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Good Morning

Wow, aren't they beautiful. hope you have as many this morning.

Did everyone see this about Pasty Cam's Sgt. Nate?


Armed Forces Day Noted, Soldier Honored
By JANE NORDBERG, Gazette Writer

SOUTH RANGE - At the third stop on a day-long visit to the central and western Upper Peninsula Saturday, U.S. Rep. Bart Stupak took time out to honor a local soldier.

Stupak, D-Menominee, attended the Armed Forces Day celebrations at VFW Post No. 6165 in South Range where he met with Sgt. Nathan Tormala, who recently returned home to the Copper Country after a year in Bagram, Afghanistan.
"I just wanted to come by and say thank you," Stupak said to Tormala, amid tears and admiring glances from the soldier's friends and family.

Tormala, a medic who returned to the area May 6, said he had heard rumors that the congressman would be at the celebrations but remained skeptical until Saturday night.

"I wasn't really sure he would show, but it's awesome that he's here," Tormala said.

Stupak said he was "grateful to servicemen like Nathan," and said it was important to him to keep the soldiers in his thoughts. "Armed Forces Day is the perfect time to show that gratitude," he said.

Junior Vice Post Commander Butch Paavola said Stupak had always been very supportive of the post and had attended last year's Armed Forces Day events as well.

"He is a great supporter of the armed services and this post in particular," Paavola said of the statesman. "We are continually thankful to him for making the time to stop by whenever he is in the area."

Stupak's previous stops Saturday included a social security forum in Marquette, and an Ontonagon community roundtable regarding the dredging of the Ontonagon River. Despite the grueling schedule, Stupak said the South Range post was one of his favorite stops.

"They are one of the most active posts in the U.P.," he said. "They always seem to be doing something, so if anywhere near them, I like to see what's going on."

WOW!!!

Awesome article on Sgt. Tormala. I also like the picture the Marquette Mining Journal ran when he came home and met warml by his girlfriend! Hope he framed that one.

After looking at the photo and messages from the past with the finches, I'm wondering where our old friends are from the past couple years? How about WALTER P, TAMPA. or Bthecuteone, the truck driver from Oklahoma or the lady from Houston? I miss their input. How about Mr. Wheatman?

Hello, Ms. Katie, I am still here. I read the PastyCam on an almost daily basis. Thank you for almost missing me. (Some might argue that point with you.) Bthecute1

Oh, and I am not a truck driver from Oklahoma. :)

Beverly,

Aaaaah c'mon you can be honest with us about being the truck driver from Oklahoma. :)

Sur5er, Heaven help anyone, if I got behind the wheel of a truck. (Anysize) It would most certainly be a demolition derby. :) I can just hear those gears agrinding right now. No, I like it simple. The R-N-D and C method and I must say, I like to drive fast (Allways ahead of the traffic) The only truck I ever drove I backed it thru the garage door and out the other side, and now they won't let me have a garage. :) Oh well, I have to make do. I could have parked it in the house.

Beverly, So you did a 'little' renovating with the truck and the guys will never forgive you. What's up with that?
For the entertainment pleasure of the local police department, hubby would give me driving lessons in the semi in the school parking lot on Sunday. First Sunday, there was one patrol car watching 'Semi Driving 101'...second Sunday, there were a few more patrol cars scoping out 'the little lady in the big semi crusin round the parking lot'.
I kept forgetting that what is considered 'first gear' on the stick shift in a car, is actually 'reverse' on a semi. I remembered that, after I went to pull out of a loading dock one day, in what I believed was first gear, and kept slamming back into the loading dock.
The first time it happened, I thought I wasn't giving the ole semi enough gas and was rolling backwards. So I tried it the second time, and really gave it the gas, and let off the clutch and dang if I didn't hit that loading dock really really hard again.
And hubby being a man, never let me forget that one...same as you with the truck and the garage. What gives?

The pretty flowering shrub in Monday's Cam picture is an Amelanchier, also known as shadbush, Juneberry, and sericeberry. There are a dozen or more varities, but this one, growing wild in the U.P. is probably Amelanchier arborea, downy Juneberry. Those who may have mistaken it for magnolia probably just didn't realize this photo is much larger than life! Flowers are quite small in reality. I used to pick and eat the berries where they grew back by my outhouse. Not as nearly wonderful as thimbleberries, but a treat none-the-less.

Sur5er: The bet was 'I bet she can't drive it'. That was their first mistake. I figure, if I can get it through the back wall of the garage....you lose. :) And don't you know, it was full of construction material. Didn't even have to unload it. Now don't you think that was accommodating? :)

Beverly, The guys also have to keep in mind that reconstruction was covered by the car insurance...or would it be the house insurance...or perhaps both? Heck, that's why we women carry car insurance, right...to use it.
Picturing the looks on the guys faces when you "conviently" unloaded the truck for them. That had to have been a Kodak moment.
Heck, we might just get us a job in one of those car insurance commericals. "State Farm...we're there when you forget where reverse is located on the gear shift of a semi."