Not snowing. But snow in its piles and layers across lawns, trees, and just about everything but the street still dominates the mind’s intake.
Thirty degrees F. Soft grays infused with whites blanket the sky. Creamy blues enhance the edges above the snowed in evergreens and low mountains.
Today is December 29, 2021. Wednesday. Today, tomorrow, and the day after, and we’re done with 2021. Can stick it in the garage with the other years.
Sunrise crept in more like it was fog than it was sunshine at 7:39 AM. Sunset cometh at 4:47 PM. Sunset is slowly ratcheting back. Sunrise has hit a pause. More daylight is in the offering, if the clouds will let it in.
A 1972 Steely Dan song, “Dirty Work”, is floating on the morning mental music stream. Came into the stream last night as I cleaned the cats’ litter box, harvesting the potatoes. I don’t think much more needs said about that connection.
Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask as needed, and get the vaccine and boosts when you can. Here’s the music. There’s my coffee. It’s like a moment of Zen. Cheers
Welcome to Tuesday, December 28, 2021. It’s 28 degrees F out there, so wear your warmest sandals.
Sunrise came at 7:39 AM, showing that the snow is still out there. Had fifteen inches on the ground yesterday. We shoveled off the walk and driveway and removed the snow wall the plow had kindly built for us. This morning, all was covered by a fresh two inches. Everything was closed, canceled, or shut yesterday in our little town — well, everything except grocery stores, hospitals, and emergency services. They all functioned. It’ll get up to 36 F today, so we might get some relief if the weather system can move on the clouds and let the sun in. After sunset at 4:46 PM, the temperature is expected to drop locally to 19 degrees F. Yes, that’s chilly for us.
These snow levels are not consistent across the area. We’re in a valley. Houses are on the valley floor and up the mountain slopes. My house sits at about 1800 feet. Some friends higher than me reported that they had two feet of snow. Others who are lower in the valley received two to three inches. Up the Interstate twenty minutes where the valley is broad and wide, a buddy reported he had two inches. Three thousand feet higher than me, down the road ten minutes, they received sixty inches.
Weirdly, I have a song by the Beatles in the morning mental music stream. “I Feel Fine” came out in 1964. I remember neighbor girls playing a 45 RPM record of the song on a little pink and white portable phonograph on their back patio but that was a few years later, probably in 1966. I guess that because, while I was young, we’d moved to a new neighborhood then, our fourth one in five years. A lot of moves, houses, and schools, but it helps organize and structure my memories, if you know what I mean. I suspect the song is housed in the stream because my wife and I were talking about The Beatles with friends last week. My wife confesses that she didn’t like the Beatles. Never thought them that great. Which, shrug, is fine, because tastes are different, as are choices and circumstances. That’s life, which is another song now playing in my head (covered by Frank Sinatra), but we’ll go into that another day. I think “I Feel Fine” is in my head because I like that opening bit of feedback they incorporated. I’ve gone with a live version of the song so that feedback note is missing (ironic, right), but I enjoy flashing back to these live performances of groups and the changes between now and then so sharpy etched. Guess it feeds my nostalgia.
Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask as needed, and get the jabs and boosters as needed. Speaking of getting, I’m getting some coffee. Make it hot and black.
Monday, December 27, 2021, 6:55 AM. Sunset was forty-five minutes away, but the light was strong. “Alexa, what’s the temperature?”
“The current temperature in Ashland is thirty degrees. Today’s high will be thirty degrees. Have a nice day, Michael.”
We have about fifteen inches of snow around the house. It snowed all Sunday, stopping at night, as if it was checking out of work. Snow fall resumed about 8 AM. I was checking on the temperature because I’d just let the ginger wonder, Papi (formerly known as Meep) onto the covered back patio. He walked the bare cement, judging the snow, then made two long leaps to some bushes where scant snow covered the ground. I thought he’d come back then, but no, he turned and made a mad dash along the fence and disappeared into the back bushes. Twenty minutes later, he returned, heading for the kibble.
For the record, sunset is at 4:45 PM. Snow is expected to continue throughout the day. For the record, I hope all are safe and warm.
I have an Eagles cover of “Please Come Home for Christmas” jing-jing-jingling in the morning mental music stream. Mellow cover, fine voice, came out in 1978, so it’s thick with memories.
Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask as needed, and get the jabs when you can. Stay safe but have fun. They’re not mutually exclusive. Time for coffee for me, for being a good boy. At least, that’s what my cats tell me. Cheers
Twas the day after Christmas and all through the town, the snow had fallen, and was still coming down.
