Here’s a correction and a little more information on what I wrote yesterday about the XTO application to drill for oil beside the Elkhorn Ranch. The hearing on XTO’s application is in front of the Oil and Gas Division of the North Dakota Industrial Commission, not the full Industrial Commission itself. That means the oil … Continue reading Just West Of Ruby Tuesday’s

Okay, next crisis. There seems to be one every day for people like us who are concerned about the impact the oil industry is having on western North Dakota. Negative impact, that is. There are lots of positive impacts. I take note of those, and am grateful, like every other North Dakotan. It’s the negative … Continue reading Come Early, Stay Late

There’s a big building on the edge of downtown Bismarck that’s home to many civic functions, concerts, basketball tournaments and recreational uses by the community. But it’s not big enough, in the minds of Bismarck city leaders, for the kinds of events the city is capable of hosting. Seating is too limited. It should be … Continue reading Where Should We Build A Civic Center? Ask Harold and Evan and Dave

There is an AP story about the 2013 North Dakota Moose and Elk License Proclamation on the Grand Forks Herald’s website today that is very confusing to me. The story is basically a short version of the press release sent out by the North Dakota Game and Fish Department this past Monday. It says that … Continue reading A Question For The ND Game And Fish Department: Do You Think We’re Stupid?

Count Bighorn Sheep as another casualty of North Dakota’s oil boom. The North Dakota Game and Fish Department has moved what’s left of a herd of Bighorn Sheep away from heavily traveled U.S. Highway 85 in the North Dakota Bad Lands to protect them from the heavy truck traffic on the highway. The move comes … Continue reading Watch Out For The Bighorns

When you take a nearly 12,000 mile driving trip, you get a lot of time to think. Lillian and I did that this winter, and we learned a lot about the country we live in. But we learned something else about ourselves: We’re both pretty comfortable in our own skin. And because of that, we … Continue reading Where Are The Big Ideas?

Okay, I promised myself I would do a wrapup on our winter trip, to look back on when we get old, and remember all the thing we could do when we were young. I’ll have to say, first of all, that it was surely the best winter of my life, simply because of the overwhelming … Continue reading From My Cold, Dead Wrist

There’s talk in the Legislature about getting us new license plates. We’ve had the same one for 20 years, so it’s natural someone in the Legislative or Executive branch of state government would be getting antsy about getting new ones. We’ve never gone so long without changing plates before. In the early days of automobile … Continue reading Two Sentinels

Okay, Day 32 on our quest to stay warm this winter under the guise of seeing national parks, dead presidents’ graves, and dead authors’ houses. We’ve seen a bunch of each of them, and with another 30 days, at least, to go, we’re going to see a bunch more. For the record, right now we … Continue reading Dead Authors, National Parks and Biscuits

Well, 12 days on the road with spouse Lillian, approaching 3,000 miles on the odometer, and we find ourselves in the lap of luxury at the Inn at The Biltmore in Asheville, NC, built and managed by the descendants of Cornelius Vanderbilt, who endowed Vanderbilt University, where Lillian did her graduate work. It hasn’t always … Continue reading North Carolina, So Far . . .