When Ted and I visited Jeff and La in El Centro, CA last spring, we saw what used to be the World’s Tallest Flagpole in Calipatria, CA. A little while after that, I accidentally learned that the tallest freestanding flagpole in North America is now on the Acuity Insurance campus near Sheboygan, WI–right along our route to visit Ted’s brother.

Calipatria is 184 feet below sea level, and its flagpole is 184 feet tall, so the top of the flagpole is at sea level. The flagpole on the Acuity Insurance campus, dedicated in June 2014, is 400 feet tall. It is billed as the World’s Tallest Symbol of Freedom. (The tallest freestanding flagpole in the world is in Cairo, Egypt.) The flagpole is anchored in 680 cubic feet of concrete reinforced with steel rods and weighs 420,000 pounds. The flag is 70 feet by 140 feet (9,800 square feet) and weighs 250 pounds. Each stripe is over 5 feet high, and each star is over 3 feet across. While driving on I-43, you can see the flag for about 10 minutes before you reach the site. At least 5 people are needed to safely lower the flag and to keep it from touching the ground. Acuity keeps six flags on hand at any given time.

Ok, been there, seen that.

We continued on to Ted’s brother’s home and spent several days visiting with him. You probably have to be from Wisconsin to know how to play sheephead, and you’d have to be a member of our family to know that I’m a pretty decent player, but I get a greatly unfair number of horrible hands dealt to me, and I usually lose. Well, this time was different! On our first evening together, I was the big winner! I had at least one queen in every hand, and several hands with three or four queens. Awesome! It’s almost embarrassing that it’s so rare for this to happen to me that Ted felt the need to immediately text the kids to let them know that I was the winner. Also, maybe embarrassing that they were probably all surprised. I guess I proved it could be done–just not very often. Things evened out, which is good. Ted won on the second evening, and Gary won on the third evening.

In addition to playing cards, we also spent time in conversation and exchanging/sharing family news. For meals, we visited some of our favorite restaurants in the area. Here’s a photo of the brothers.

Of course, Ted and I took time to pick up some real cheese from a local cheese factory (enough of Missouri’s grocery store cheese!) and some of our favorite pastries and hard rolls from a local bakery.

Again, you might have to be from Wisconsin to know what “hard rolls” are. When Ted and I lived in Maryland, we asked bakeries and grocery stores for hard rolls. Most just said, “No, we don’t have them,” but one grocer told us he thought they had some buns left from the day before, if we wanted them. Let me just say that “hard” is not equivalent to “stale.” In fact, the rolls are quite soft, so I don’t know where the name came from. They are made without eggs and become stale (hard?) very quickly, but they are perfect with hamburgers.

The next morning, we packed our luggage and bakery into the car and met Gary for one more lunch together. We all ordered breakfast, and it was delicious, as usual.

On the way out of the restaurant, I noticed this decorated tree in the lobby. It looks fall-themed, so I’m guessing they let it stand in the corner all year and change the decorations seasonally.

After our lunchtime breakfast, Ted and I headed south toward our home and Gary went north toward his. We had another good family visit.