Oh My It's Nasty Out There

So it's a mess here - cold and frozen and we don't even know what to do with it. This poor tree stands outside the library, looking brave but I feel badly for it.

As I drove through the McD's drive-up the manager was out with a shovel, trying to break up ice so the delivery semi could pull in tomorrow. Good luck with that. That brick building at the back is completely encased in ice.

Feel free to park your bike  here....

Here's how we move snow in the east. Piles and piles and piles of snow. We're just about out of places to make another pile. Drat that groundhog, and come on March 21 already!

February Sunset

PA is beautiful about six months out of the year. The rest of the time it's drab, drab, drab. The trees lose their leaves, and from November on there's a bareness so heavy that somedays it takes all the fight you have in you to keep it from seeping inside.

We're stuck in the middle - winter is more than half over, but spring still feels a long ways off. This time of year I'm so impatient for color I start poking in flowerbeds with snowy boots, looking for signs of encouragement. Surely there's something under all that dirty grey snow? It's a little early for daffodils and such. I know that. I know they're more patient than I am, lurking just under the ground, waiting to make their grand appearance. Once daffodils and tulips and hyacinths start strutting their stuff I won't be paying much attention to skies.



Right now, when there's no color to be had, on an ordinary grey day, the sun starts to set with reds and yellows that take my weary of winter breath away. A sky that looks like it should be in Santa Fe with saddle straddling cowboys lined up across the horizon. But it's not - it's here in bare, grey PA. Fifteen minutes of brilliant color, enough to get through a few more weeks of stuck in the middle drab.

James 4:13-15 and one Heck of a Snow Storm

Now listen, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money." Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, "If it is the Lord's will, we will live and do this or that."

We thought we had all sorts of plans today. See that line at the top of the photo. That's the interstate, with N.O. C.A.R.S. on it.

That is a measly ruler - 12" of ruler isn't going to touch this.

After snowing for 24  hours we ended up with 18" of snow. That's a lot of snow.


It IS beautiful. Looks like a winter wonderland out there.

Someone in our family thought they were going to work today.....

and since that certain someone had rotator cuff surgery this past week, guess who's the chauffeur? (For a month but I'm not complaining. I am thinking, just a bit, "What the heck, I already retired! I sleep in every morning! Obviously God isn't done with me yet.)

After shoveling for a good hour I got the car uncovered to see that our hill had not been touched. Even a chauffeur has her limits. No way, Jose. We're not going anywhere. Putting a pot roast in the crockpot and staying inside. Sometimes it's good to be reminded Who is in charge!

Classic Reads and Icicle Impalement

I've been accused of reading "How to Make a Meatloaf" and that may be because I did in fact read "How to Breastfeed Your Baby" three times, but give me a break - I had three babies. Because I tend to lean towards non-fiction and that can make for a dull, boring person, last year I resolved to lean heavy on fiction. I made it through about 20, mostly 'popular' reads and it was a fun reading year!

This year I'm going with the same resolution (fiction), choosing classic books, with a goal of 12 - one a month - surely The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin counts as much as two of the typical fiction? I went to this website to get a list of the top classic books. There are 108 and I'm happy to say I can check off 22 of them, 1/5 of the way! (I pulled up Random House's 'modern classics' but was pretty turned off when I investigated some of the books - either too futuristic or bordering on obscene - don't get me started on Gravity's Rainbow!)If I'd attended college it's likely more would be checked off this list, but alas that's spilt milk and no use spending time there.

So as soon as I finish People of the Book (leftover from 2009), I'm jumping into my first classic read of 2010. Here's my list for the year, and since January is already half over I better get hopping to it.

Ethan Frome, Edith Wharton (starting with this one - it's 70 pages long)
The Autobiography of Ben Franklin (Ben Franklin)
Daisy Miller, Henry James
Frankenstein, Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
Howards End, E. M. Forster
The Iliad, Homer
Ivanhoe, Sir Walter Scott
Kidnapped, Robert Louis Stevenson
Lord Jim, Joseph Conrad
My 'Antonia, Willa Cather
Uncle Tom's Cabin, Harriet Beecher Stowe
Walden, Henry David Thoreau

They're in no order. I'll mix up heavier and lighter, and if I finish more than one a month I can grab a popular read to enjoy too.

What are you reading? Feel free to share non-classics as I'm hoping to squeeze in a few of those too.

BTW, that's the scene outside our window this morning - the front page of the newspaper had a 'chicken little' warning to watch for falling icicles up to four feet long - crazy winter - but that means it's warming up today!

Seeing Winter's Beauty

We've had snow, in varying amounts, every single day except one since December 24. (Here in Pittsburgh we call it 'Erie spit'.) My hubby makes sure to point this out D.A.I.L.Y. That there's a bit of a scowl on his face makes me think he's not seeing it as a good thing.

You can't put this pillow out in July - a little bit of winter is a good thing, don'tcha' think?

Bird houses look much sweeter with snowy caps.

It makes me smile, looking at this woodpile. Walking by houses and smelling the smoke coming from their chimneys is fabulous, especially since we don't have a fireplace right now. Who doesn't love that smell in January?

I reminded him yesterday, when you have six inches of snow on the ground it's impossible to mow grass. He was able to see the value in that. Maybe, just maybe he'll start noticing how beautiful winter can be. How about you, do you unlove winter's grey days and long for spring, or are you with me, happy there are no weedy flowerbeds to deal with for awhile, so you can stay inside and knit and sew and read and sip hot cocoa (next to a roaring fire if you're especially blessed)?

Leftover Christmas Cookies = Fat, Happy Birds

Which is much better than fat, happy me :-) We ate a good bit of these, too many actually, so it was time to get them O.U.T. O.F. T.H.E. H.O.U.S.E. I think the birds will especially like the ones with jam in the middle.

There's also a bit of leftover popcorn from the tin we sort of stole from our next door neighbor, but that's another story for another day.