On The Way Home

This is a picture taken from a rest stop in Montana. It looks like this all the way from just outside of Billings to the northern border of Denver.

We stopped here on the way back from Denver. They are a real truck stop on the 25 near Loveland CO with very good cinnamon rolls. Keep your eye open as the exit comes up on you kind of suddenly.

At the same Johnson's Corner there is a very large RV dealer whose salesmen look a little sad these days. They didn't even try to show us the big Class As, see below, sitting all over the lot. These class Bs, above, look fairly nice. The engine is a Mercedes Benz diesel, supposedly getting about 19-20 mpg. Only able to haul about 2000 lbs. though.

A Visit to the Auctioneer

A quiet, slightly seedy place on Broadway near downtown Denver, looking like it sells old fire engines. If you miss a whole lot of Saturday morning garage sales, this is the place to go.

Just in case you wondered where all those slide rules that we nerds used to use went when calculators came into fashion, many of them are stored here. They are in excellent shape and would make a great present for the young mathematician with some interest in the history of the field. They also have instruction manuals.

The collector of this collection started with his father's stuff, which he didn't know what to do with; and then his own stuff, most of which he sold. Only the really good stuff did he keep.

As you can see, this little mini-museum has been around since the middle of the last century.

Rosie's Diner in Denver

I forget exactly where this is. Somewhere in Denver. We found it by looking for some other place which we had trouble finding and we were getting hungry so we decided to take a chance on a fancy 50s nostalgia trip. It was very good. See below.

Rosie's had an old fashioned juke box in which I thought I saw an old 45 rpm record spinning, until I looked a little closer and noted that it was really a modern CD.

This was an excellent "mac and cheese" with bacon bits and garlic bread. Very, very good.

Good Eats on the 25 in Colorado

I can't quite figure out how I missed this place on the way south but I did, and was lucky to spot it, thanks to an alert wife, on the way back north. The exit from the 25 going north is a funny little curving turn that looks like it might not accomodate some of the bigger trucks which probably have to use the frontage road and exit (I think it was exit 254) earlier than we did. The re-entrances are a long way on the frontage road in either direction.

Anyway, the place is Johnson's Corner, near Loveland CO, advertised as a truck stop but it is a little more than that. Maybe it started as a truck stop back in the olden days on Hwy 87 but when Interstate 25 came along it really struck gold. It's big. So it's been there since the 50s and is justly famous for their cinnamon rolls, almost dinner-plate size and slathered with lots of sweet things. Carol and I shared one as an appetizer while waiting for our breakfast.

Sorry, we were both so hungry and life getting shorter by the minute, we tore into the roll before I thought to take a picture of it. Next time, I promise. We were going to just sample it, then take the rest along in the car, but it was so gooey that we just had to eat it right there.

The breakfast was: hash (the corned beef version, not short for hashish; and certainly not the computer version) & eggs were excellent as was the "early burger" their version of sausage, egg & cheese on a bun. The hash brown potatoes were better than average, in fact they were actually good. This would be a good place to stop for breakfast, and probably lunch and dinner too, and to get your RV fixed I suppose, or buy a Harley: They are both very close and on the frontage road. The waitresses are pleasant and hard working. I can't think of anything remotely critical to say about the place unless it was that re-entry to the 25 thing but you feel so good after the meal that that minor problem is not so big as you might think.

Lots of normal people eat here and wait on table too.

They even have a chapel.

A Few Days in the Duke's City of New Mexico

Fountain in downtown Albuquerque. That is abuela Carol and nieto Diego in front of her.

St Philip de Neri Church in the middle of Old Town, Albuquerque

Wednesday morning we spent walking around Old Town. Lunch at La Placita.

Eating at NYPD Pizza Place in downtown Albuquerque. Carol, Sharon & Diego. Only fair: good pizza, bad service.

Central Ave, formerly Hwy 66 from Chicago to Los Angeles, going through the middle of Albuquerque and the middle of a lot of other towns as well, the way highways were built when I was a boy. In the 40s we would sit glued to the windows of our car.

Sign on pedestrian walkway in Albuquerque, about 4th and Central Ave (aka Rte 66)

Gigantic dessert served by two waiters at Rte 66 Diner on Central Ave ABQ.
Somehow I'm not surprised that these folks ordered this dessert.

Rte 66 Diner ABQ

New Orthodox Church on 4th St ABQ, just down the street from Catholic and Protestant churches.

Corn is higher than your head by 1 Aug in ABQ. Taken on residential street a few blocks from Sharon and Leo's house in the Barelas neighborhood.

Native American sellers of nice jewelry in Old Town ABQ

Trouble in Wyoming

We were sailing smartly down the 25, stopping every other hour or so to let us and Mag the Dog do our duties, fill up on gas, and check out the Subways and McDonald's on the way to Albuquerque. Wyoming is surprisingly green for August and hazy too, I suppose from wild fires.

