No Revelie on the Reverie Harp

Today's Pioneer Press Washington County section has a story on a Stillwater company's Reverie Harp. It was designed by Matt Edwards of Musicmakers, a local retail and catalog merchant of stringed instruments and kits to build your own. They offer the harp in kit form or ready-built and it has become their best seller. People love it because anyone can play it. You can't hit a bad note. It is tuned so that all the strings are in accord and a person can play it without lessons.

Our daughter worked for this company for almost ten years and Matt is the young man who filled her job when she left. I was thrilled to hear of the company's success with the instrument.

This easy to play instrument is reported to be soothing and used during pregnancy, labor and with hospitalized patients. Even a child can play.

Link to website: Scroll down left column to the light green area and click on "sound" for a page with audio samples. I like the effect when it is played with dulcimer hammers.

http://www.harpkit.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=revfin&Category_Code=

Field of Dreams

I'd bet most Chicagoans still say Marshall Fields instead of Macy. Now they find the Sears Tower has been sold and will be renamed Willys Towers. What next? Juicy Fruit Field?

Naming rights to raise funds has been a growing concern. We have Target Center and Target Field is being built for the Twins to play baseball outdoors. The U of MN got a big donation to name their new football stadium. It is getting harder to follow which team they are talking about when they broadcast from the different ball parks around the nation. Many have new stadiums with corporate names that don't identify the place.

Recently the Vikings team made another pitch for a new stadium. Currently the Vikings, Twins and MN Gophers share rent on the HHH Metrodome. Stadiums for the Twins and Gophers are under construction. I guess the Vikings feel left out. Vikings management suggested we think of building them a stadium as a stimulus to local economy. Think of all the construction jobs. (Don't think of the billion dollar price.) Since the Vikings usually self-destruct at the end of each season there hasn't been a lot of good will to build them fancier digs.

Like you, I am sick of hearing about the "Octomom". The woman seems like an idiot, but one can't help but feel concern for her children, although not enough concern for me to send a donation. I have ambivalent feelings. I hopes she finds a way to care for and feed them but I am not responsible. Then...viola! An idea. Naming rights. Why hasn't anyone thought of that? There are eight kids. Lots of possibilities. Maybe she could even lend her pseudonym (Octomom) to a sequel to that James Bond movie. Lots of possibilities for childrens names: Victoria- sponsorerd by the lingerie store.

Wally, by the world's largest retailer. Might even get some diapers from them.

Macy is a neat name.

How about Olympia? It might offset some of the bad publicity one of their heroes created.

Even Bernie Madoff might tell where he buried the money for a little image improvement.

Bernie Madoff With the Money

By Jane Celeste the Pest

Bernie made-off with a stash
Of his trusting investors’ cash
But now justice may have come
They've incarcerated the bum
And he’s wishing he could make a dash.

Bernie expressed his regret
One day in jail has made him fret
No Rolex or no yacht
Just a stainless steel pot
Things won’t get much better, not yet.

You must show us the money
No 67 million for your honey
You stole from your friends
And must make amends
Others futures are now not so sunny

While he’s lounging in jail
Getting tons of hate mail
The Feds audit his books
Thinking there were more crooks
In the scam and there must be a trail.

Where did the fifty billion go?
Banks in Switzerland? Curacao?
It’s time to confess
Let’s have some justice
There is plenty of room at Gitmo.

We'll Miss the Swiss

I was raised in the central Minnesota town of Little Falls. Two local businesses were Simonet's Funeral Home and Simonet's Furniture store. When we moved to Stillwater we also had a Simonet's Funeral Home and Simonet's Furniture. The families were related distantly. The Simonets emigrated from Switzerland in the mid-1800's. Years ago the furniture makers made the caskets and the two businesses were a natural pairing.

Simonet's Furniture in Stillwater was a main street fixture for years. A decade or so ago they moved up the hill into a new building. The same family has owned and managed the store for five generations. This week my good friend Mary, whose great-grandfather started the business in 1864 told me they were going out of business. Bad economic times have taken their toll.

In the 80's the store made news by breaking a record for the longest run of an employee in the same job. A local woman became their bookkeeper when she was about 16 yrs old. She stayed in her job until she was around 90, if memory serves me correctly. The last years she used a walker to accomodate an aging body. Her mind stayed as sharp as ever. The owner of the store gave her a ride to work each morning. What nice small town values, a faithful employee and accomodating employer. When she retired, they probably computerized their records.

You can't read the small print on the sign on the back of the truck, but it says "we retired the horses in 1913." Now we are going to retire the store in 2009. We will miss the good service from a local store where you could buy a piece of furniture in the morning and have it delivered free the same afternoon.

Almost 6 Months Old Already

New Realities and Old

It's March, it's Minnesota and we had another "tournament blizzard" yesterday. The metro escaped with a glazing of ice and little snow, but outstate got hit hard. Actually, in Minnesota we refer to everything north of the twin cities as "up north". If you look at a map you will notice "the cities" are in the lower fourth of the state geographically. We have been conditioned to look for the tournament storms. Years ago there were two tournament weekends in March: the hockey and basketball tournaments. Now, I believe they run almost the whole of the month. We have divisions according to gender and size of the school. Hence you might have AAA, AA, and A boys basketball and repeat that with girls' sports and duplicate it with hockey. You see we have a lot of tournaments in March. The poor Minnesota Wild Hockey team has trouble scheduling home games.
Might as well face it--it snows in March.
The poor Minnesotan is not only bombarded by freezing rain and snow, we have to contend with daily updates on election results. You had forgotten about the election, hadn't you. We are not so lucky. Our senatorial contest is still being contested in court. Both sides are spending someones' money picking at nits. Norm Coleman finallly suggested a week ago that we vote over. It is hard to imagine anyone feeling good about any decision that comes down. This is ruining our squeeky clean political image. Wouldn't a coin flip work? An article in Newsweek this week proposed another solution. Vote over with two new candidates. I think I heard a loud AMEN from the populus.
Times have been strange.
-- You can buy a couple shares of GE or GM stock for less than a Happy Meal.
--Michael Jackson still has fans in the UK and is touring again.
-- The former CEO of Countryside Mortgages who helped topple our empire with bad mortgages is getting rich buying up houses at firesale prices.
-- Bernie Madoff is about to plead guilty if his wife can keep some spending money----$67 million.
Friday I finally sold off part of my IRA that was invested in "financials". It had lost so much I thought I might as well take what was left before it was Zero. Yesterday Citi Bank announced a 4 biillion dollar profit and the stock market soared. Maybe I should keep an eye on what that CEO of Countryside is doing or invest in Michael Jackson memorabilia.

Simply Amazing

My sister sent me this link to an amazing You Tube video called "Regeneration of Cells". I thought it was another video about reuse of cell phones.
No destruction of human embryos needed for this scientific miracle. Do you think this just happens or are we not wonderfully made by a very "intelligent designer".
This may be a very good place to invest---probably better than Citi Bank or GM

.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qxhi4Q8EDTU&NR=1