down in the mine 9 months of the year, and were brought up for three months at a time to spend time in the sun. What a terrible life for a mule! Crazy.
In choir I learned to successfully sing almost all of J.S. Bach’s Mass in B minor. There were just a couple of little places that gave me a bit of trouble in the end, but most of it fell into place, and I had so much fun singing it!
On the cello I am working on several new positions and I played several etudes in not-so-very fun keys. I’m also catastrophically trying to work on vibrato. It’s not coming easily.
On the piano I learned several accompaniments for my daughters. Orchestral reductions are not my favorite because there are so many parts you have to leave out to be able to play smoothly, and you need to know what parts to leave out. Ugg.
I read a book about Latvian history, Walking Since Daybreak, by Modris Eckstiens. I learned so, so much that I didn’t know about the Baltic region before, during and after World War II. I wasn’t always so excited about the format of this book, but I really liked how the historical analysis was interwoven with the story of several generations of the author’s family.
It’s a little awkward to walk through the mechanical engineering building with a giant cello case, plodding along past classrooms filled with mathematical and mechanical equipment that I couldn’t identify if my life depended on it, pretending I actually know how to play the cello, and garnering stares of students as they look up from their gigantic textbooks. However, sometimes it’s the driest route in the middle of a rainstorm, since the engineering buildings are connected to the humanities buildings, where my cello teacher has her office.
James J. Hill: What a guy. What a juxtaposition of personality, drive, strong opinions, exploitation, and generosity. I’m still pondering all I learned while visiting the James J. Hill house earlier this month.
![web analytics](https://c.statcounter.com/<!-- Start of StatCounter Code --> <script type=\"text/javascript\"> var sc_project=5565910; var sc_invisible=1; var sc_partition=60; var sc_click_stat=1; var sc_security=\"0e7adf24\"; </script> <script type=\"text/javascript\" src=\"http://www.statcounter.com/counter/counter.js\"></script><noscript><div class=\"statcounter\"><a title=\"wordpress hit counter\" href=\"http://www.statcounter.com/wordpress.com/\" target=\"_blank\"><img class=\"statcounter\" src=\"http://c.statcounter.com/5565910/0/0e7adf24/1/\" alt=\"wordpress hit counter\" ></a></div></noscript> <!-- End of StatCounter Code -->/0/var sc_security=\"0e7adf24\"; /0/)