I know it’s not Ground Hog Day any more. That’s what I wanted to write about yesterday but by the time I got around to doing the blahg, I was wasted. I don’t mean drunk wasted. A coupla wee (watered down) cocktails with dinner isn’t gonna get me drunk. I mean brain wasted from too much thinking and that’s not a bad thing.

Anyway, yesterday morning, I was walking in the woods in the dark and I heard a wee bit of a yip out on the sidewalk somewhere. I knew it was my friend Ano and sure enough, next thing I knew, I spied the flash of the orange LED lights on Ano’s collar. I haven’t seen much of Ano and his human lately so I stopped to talk to them a bit. And yes, Ano apparently sensed my presence in the woods well before they got there. I know about this kind of thing because my brother’s dogz always sensed my imminent arrival at their house in Grand Blanc when I was blocks away. Maybe that’s what gave my brother a clue to get his taaaaar pump out in time to meet me in his driveway with it. He knew my taaaarrrs would prob’ly be low.

I miss my brother. I miss his dogz, even though the only remaining dog (Ernie) has probably been trained to go for my jugular if he ever sees me again. On the other hand, Ernie might remember me for the FRIEND I have always been to him. I’ll probably never know. Sigh.

Anyway, Ano’s human and I were talking about winter and one of us said something about Groundhog Day and Ano’s human asked me if I believed that the groundhog could predict when winter would end. Well, of *course* the groundhog cannot predict that. What I do know about February 2 is that it is a cross-quarter day, a day halfway between a solstice and an equinox. That means we are halfway through winter. Some of my Celtic ancestors probably had different names for days like Groundhog Day.

Nowadays, I don’t think Punxsutawney Phil has much to say about how much longer winter will last. The sun starts to look summer-like in February (when it shows its face). The birds start singing their mating songs. But February is still winter and can bring snow and ultra-cold temperatures. March can be horrible (or not) and four years ago we had a glacier in our backyard in mid-April but that was the Polar Vortex year. This is Michigan and we get all four seasons with vehemence.

And then there’s the Groundhog Day movie, which we have seen a few times (on the TV). I lived that movie during the time The Commander was dying. Schlepping down through the snow every morning to either the hoosegow or assisted living and well, I dunno, listening to oxygen musheens hum the tune my musician ears still remember and jumping to respond to requests for WATER. People kept wondering why I was walking everywhere and sometimes asked me if I wanted a ride. No. I NEEDED to walk. It’s what kept me sane.

To end this on a more upbeat note, the photo captures a thing I find interesting, which is the juxtaposition of nature’s version of engineering, aka naked tree branches, with an elegant man-made construction crane. At least I thought it was elegant. It isn’t the best photooo. The GG dragged me out into middle of the street to help me get the shot and we had to dodge a few vee-hickles to do it.

This entry was posted on Saturday, February 3rd, 2018 at 6:57 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.