By the way, if anyone is interested, the Subway breakfast sandwiches are at least as good if not better than the McDonald's. We stopped at a rest stop 15 or so miles beyond Douglas and our Saab died electrically right there. No rhythm in the old ticker. This was the middle of nowhere at 3pm on a Friday afternoon. AAA eventually found someone to haul us in to Douglas, where we learned that the "high-end" techs would be back on Monday and the parts could probably be ordered from Denver then and we would be good to go on Tuesday or maybe Wednesday. They would be glad to phone around for a room for us to stay 'til then. Hmm.

We learned that a taxi service had recently opened in Douglas. They were capable and willing to take us to Casper for $60 where we found a very useful car rental agency at the Natrona International Airport, a nice place with Delta, Northwest, United and maybe some smaller airlines willing to take us to Salt Lake City, Minneapolis or Denver, but we would have to wait until the following day. [Added later: if you are approaching Casper Airport from the south, do not expect to see a sign telling you where to turn off the 25. It is 4 to 6 miles west of town on the north side and says to "Shoshoni."]

We took a small Hyundai SUV for the week and found it excellent, getting anywhere from 24 to 27 mph, depending on what we were doing. The only problem we had was that we had brought along some cassette tapes and the Hyundai only had a CD player.

More Modest Proposals

Heading toward Albuquerque on Friday to check out a grandson who has recently started talking.

Never leave home without first consulting George Motz's Hamburger America. Sadly, I see no places mentioned in Wyoming, though I distinctly remember a pretty good joint on the 80 around Rock Springs. I think I even have a menu framed somewhere. Maybe they specialized in fish.

Bud's Place in Sedalia CO is on the list, as well as couple of places in New Mexico: Bobcat Bite in Santa Fe and Owl Bar & Cafe in San Antonio. New Mexico is a little tricky in that they name some of their small towns after bigger places in other states, or maybe it is the other way around as some of the folks in NM have been there a long time. Will let you know.

A Visit to Hustisford

This is a shot of the wooden stairs going to the second floor of the house on Mill St. Upstairs is where Mr Johnson lived. He was the high school history teacher as well as being in charge of all the music. Interesting guy. I guess it is now OK to say that he was gay. They did things differently in those days.

Patriotic Russ Mueller is exploring the basement of the house where there seemed to be a card game going on most weekends with Mr Schlicht, principal and superintendant of the schools, Mr Lehmann, assistant postmaster of the village, and Mr Mueller, County clerk for Dodge Co, the usual suspects present. This is where I learned to swear. Dad used to do fish fries down here on Fridays as well. I guess there were some things the Catholics and Lutherans agreed upon in those days. The smell of the fish is no longer there. I can't remember any Catholic friends except the Wills. I remember my paternal grandmother telling a story about some unexpected good thing a lady had done for her. The punch line was: "und dat lady vas a Catlick!"


Here are the two gigantic maples that grew from the little saplings planted by Walde H Mueller in the back yard of our house on Mill St in 1972.


A view of the back porch of the house. It needs a little work. We used to have a barbecue on that porch. It is a wonder we didn't burn it down.


One of the stained glass windows in the house on Mill St that Peg and Joan remember from their childhood visits. I only lived here about a year before leaving home for Carroll College. When we left for England in 1972 my father planted two little maple saplings in honor of Peg and Joan. See above for the result.

Here is the whole group of pilgrims. The present owners are doing a big job of rehabilitation and were very kind to let us tramp around the house and take pictures of everything. See above and below for more.


The Rock River was very high and running fast. It overflowed its banks as you can see here. The fishing won't be that good until the water settles down.


This is a more or less unchanged part of Main St in Hustisford WI. We lived in the two buildings at the left. The furthest left was the meat market my father owned from about 1947 to 1957. We lived in the apartment above. The second house we moved to after moving from my grandfather's house on the south end of the village where we lived during the war. (WWII that is). It was actually owned by Otto Hensel. When my mother excitedly called in a report of a chimney fire to the operator—our telephone # was 6, simply 6—who lived and worked in the next building down the street she said the fire was on the roof of the Hensel house so the operator sent the Fire Department to the south side of the village where Mr Hensel lived.



No visit to Hustisford is complete without a quick stop at the cemetery. The names on the stones remind us of our past and future.

Mueller Melee II

A smiling Mitch Mueller at Mueller Melee June 2008. Does he know something the rest of us do not?

Tim and Joelle Mueller, not quite newlyweds anymore, at Mueller Melee, June 2008.

An effort at self-photography with Joan laughing at my efforts. She may have snorted during the process, I'm not sure, we were both fairly merry by this time.

Matt Mueller and scary Aunt Joan, Mueller Melee, June 2008

Brother and sister Arlen and Ardis, Mueller Melee June 2008. It looks like Ardis is not quite believing what Arlen is saying. But then, have older sibs ever believed younger sibs? I remember Gerald telling me the facts of life when we were quite young. Of course, I didn't believe him.

Northern Bay Resort: a little inlet from a wide place in the Wisconsin River; fairly new.

Peg early morning dreaming at Northern Bay Resort

Five cousins in the Wisconsin River shallows: Matt, Nick, Matt, Zack and Mitch

Close-up of Nick Mazzuca doing some reading. What else?

Carly Mueller and oldest daughter Isabella at Mueller Melee.