with all further ado: on five-Ks, friends and fin(n)erans

CTHULHU SLIPPERS ♥ BUY ME THESE

Hello! I haven't been posting too much recently, other than the odd link or pic. So here's what's been happening lately:

i ran a 5k... yup • had a music party • LEFT MONTANA :( • stayed a few days with my aunt amy, uncle erik and cuz emily in bismarck • ran out of gas in the middle of north dakota and had to be rescued by "Triple A-my" • got carded at a random irish pub • made a midnight run to DQ with emily in the pouring rain... we couldn't see the road, and the radio kept telling us to seek shelter immediately. plus, the drive-thru wasn't operating, so we walked to the window, and stood there in the pouring rain in our sundresses and raincoats, which, as it turned out, were not actually raincoats, but windbreakers that were not the slightest bit waterproof. needless to say, we were SOAKED. • the cute baby owls in the tree outside the window at amy's... i love them • stayed with aunt jayne and uncle bill in moline • did some school shopping. :P. • arrived in wisconsin! new state for me... never been here! i love it! • got to our friend sylvia's condo in west side madison

So the past couple days I've been lounging on the HUGE deck in a hammock, reading Ernest Thompson Seton. I love Wisconsin! And Madison! Sylvia, who's my family's best friend, retired this year and moved to the condo in Madison. Her condo is above a library (!), a coffee shop (!!) and an ice cream shop (!!!). Her deck/terrace is huge, with two hammocks! It's really cool.

Today, we went off in the car, in search of the Finneran family farm. I'd better give you some backstory here: my mom's family are the Finerans. Some day, I'll type up all the old written histories, but for now, I'll just say this:

It was the farm of Michael & Ellen (Fineran) Finneran. The original house on the property burned in 1895. I believe this home was built around 1920 primarily by their son John. It was farmed by their son William S. until his death in 1980 at the age of 96. It is no longer owned by the Finneran family. Michael & Ellen were both from County Galway. He came to America around 1854. (Michael and Ellen were my GG grandparents.) Their son James M. adopted the spelling of Fineran from the maternal side of the family, while his brothers kept the paternal spelling.

Thank you to my aunt Jayne Fineran for this information!

My mom has lots of memories from when she was a kid at her Uncle Bill's dairy farm, and when we realized how close Madison was to the farm, we decided to go find it. We drove out of the small town of Evansville. We came across a cemetery along the country road— we'd been planning to go find where the Finnerans (2-N) were buried, so we got out and looked through the cemetery. Unfortunately, no Finnerans were found, but we did find the grave of old Lida Cole, the housekeeper of the farm, whose sons later on inherited the estate, causing much outrage with the incensed Finnerans. (Not us - we sent flowers at her funeral! With the farm Finnerans.) Anyway, after visiting the cemetery we drove on until we came to Finneran Road (yeah, I have a road named after me! hahaha.). We got to the farm and my mom told us all sorts of stories about it... like how this was the place where she had discovered how cows hate her— more on this later! Anyway, no one was home, so we didn't get to meet the owners. The farm's not in the family anymore, so we don't know who lives there now.

Then we went back to Evansville for lunch and headed back to Madison, where there was a gay pride congregation around the capital building. We did some shopping (I acquired a "Women's Sewing Circle and Terrorist Society tee!) and came home. For dinner I had some really good Indian— man, that stuff's good. NAAN ❤