Can you believe Thanksgiving is right around the corner? Where has the time gone? Winter has certainly made its arrival, but it hasn’t been nearly as brutal as years past. With the chilly weather comes the holiday season, as evidenced by the five foot Christmas tree Rebecca brought into the office on Monday morning.

Both Langdon Area Schools and North Border School have had a very busy and successful couple of weeks! With students participating in drama, cheer, football and volleyball, students and coaches have been staying busy, not to mention the parents traveling the state to watch their own kid as well as others do their best in their chosen competition. Job well done to all; great memories were made! As of this minute, we are still snow free.

As this community switches from football to volleyball state competitions, this past weekend - the same one in which the Langdon Area Munich Cardinals brought home the state championship in football - a group of people loaded up on a train and headed to the land of the Vikings to celebrate Jason Wirth’s 40th birthday. It started with just a conversation that Kim and Jason would be going to Vikings vs. Bears to celebrate a low key 40th birthday event. I happened to overhear it and decided to grab some other football enthusiasts, and we thought we would surprise him. We loaded onto the train in Devils Lake at 3:00 AM and arrived in St. Paul at 10:00 AM. The cast of characters were Kim and Jason Wirth, Bri and I, Justina Klindt and Adam Wirth, and Derick and Greta Samuelson. With an assembly of such a crew, we knew that it was going to hurt and be awesome at the same time. Upon our arrival, we immediately hit an extremely hard escape room. It didn’t really help that Greta is scared of everything that doesn’t have four legs on it, so she was pretty much there for moral support. Bri, Kim and Adam were the ones that were rifling through the clues. Jason and Derick tried every method to cheat and pick open locks that we did not yet find the keys for, and I tagged each corner of the room with “Sara Sucks” as I do every place I visit. In the end, we solved it with 20 minutes to spare.

By Bob Simmons, CEO, Simmons Multimedia During my October radio convention in New Zealand, my broadcaster buddies and I made the most of our spare time by exploring as much of this island paradise as humanly possible. The official bird of New Zealand is the ‘kiwi.’ The kiwi is a flightless, chicken-sized bird with a stout, round body covered in shaggy hair-like feathers. It has a long curved beak with nostrils at the tip, strong legs and tiny hidden wings. The kiwi is nocturnal and is an omnivore, meaning it eats plants and bugs. Following our Tuesday night banquet at the exclusive Fisherman Wharf Restaurant located at Port Ohope, several well-lubricated radio folks piled into my rental car for what would be an adventure we will all long remember. A search for the elusive kiwi bird! Since kiwis are nocturnal and sleep in burrows in forests by day, they come out at night to forage. They are elusive, and we were warned that they can be aggressive if threatened. Fun factmany New Zealanders have never seen an actual kiwi bird.

Writing this article every week is not as easy as you might think. There have been many times where I’ve written about something and then realized that by the time you read my article, the event will be in the past. Most of the time I write about things that have just happened or are happening in the near future, so I will lay out a paper version of my monthly schedule to make sure I have the timing right. Do I talk in future tense, present tense or past tense about a particular subject? I typically submit my article on Monday, and then the paper goes out Thursday online and Friday in paper form. I know my parents and others who live out of town or out of state and receive the paper form sometimes have a delay of two or three days or even a week, so I try to keep that in mind, too.

There’s been a lot of Cardinal sports to pay attention to lately, as football and volleyball get set to wrap up so that hockey and basketball can begin. The Borderland Press sends congratulations to athletes and coaches participating in fall sports! Another shoutout to Blu Soul Design, The Crooked Halo, Nature’s Best, Mimi’s Boutique and The Cure for a fun Saturday of shopping in Walhalla to open the 2025 holiday season! My friend and I have made this an annual thing, and we think this was our fourth trip.

First off, I hope you took advantage of Veterans Day to appreciate someone special in your life who has served our country. My favorite veteran is my dad, Jerry.

There’s something special about living in a place where you can still find kids playing outside without constant parental supervision. In so many other places across the nation, parents and guardians don’t even feel comfortable letting their children play in the front yard without constant supervision.

I’ve driven a suburban for almost 20 years. I remember test driving my first suburban and thinking to myself - I feel like I’m driving a bus. Now, 20 years and four suburbans later, I’m the first to suggest a suburban to anyone wanting a bigger, roomier vehicle. I love that I’m sitting up higher than other vehicles and can see around me well, and I also like that it’s a bigger, heavier vehicle so it feels safer on the road. On occasion, I also like driving Catelyn’s Blazer. It’s a completely different vehicle - you sit lower and can’t see as well, but it’s small and zippy and fast and easy to park. Easy to park is not how I would describe my suburban.

By Bob Simmons, CEO, Simmons Multimedia Our broadcaster groups’ fall convention in Whakatane, New Zealand, came to a close after the morning meetings on Wednesday, Oct. 15. My buddy, Larry, and I had chartered a private plane that afternoon to fly us out to Whakaari/White Island, which is an active volcano about 30 miles off the coast of Whakatane. This volcano is the subject of the Ron Howard and Leonardo DiCaprio Netflix documentary ‘The Volcano: Rescue from Whakaari,’ which I highly recommend you watch.