A Leisurely Saturday

Ah, the weather is finally warming up again and today it reached the fifties. That works for me. It was such a great day for a drive, we decided to check out the monthly flea market at Ft. Dodge. We usually get there most warm weather months and a couple of times during the winter. I lucked out and found a vendor selling paperbacks for only fifty cents again so I picked up 4 more. This time I got Thrown Away Child by Thomas Adcock © 1996 which is a Neil Hockaday mystery that takes place in New Orleans; Stars by Kathryn Harvey © 1892 which is about a luxury resort by that name; The Rock Child by Win Blevins © 1998, a historical novel that takes place in the west of 1962; and Vanish with the Rose by Barbara Michaels ©1992 which is about a lawyer's undercover search for her missing brother.

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After we had lunch we left Ft. Dodge heading east and north. We made our way to Eagle Grove. We were driving around looking at the town and we drove through the county fairgrounds. There was a dog there that started following alongside our pickup. Jim has a ball on his antenna and it was making a shadow on the ground behind the dog. The dog happened to look back and saw this shadow chasing him and he kept trying to outrun it. He would run a little ways, look back and see it was about to catch him so he'd run faster, look again, run, look, run, look. He kept doing that and we were cracking up laughing. It's a good thing we finally turned so that shadow didn't get him.

We then went back south and east to Woolstock. Just outside of Woolstock we were lucky enough to spot about 8 bald eagles sitting on the ice of a partially frozen quarry pond, feeding on something. I love seeing these magnificent birds.

From Woolstock we headed over to hwy. 69 and then south. There are hundreds of large wind-power generators which are spread around the southern Wright/northern Hamilton County area. The terrain in that area is pretty flat so you can see many of them at the same time. It's like something out of a futuristic movie. They're so huge but you don't hear any noise driving near them and they don't seem to move very fast when looking up at them from the ground. It's my understanding that the landowners get compensated fairly well for leasing land to the energy companies and letting them erect the towers. It's a great way to earn some extra income and help provide clean energy.

We hit the outlet mall at Story City but it doesn't offer much anymore. About half of the store spaces are empty. They have a large VF outlet store, a Black & Decker, 2 shoe stores, a flower & gift shop, a kitchen store, a store for dance clothes (leotards, etc.), a Van Huesen's, and 2 women's clothing stores. There used to be a toy store, a card & paper products store, another shoe store, and a store that sold towels, bedding, etc.. They're supposed to close at 8 on Saturday nights but 2 of the stores were already closed when we got there at 7. Jim bought some socks and we left.