Yep, had three inches yesterday. Warmed to 34 F, melting some of that, but it became densely foggy yesterday. Then it started snowing after sunset and hasn’t stopped. We’re back up to three inches. Real winter has closed its fist on us. S’right. Snow is falling on the mountains, too, building our snowpack to survive the summer.
The winter sun rose at 7:38 AM. Current temperature is 30. That’s the day’s high. Tonight’s low will be 24. Plan for the same tomorrow. Sunset will come at 4:45 PM.
After dreaming about my old friend, Randy, the morning mental music stream is bursting with music from his two favorite groups, Van Halen and Boston. After a crazy mad dash by Tucker, the resident first floof, “Runnin’ with the Devil” has gained volume. That was an early Van Halen hit and came out while Randy was stationed in Korea, so it always meant a lot to him, as he often told me. Part of that was because his personal life was a mess at that point and the music helped him cope.
So let’s turn it up. Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask as needed, and get the vax and booster. Got coffee? I do. Cheers
Happy Saturday and Merry Christmas. If this is Christmas, then it is also December 25, 2021. If you had white Christmas on your wish list and live in my region, congratulations: you have won! Yes, we have 30 degrees F outside and about three inches of snow. Beautiful to take in, and shoots childhood memories through the neurons. Out last night, breathing in the snowy cold air as snowflakes flirted, I stood as a child and young man again, as I’d stood on many such nights in a string of diverse locations. I’m fortunate to have such memories and to still enjoy them.
Sunrise popped in with Christmas light at (drumroll) 7:38 AM and the sunshine will head at 4:44 PM. Our high temperature today is 34 F. During the and into the night, we’ll be celebrating on a low key this year, just the wife and I, although phone calls have been made, and Christmas baked goods are here to help put caloric joy into our bodies.
Thinking of Christmas memories, I was in the Philippines in the military in 1976. I’d been married less than two years and my wife was living with her parents in the United States while I lived in a dorm room. She and her family sent me a huge Christmas care package and I celebrated the holiday with other unaccompanied and single peers. We had a good time despite being away from family.
One song from that year is “You’re My Best Friend” by Queen. I would say that my wife is my best friend — certainly my longest friendship. We met and hit it off in June of 1971. Married four years later. Still together decades later. I’d never tell her she’s my best friend because she bristles at such sentimentality. But, here we are. I’m using it as my theme music on Christmas, 2021, half a century after meeting her.
Stay positive, test negative, enjoy some holiday cheer, wear a mask as needed, and get the jabs when you can. Make yourself some memories so you can pause on a dark night, look up at the sky, feel the weather, and recall who you were. Excuse me, a coffee has my name on it. Here’s the music. Cheers
Happy day of Christmas Eve. It’s a sunny-cloudy-foggy-snowy-misty Friday this December 23, 2021. Lovely to gaze up at the snowed-in mountains and the white-topped evergreens. Snow levels are still a few thousand feet above us. Weather services said that’s gonna change, with snow levels dropping sufficiently for us to get one to three inches in the next twenty-four hours.
Temperature is 34 F. Sunrise kicked in at 7:38 AM and the sun will vacate our immediate airspace at 4:43 PM. A high of 42 is hoped for and a low of 30 is in the charts.
I was out driving in the weather yesterday. Went to dinner at some friends’ home — they provided salad and chili, perfect for the weather, and we provided an apple tart and cornbread, though I confess, I didn’t prepare anything (my wife made the cornbread), and the tart came from TJ’s. Cold and rainy outside, with dusk imminent, I began enjoying the 1979 Gary Numan song, “Cars”, in my mental music stream. It remained in the morning stream so I put it up as the day’s theme music. The song has that 80s robotic-techno vibe (yes, I know it came out in 1979, but music eras aren’t clearly defined by calendars).
I wish happy holidays for you, no matter what you observe (okay, I do draw the line at human and animal sacrifices, and don’t tell me about what anyone used to do), with good health, happiness, and joy. It’s hard to reach the trifecta but please keep trying. Stay positive, test negative, wear a durn mask as needed, and get the jabs when you can. Here’s the music. I’m gonna go rustle up some coffee. Get along, little kitties, get along, get along.
Sing us a song of Thursday, on this twenty-third day of the month. Yes, it’s still December, 2021, for a few more days. Ticking down, though, ticking down.
