Comments
1 May 2014
Hi everyone,
Where has the time gone? It is hard to believe that 50 years have passed since high school. Like Sharon, I must send my regrets that I will not be able to make the celebration this weekend. However, I wanted to send a short note to let everyone know what I have been doing, and that I am indeed still alive.
After graduating from DHS I received a BS in Wildlife Management from Purdue. With few job prospects in sight and a desire to move west, I went to the University of Idaho for grad school. I fully intended to move on, but those plans were thwarted when I was offered a job with the US Bureau of Land Management right out of grad school that allowed me to continue my graduate research. Consequently I have been in Idaho for the last 45 years. I married a native Idahoan, so it looks like I will spend at least the next 45 years in Idaho. I was 40 when I slowed down enough to get married, and literally overnight went from 0 to 3 kids (speaking on an adjustment).
Phyllis and I moved from Boise to our farm on the Big Wood River north of Gooding in 2001, and for nine years I made the 100 mile commute to work in Boise (we had a second home in Boise). I retired from the US Geological Survey in 2010, but old habits are hard to break. I am still an emeritus with USGS and an adjunct faculty member at Boise State University. Oh yeah, our farm is 100 A, which is a hay, pasture, and wildlife habitat operation; all gravity irrigated. I guess we need to keep busy. Given that, we still find time to travel around the US and internationally.
Phyllis and I really enjoy our two grandkids (11 & 7), who are in Boise. However, that may be all the grandkids we will have. We lost one of our two sons 11 years ago, and the other son is not in a big hurry to get married.
Below I am posing in the badlands a few miles north of the farm with the “Doofdog” my hunting buddy. Hope that everyone has a great time on Saturday.
Regards,
Mike Kochert (mkochert@juno.com)
Just returned from a trip to Peru.
