Terry, Norma, and Katie's mom Pat. Of course, Pat had a big party to welcome us to Decorah for Nordic Fest.
Main Street, US...um, Decorah. Each of those little huts has something different for sale.
There were all these tents up in the streets, too, where people were telling jokes, singing songs or dancing.
See?
I'm led to believe that Decorah is a typical little midwest town. I've never understood the term midwest. There's the west, and the east, and the middle. To California, is Iowa in the mideast?
Hilarity.
This is varma polse, (varr-muh pole-suh) which is a special kind of sausage wrapped in a kind of crepe-thing called lefse. (leff-suh) Oh, and that's a $1.50 beer there. Sheesh.
Katie loves her varma polse. Look, she made that little bracelet she's wearing.
This is Your Place. That's the name of the bar, guaranteed to have caused many hilarious/irritating confusions. (Same as that restaurant in St. John's called "My Brother's Place.")
Oh, I got right artistic.
Katie and her mom.
Well, Katie's dad has a tiki hut in his backyard. He's retired and likes Jimmy Buffett and the drink.
That's Josh with Katie there. He's going/gone to Nepal, I believe.
Visiting Reed's house is like going to a timeshare. Nice spot. His basement (straight through that door there) got a little flooded during the big floods in Iowa, but the damage wasn't too bad.
There's Reed himself!
Katie's buddies Luke and Ben contemplate the anti-mosquito candle which Ben had sat on.
Ben was kind enough to re-enact the sitting-on-of-the-candle.
It's a palm tree.
Then night fell.
Another of Katie's friends, James. Luke remains unimpressed.
Herkie. He's a hawk.
(Part of) Reedo's basement. Reminds me of my uncle Robert's house when I was a kid. Except Robert actually worked for Coca-Cola.
The basement is well-appointed.
This is what the tiki hut and environs look like all lit up at night.
Hey, it's that palm tree again.
Found poetry in the men's bathroom: If it's wet, drink it. If it's dry, smoke it. If it's moving, fuck it. If it's not moving, load it in the truck. Git R DONE!
I had to wonder if it was misspelled on purpose.
Everybody turns out for the big parade on Main Street. How cliche, and yet, natural.
I mean, look at that. With the flags over the street and everything, and the blond, blue-eyed children. Damn.
Speaking of which, here's Anna, Aimery and Aaron. Aimery belongs to Anna, and Anna and Aaron are Katie's cousins.
Cute kid.
The cops led off the parade.
The guy in the middle with the blue flag is Katie's Uncle Glenn.
Decorah is mostly Norwegian. In case you couldn't tell.
Check out the little train.
There's "Lit'l Pokey."
Big Pokey, I presume. 'Voiture' is French for 'car,' and 'chemin de fer' is 'railway.'
Army truck. I dunno; I thought it was kind of sad. There were only like three guys in the trailer attached to the back. Americans are kind of weird about their military.
Check the mayor in his Beetle. I guess he's the old guy in the back.
Wow, it's Ole's Lefse Queens. Okay, hold on, hold on. The theme for this year's Nordic Fest was "Ole and Lena's Lefse, Lutefisk and Laughs." Jesus. Ole and Lena are kind of like the stereotypical Norwegian folks. (Like Uncle Mose, or the old ladies from CODCO's Wake of the Week skits are for Newfoundlanders.) Lefse is a crepe-y sort of flat thing. Lutefisk is some horrifying type of dried cod that some people love. Laughs.. well, I'll be honest, I have no idea what laughs are.
It makes sense, it does.
There's Katie's mom again. She's a Lena. The crowd loved them.
I think Katie and her cousin were shouting at these ladies, but I have no idea who they were.
Cheerleaders. *clap* *clap* All right! *clap*
We watched the parade. We got to sit in these chairs, and it's a good goddamn thing. The parade was over an hour-and-a-half long. OMG SRSLY? YA SRSLY.
Norwegian humour.
Real horsie!
This thing was awesome. Totally steampunk. It was all hissing, clattering gears.
The bagpipes stopped and played a little song for us.
Then the priest. I forget, but I think he was telling jokes.
The Snow Queen and Princess were waving in time together, allowing me to get the funniest picture of the day...
Heil!
There was no shortage of tractors.
Nothin' runs like this thing.
The League of Women Voters was in full effect in their bitchin' ride. Driven by a man. A-hem.
I almost fell over. What a title.
*stunned silence*
Okay, now you're just fucking with me.
Strap the massive cow to the boat trailer, boys, the parade's today.
I kind of wished they had more tractors, though.
Then we listened to some bluegrass singers later on.
Katie decided to join the army.
Some sort of thing was going on here at the court house.
There was a little orchestra giving a concert.
Yes, I know, I know.
Oh, so, good story. We're driving over to James' house, and we pass this mob of girls walking down the road, slightly the worse for wear. We pull over when we realize...
That the girl second from the right is Katie's brother's girlfriend Jenny and her family, after having been "tubing," which apparently involves stripping one's hands of flesh on a rope, floating down a river on inner tubes, getting loaded drunk, and losing both of your shoes. But, Adam, you say, Jenny still has one of her shoes. Well, true, but she lost both of _hers_. That one on her foot is one she randomly found on the way back. I fucking love Jenny. She's awesome.
Glorious.
Back to Your Place that night. The beer garden let out after the fireworks, and it was madness. Everybody was piling into the bar.
James was feeling a little blurry.
So, by the end of the night, we were all finished. We all piled into (Katie's aunt) Lara's van and zoomed back to Reed's again. Jenny felt safe, I think. The other girls are Lara's old buddies from high school or something. I think they babysat Katie.
Lara was the queen shit. Everybody likes her. Except me. Fucking Lara. What a dick.
Pat and Katie.
Oh, I loves being a viking.
It's a tauntaun!
Good for keeping you alive in a blizzard.
We ended up going to meet our good friends Jody and Oliver in Minnesota, and, can you believe it, the only time I got the camera out was to take a picture of this "Little Canada" sign. That's terrible. While we were with Jody and Oliver, we had bonfires, barbecues and went to see The Dark Knight at the IMAX. So fun. Huh. Anyway, thus endeth Adam's Trip to the Midwest II: Trip to the Midwester.