Our weather report is about fog with 37 degrees temperatures and a sky without a break in the clouds insisting, “Rain is coming.” That’s for the lower elevations. Above two thousand feet, snow is expected with some heavy accumulation, and lower temperatures. The snow levels will be dropping to seventeen hundred, so the valley floor will probably experience a taste. We’re at eighteen hundred feet and will probably enjoy a winter blend.
Concerned thinking this morning brought out the morning mental music stream inhabitant, “Distant Early Warning”, by Rush (1984).
Have some coffee (or whatever your preference is), stay positive, test negative, wear a mask as needed, do some social distancing, and get the vax and boosters when you can. Onward. Cheers
Hello, life forms. Today is Wednesday, December 22, 2021. Sunset came on us in our valley at 7:37 AM and sunset will be at 4:42 PM. The current temperature is 44 F under mostly cloudy skies. The present clouds don’t promise much of anything now, but rain is in the forecast with a high temperature of 50. Winter storm advisories are out. Predictions call for seven to sixteen inches, but the snow level will be 3,000 feet or more, and we’re below 2,000.
I heard today’s theme song on Ted Lasso the other night. I hadn’t heard this song in a long time it seemed, and it stayed with me, showing up on my walk last night as I took in the valley and the mountain’s shadow spreading across it, and then popping back up in the morning mental music stream today. “Somewhere Only We Know” by Keane came out in the first few years of this century. It’s a moody song about changes. Seems to fit.
Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask as needed, don’t be complacent, and get the vaccine and boosters when you can. Now, I need to go see a cup about a coffee. Here’s the music. Cheers
Tuesday has come upon us, sunshine, clouds, and wind in my region. Looks like an artist took spray cans of gray, blue and white and began spraying, but ran out before anything was finished. The temperature is a comfortable 50 F although the wind has a bite that’s worse than its bark in the way that some wintry winds can manage. The weather prognosticators claim that the high is going to be 50. We’ll see.
But, happy solstice! Yes, it’s December 21st. Some years it’s on the 21st, others, it’s on the 22nd. Don’t know what it is this year, but this is supposed to be our shortest period of daylight. Previous years of observations show that, no, it probably won’t be. But we celebrate solstice as a holiday in our household, picking it up from the pagans. It’s all about meeting with friends, eating earthy foods, drinking wine, making wishes for the future, and stoking a fire against the cold darkness.
For the record, today’s sunrise was 7:36 AM and sunset is scheduled for 4:42 PM.
Today’s song comes from reading various accounts of people who dismissed COVID-19, dissed wearing masks, scoffed at the vaccines, and smirked at social distancing. Then, some — can’t say how many — contracted the virus, and went through some horrible shit, becoming hospitalized and intubated. Then — can’t say how many — some died, leaving relatives to write the follow up posts. Moms, fathers, sons, and daughters.
Out of that stew of reading and thinking about learning and not learning, arose Alanis Morissette with “You Learn” from Jagged Little Pill (1996). What’s ironic about this release (sorry about that) is that the other side of this single (what a quaint idea that is now, the flip side of a single record) was a song called “You Oughta Know”, an angry, sexually explicit rage-on about a terminated relationship that swept across the country. It’s ironic because it was the B side. The A side is supposed to be the major hit.
Here’s the music. Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask as need be, and get the vaccine and boosters when you can. Don’t force another to finish writing your story. Now, I need to rescue a lonely cuppa coffee from the kitchen. It’s my good deed for the day. Cheers
Another Monday has dragged itself to our doorstep, whimpering, here I am. We have no choice but to take the poor critter in and make the best of the day. “We’ll call it December 20, 2021,” we declare.
This Monday is little different from others this season. Windy, with temperatures slogging through the forties. A bleak sun huddles among clouds, displaying a marbled blue-gray sky. Daybreak came at 7:36 AM and sunset is due at 7:41 in the afternoon. Of course, we’re in a valley and the sun sets behind the mountains. Mountain shadows overtake us about 3:30 in the afternoon, cutting off the sun’s scant heat almost instantly.
Was out last night checking out the moon. Strong one, it burst through the clouds, which anointed it with a colorful corona. The clouds restlessly paced and squirmed. Stars and planets showed their faces but were gone in seconds. All that kicked in a David Bowie song, “Starman”, 1972, into the mental music stream. It still resided there this AM. Because the song sings about a starman being out there.
Well, let’s hope we don’t blow it. We often seem on the verge.
Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask as needed, and get the vax and boosters when you can. Stay informed and alert. I have my coffee. Now I’m gonna listen to the music. Cheers
Michael Seidel, writer 