Well things have been real mixed up for me this time out in Minneapolis. Soon after I arrived out here and was made to feel at home by my niece Kim and her husband Nicolas, I started to feel miserable. I felt so sick one evening they decided to take me to the hospital. I was addle-headed and they found that my lungs had started to collect liquid. So by 12:45 am they had me in a two-patient room. Next day they told me I was having heart and kidney failure. They thought I might have to go on a defibrillator or a pacemaker. The doctor on the floor thought medication might be the answer. After the male R.N. had put a heavy belt on me and taken me for a long walk, they stopped talking about any mechanical help. So now I'm on a low-salt diet. 

 This is Sunday and yesterday pm, Luty got to feeling so bad they took her to the hospital where they found she had an infection and was dehydrated. She was much better this morning and Kim has gone to visit her. 

 The weather was mild when I first got here and I accused Nicolas of stapling the hand of the big thermometer right outside the window which hung at 40 degrees for days till we got a little snow and some colder weather. 

 The winter has been a big disappointment and a financial looser to many of the natives out here. Ice fishing is so big a part of many of the peoples' lives that furnish bait and fishing supplies, that not having thick enough ice to even but sure of safe travel with a snow machine is a real hardship. A man on a snow mobile went through the ice the other day and was not found right away. 

 Nicolas and his big yellow Lab, who is treated like a member of the family, go for a long cross country ski trip in the mornings. 

 Jim tells me that things are going well at home and the doctor says I should have someone by me when I walk on the treadmill and that I should have someone cook me salt-free meal every day. Tom is going to give it a shot being my caretaker. I should soon know what it feels like to leave the 00 people and join the 01s. 

 Right now Nicolas is painting one of his favorite types of pictures showing things that are not there. He is showing, on the front of two side tables, two snowy Egrets. It looks as though one bird is picking among the green growth in the drawer to make a nest. For Luty and me to be cooked for and waited on by hands that can do such things is thought-provoking. Kim is very kind hearted, too.