Well, Christmas has passed and all is well. Spent Christmas dinner at the main house... Denise's sister Lisa and her husband Chris, and daughters Quinn & Phoebe were there. Along with Tom, Henry and Wayne, we had a wonderful turkey dinner with all the trimmings... And then afterwards we played a game called 'Apples to Apples' ... I'll spare you the details on that ;-)  All in all it was a good night. A few more day's and we're in a new year... I need to get a haircut... bring in the year properly coiffed. Now that Tom's here for a week or so... I can pull back on a few chores and get focused on me again. Let that slip a little... that and no water for 2 weeks has changed the routine. But I think the snow is taking a break for a week... the weather has actually been warming up for the past couple of days now and it's been raining. We shouldn't see temps under 32 for a while... maybe we'll catch a break with the water situation :-)  We'll see...

This was after our last snow fall a couple of days ago... all that white powdery snow is just starting to turn into slush. I have no idea what to normally expect for WA. weather... so I'll just have to wait and see if it snows periodically for a few months or what... But they haven't had this kind of winter in a very long time... 

And with the warmer temps, the roads were starting to thaw. Actually driving in the slush was more precarious than in the snow... I think you 'hydroplane' with the slush since it's more water than snow. And with slush 3 inches high in some places, it was pushing my front end all over the place... and yes, I had it in 4 high. But I admit that even with living in Boston for 13 years... I rarely had to contend with snow like this... So I'm on that learning curve too...

I woke up Christmas day feeling pretty good... for no particular reason, except maybe to get a little organized... So after washing my hair and shaving... I did laundry. My big socks were running low and I have yet to go out and find a laundry mat. So I decided to wash them in the sink... It's amazing how much snow you have to melt to just fill the sink half way... I must have done this at least 6-7 times for the whole wash process. 

Et Voila!  It wasn't hard... just took a while... But I wasn't in a rush... I think 'It's A Wonderful Life' was on and so I had that playing in the background.... I love that movie! And here you go... just what you wanted to see... my dirty socks in the sink...  Oh well... Merry Christmas ;-)

After doing my indoor stuff, I had to go out and get some water. I had used the last of it to wash up and start the socks... So as I was getting the Jeep ready... everybody from the main house were out starting to build a snowman... Their goal was to build a really big one...

So here's the crew... the fam in front and Wayne in back. It was a good days effort, but alas... this is still what the snowman looks like today... Unfortunate timing has it raining for the next week... I think we'll have a pyramid in the driveway instead...  

But any way... with Tom back home and Wayne picking up some of the slack... I've gotten back into listening to my Abraham material and started reading Castaneda's 'Journey To Ixtlan' again... It's been years since I've read him. It's also time for cutting back on the distractions that I've slipped into and face the man in the mirror. And to really try to explore what it really means to live in the 'moment'. The ever, ongoing 'present'... this is where the power is. Don Juan said that the 'continuity of time has no meaning in this awesome, mysterious world'  and that every action you take should be regarded as your last battle in this life... because death is hunting you. In other words... Treat today as if it were your last.   Easy to say... ;-)

And on a lighter note... My good friend Rick down in So. CA. asked me about the current mouse count since I instituted the 'catch & release' program. Well I had stopped at 30... took a break... but now it seems Mousy's getting more bold... F__ker!  And I've resigned to getting the 'permanent' traps or the 'transition initiating' traps. The gnawing on whatever, in the middle of the night... the sound of little scurrying feet... and the poop... every where. It's time... Last night I had put some pennies on the headboard so that when I heard the little F__ker... I could throw a penny in his direction and scare him off... But these tactics are temporary... It is just a fact of life...