Jan 25 2016

Blizzard? Not so much.

Rosemary

We had one day of totally blizzard weather, with about a foot of snow, but then it was all over.  Nothing at all like the hit New York City or the Connecticut shoreline took (south of us).

I handled it by staying at home and doing all my household chores for the week.

The following day, all the roads were plowed, and the trip to my writing office (all two miles of it) presented no problem at all.

I would have gone during the blizzard, if not for an unavoidable treacherously steep hill.    No matter which route you take, you have to go down a steep, twisty road that ices over really quickly, and leads directly into a busy intersection.  Saturday was a good day to not do that.

Upside: I could observe all the birdie-pal action at home!  Our restaurant is very popular in winter, being the only one in the neighborhood with a heated birdbath.   Not that they’re bathing — it’s drinking water, and it saves them from having to eat snow and spend precious calories heating it up with their tiny birdie bodies.

We always get the cardinals and sparrows and chickadees, with some juncos tossed in the mix.  Downy woodpeckers, and red-bellied woodpeckers.   The mockingbird comes by once in a while.  But Saturday, we were also mobbed by the starlings.  Good move on their part: we had liquid water, birdseed, a hanging block of suet, and a cedar tree whose branches are loaded down with a good crop of cedar berries.   A well-balanced diet, no foraging in the blizzard required.

In other news:  I totally skipped Arisia, and will probably skip Boskone, as well, due entirely to my dropping the ball during the job-loss officialdom scrambling.  Except, I might possibly drop by for a day, as audience, not panel participants.   Readercon, however: I responded to their request to let them know if I was interested in participating, with a definite Yes!  Last year I got lost in the shuffle, and didn’t make it on the program; this year I want to stay on top of things.

Also: Worldcon is coming up in the middle of August (didn’t it always used to be over Labor Day?  When did that change?), and I really do want to be on the program!   As does every other writer in the universe.  Plenty of competition, there.  Well, I’ll attend either way, but I really want to get back into the swing of panel-participating and fan-meeting, and writerly professional schmoozing.

Okay, enough of this  blogging stuff… I have some actual work to dig into!

— Oh, all right, one more thing: Walk Off the Earth.

 

The dancers are guest stars, and I bet you didn’t know that your fly could double as a percussion instrument.

One of these days I’m going to have to see those guys in concert.