|
Our invocation was offered by Jamie Larson following the Pledge of Allegiance and preceding recitation of The Four Way Test. Steve Andrews introduced as his guest his wife Menghui; Kathy Austvold introduced her husband, Steve; and Bob Russell introduced as his guest younger daughter, Heather Rekken. Announcements included a reminder that peaches are expected to arrive around August 15th, that we will be helping to pack backpacks at the United Way office after meeting for lunch on August 10th (where we will meet for lunch still to be determined), and that on August 17th we will be meeting at Hillcrest's Lower Campus (formerly the Eisenhower School) for lunch and a program. Lisa McFarland led off the self-imposed fining and bragging by contributing for missing a few meetings, as did Mark Bring and Randy Kempfer, Randy also bragging about a child playing in the semi-finals of a baseball tournament, the game unfortunately lost. Keith Olson contributed to celebrate an upcoming birthday of his wife's, while Buzz contributed for turning a year older the day before. This writer paid for subjecting everyone to the joke he had his daughter tell. (I will laugh at least three times at a joke, when it is told, when it is explained to me and when I understand it.) Our very own Keith Olson brought us the program for the day, talking about his and Kim's recent trip to Iceland, replete with 150 slides. Of the many interesting facts he shared, Iceland was the first country to form a parliament, in the year 930. It is a little bit smaller in size than Kentucky and you could fit 7.5 Iceland's in Texas; it is one-half the size of North Dakota. Its population is around 350,000, with 60% living in its capital, Reykjavik. While there use to be a McDonalds, there is no longer one, and there isn't an army either. Iceland is the site of the largest glacier in all of Europe and it was the last country in Europe to have been settled. It was first inhabited by Norwegians from 1262 to 1380, followed by immigrants from Denmark. The country claimed its own independence in 1944. Icelanders have the longest life expectancy of any national population in the world. Because the surname of its inhabitants is based on the last name of a person's father, the names in the phone book are listed alphabetically by first name. The only animal indigenous to the country is the arctic fox. It is the second most expensive country in the world as almost everything has to be imported. It also has some topography that closely resembles parts of the moon's surface and that is why Neil Armstrong trained there before being the first man to walk the surface of the moon in 1969. Keith reported the country has a lot of geysers, with geothermal energy accounting for 30% of the country's electrical generation; the rest is hydropower. He also said that the country could produce enough geothermal energy to power the entire European continent. Every little town has its own swimming pool. Keith showed us pictures of many waterfalls, churches and lighthouses, reported the country has the cleanest public bathrooms in the world and also said it is the safest and cleanest space he has ever seen. Gas for the 1800+ miles they traveled in a rental car cost $12 a gallon, but the car got 50-60 (?) miles per gallon. He also talked about going through a four-mile-long tunnel, one of 11 on the island. While there, sun-up was 3:00 a.m., while the sun set at 11:45 p.m. The temperatures in May ranged from 40 to 65 degrees Fahrenheit. Keith made it clear that they are looking forward to returning to Iceland to enjoy its wonders again. |
.png)
