In an about a week students at New Prague Area Schools will be going back to school, although it will be different from past years. Instead of one big day where school faculty, from teachers to principals, are out greeting young students or where middle school and high school students are trying to find their lockers, it will be two days. While those scenes may play out still there will be changes in the way of masks and social distancing. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic the 2020- 2021 school year will be one that is going to be vastly different.

This week marks the beginning of my 21st year at The New Prague Times and it’s definitely not how I imagined it would be.
Talking with Tony Buthe with the New Prague Area Schools and Chuck Kajer’s name came up. His death is still something that’s hard to accept. It’s been a year of learning all of the things he would take care of. Last week’s Back to School section was one aspect. There have been and will be other sections that we have to plan for where Chuck usually took the lead. You’re still missed my friend.

Are you serious? Are you really considering not to mask, even when it’s been mandated in Minnesota? I know it’s not the most comfortable, but I don’t find tight jeans or bathing suits very comfortable either, so I avoid them when possible.

One of the recent positive news items that has been popping up lately is the comet Neowise. It was discovered earlier this year and apparently there are only a few more days left for people to be able to see it this month. After that, the next time the comet is scheduled to come near Earth is 6,800 years from now. A person has a better chance to see Halley’s Comet, which will next show up in 2061. I could be here for that, it will only be seven years before my 100th birthday.

There are people who are slowly moving back to normal due to the COVID-19 pandemic, others have been moving more quickly and some never made any changes at all. Personally I think I’ve been all over the map.

It is now that other season in Minnesota, road construction. After several weeks of waiting, the Main Street 2020 project is now underway. Currently the work is on the west end of Main Street near the intersection with Highway 21. This is a project that the city, working with the Minnesota Department of Transportation, has been planning for over several years. Like any street project this is one that is going to require patience and some compromise to get through.

The Bob Dylan song “The Times They Are a-Changin’” is one that seems very appropriate over the last few months.
Dylan’s song was released in 1964, another time of changes, social unrest, racial tension, protests, and an ongoing war. There was even an influenza pandemic, but that came near the end of the decade in 1968.
For many people today, like then, life seems to be a roller coaster. Just when things seem to be settling down, here comes another crest to ride through.

Even though technically summer doesn’t officially start until June 20, nothing says its summer than temperatures in the high 80s or low 90s with lots of humidity.

So much has changed in the world in the last few weeks.
We’re entering unchartered territory in this fight against COVID-19.
Everyone at Suel Printing Company's newspapers (Montgomery Messenger, The New Prague Times, Waterville Lake Region Life and Elysian Enterprise) remains dedicated to providing you with a high-quality newspaper with consistent news coverage and delivery.
That said, we’re doing what we can with the resources we have to keep ourselves, our families, and our sources healthy.

There’s the old saying about March that if it comes in like a lion, it will go out like a lamb, or vice versa. So far March has been more like a lamb with temperatures in a pleasant range and little to no snow. If the saying holds true we could have some snowstorms later this month, but we will see.

Time is the one thing that many of us wish we had more of, although in about a week’s, well, time we have two events that deal with the changing of time. Last Saturday was Leap Day, February 29, that one extra day in February that only happens every four years. As someone once put it if we didn’t add that one day every four years our calendars would eventually not making any sense. After a century our calendars would be off by 24 days.

There are some weeks, sometimes one day after another, where the phrase, “OK, what’s next?” seems vastly appropriate.

It’s not even March yet and there are already those sports gearing up for state tournaments. At least one, the State Dance Team Tournament, has already happened. The state tournament for girls hockey and gymnastics are going on over the next few days. In the next few weeks, there will be the tourneys for wrestling, boys hockey, adaptive floor hockey and girls and boys basketball.

This Tuesday, Feb. 18, New Prague area residents can provide input into what ambulance service will provide aid to the community and the region around town. This time of public comment will be held at New Prague City Hall at 6 p.m. Another option for those who wish to be heard, you can send comments to City Hall by way of emails or letters.
The council decided at its Monday, Feb. 3, meeting to request public comment on the issue. It will help decide whether the city should remain with North Memorial Health’s ambulance service or go with Mayo Clinic Health System in New Prague.

This spring two long awaited scheduled projects will finally get started. For New Prague it will be the Main Street project, the reconstruction of the street, sidewalks and replacing of utilities underneath the street, some of which are nearly a century old. In Elko New Market it will be the construction of a roundabout at the intersection of their Main Street (Scott County Road 2) and Natchez Avenue (Scott County Road 91).

Last weekend was a reminder that it’s still definitely winter and we have a little more than two months left of snow, ice, cold temperatures and wind. If we’re lucky we won’t have a snowstorm in April, but you never know.