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April 4th - the great blue heron is back. Also, three male Mallard ducks flew in yesterday. The ponds are full of Bradford Pear blossoms that are both beautiful and bound to clog filters later on. john installed a backflush connection to each of the two inch outlets from the large pond. He now can turn off the valve to the pump, connect a garden hose and backflush the drains when they do get clogged.
April 5th - 80 degrees and the sun is shining. Here comes the green algae in the ponds. The water lilies are starting to leaf out.
April 24th - As you can see, no entries have been made since April 5th. The quote "These are the best of times, these are the worst of times" certain applies to the last three weeks.
First, the best of times....
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joyce and john's good friends from Denmark, Lisa and Ulf, came for a visit April 12 -14. joyce and john met them at the airport the evening of the 12th and then went to dinner with them that evening. On April 13th, Lisa and Ulf came to zenpond for a champagne bunch. | |
| joyce and john gave Lisa and Ulf a glass fish to remind them of their visit to zenpond. |
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That evening, Lisa, Ulf, joyce and john were
invited to General Sharp's home at Fort Leavenworth. The dinner
was in Ulf's honor as he was being inducted into the Command and
Staff College Hall of Fame. Here is the floral centerpiece at
the dinner. The dishes were U.S. Embassy and the goblets, Waterford.
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General Sharp presented Ulf, a major general
and Commander of the Danish Home Guard (60,000 troops), with a
Stetson hat to celebrate the occasion. Ulf had wondered why his
secretary back at his office in Denmark had asked for his hat
size.
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Now for the worst of times... On the morning of April 14th, joyce and john received a phone call to come to St. Louis as quickly as possible, as joyce's mother was dying of colon cancer. They apologized that they could not be in attendance for Ulf's induction ceremony and headed for St. Louis. Just east of Columbia MO, about two hours still from St. Louis, they received another call asking where they were, because it would not be long now. By the time joyce and john reached St. Louis, Mom had passed away 1/2 hour before. joyce and her sisters wept by the bed until Mom was taken to the funeral home an hour later. joyce and john had spent a week with Mom just three weeks before and it had been a really nice visit with Mom remembering how she met Dad and some of the early years of their marriage. (Dad had literally been a shepard in the hills outside Athens while he was growing up.) joyce and john are still in grief at this time. |
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