Fast Time with a Polar Vortex

Early morning a day before the snow came

Low temps and fluffy birds!

Baby mice on the front seat of my car

usual dawn
usual sky
hard to believe
in a polar vortex
but the mice know

 ------------------------------------------

overnight
landscape change from brown to white
the big chill arrives

My main decision for today was whether to vacuum or to blog, so of course I decided to write! Winter weather finally came as a gift from Canada.....a polar vortex .......as my friend Art says, they are inventing newer more technical names for things now - it used to be called an arctic front, or even just a cold front.

After the gorgeous fall weather we had, we are all very spoiled.  Still, we usually transition into cold weather with a more genteel movement. The critters are all back.  Fred is in my bathroom and determined to commit suicide in the bathtub;  I had to remove him three times last week.  He was very fat from his summer pickings, but now has slimmed down to normal again. 

We had a nasty infestation of wasps - that is one thing I love about the cold - they disappear. Box Elder bugs swarm all over and walk on me while I am at the computer, and the mice reek vengeance indoors and out. Two weeks ago today I walked in Birney, got hot, and removed my scarf. I put it on the front seat of the car. The following Sunday I went to get a lifesaver candy and jumped a mile - there on the front seat neatly nestled in my scarf was a mouse nest and four baby mice! It got into the glovebox, I found later, and chewed through my car registration certificate. Lots of cleaning with lysol!  Indoors, I caught three mice in traps before the snow came.  How do they sense the oncoming weather?

Yesterday and today I am back to the treadmill for exercise. I don't like it nearly as much as the great outdoors.  The days are slipping by so fast. My friend Thelma said "See you at Thanksgiving" when I telephoned her yesterday! Yikes!  I have yet to find Christmas gifts for the family and I like to get them ordered before Turkey day. That is usually easy with USPS delivering two inches of catalogs to my mailbox each Monday. 

A woman who owned the Livingston Enterprise newspaper in Montana, used to call daylight savings time "Fast Time" she was always relieved when the clocks fell back in the fall. It feels to me like time is going faster than I am these days - or is it that I have just slowed down with age?  So - off to the catalogs to at least do my Christmas Consumer research before fast time catches up with me!