Twas the night before Christmas

And I sure don't like the idea of going out and shoveling slush, but I have to do it. It's 34, light rain, and I played it perfect I think. It's going to be warm for 2 days, warm enough that if I clear the pavement now, I won't have a sheet of ice to contend with.

The birds and squirrels have been fighting over the food on the deck since I put it out a couple of hours ago. I sure do love them. They are the best part of this drafty old dump. When I was a kid my grandmother loved this yellow shafted flicker that came to our yard at the cottage up north, I hadn't seen one since until I got a regular coming to the deck, he likes corn.

As usual, I have no family to spend holidays with, but that's ok, my family was kind of dysfunctional anyhow. If the weather was better I'd go down to the cab company, but I think minimizing driving about now is the prudent course of action.

I had a passenger in my cab who was kind of interesting, said she has a PhD in Education? Over qualified to ever get a job now. Drag. If the first chapter I just finished doesn't fly with an agent, perhaps I'll ask her to help me polish it enough so it does fly.

Friend of mine in Canada (ooooooo there's the most beautiful cardinal perching in the big pine tree, he's getting ready to swoop down for his meal, he's much shyer than the jays, Mrs cardinal is on the seed bell, they came together............... such beauty) has a copy of the proposed first chapter, I'm anxiously awaiting her opinion. She seemed to be interested in the blog. We were at the online bridge club and she stopped playing bridge to read it. Clearly some of the entrys are better than others.

I predict that the winter cab season will be a good one. All this snow is going to make it a brutal winter. Driving in the snow is much more work than warmer weather, there are so many details that get added. For instance, all those snow piles in the middle of the street, you can't see through them, nor can the other guy. Every time it's warm and sunny, the minute the sun sets you have black ice everywhere. But those nasty sidewalks are hard on the girls wearing 3" heels, so they take a cab. Ever try to walk in 3" heels? It's a trip.

Dog just had to get out to tree a squirril, first time I've ever seen him chase one. Woodchucks are his specialty, he lives for hunting woodchucks. The yard woodchuck is snuggled safely in his burrow for the winter, sleeping until spring.

We finally got the credit card machine activated. It does a bunch more stuff, and it's not real good yet at that other stuff. Every time you cross a zone line it beeps, the display lights up, and it shows the new zone, only it gets some places wrong. It's going to take a while. From the looks of it, eventually, we will be a metered zone cab.

Merry Christmas Fast Eddie, Jeff & Christopher, the King and Gene in NYC, the girl at Ian's, and Laurie in NB. Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night.