Lift Up Your Hearts!

Just for you, my dear Northerners, I have run around the house changing the clocks, and will get up unconscionably early tomorrow.  Daylight Saving Time makes little sense in our part of the world, and it seems yet more ridiculous to make the change even earlier this year.

But I do recall that it wasn't so bad to have the time change when we lived up north.  So I'll put up with it for your sakes.  But it does show what part of the country really runs the government, doesn't it?

For those of you who might be a little homesick for Florida:

  

Serious collectors of anything can have serious problems when they die.  We've all heard of the numismatist whose rare coins were piously dropped one by one into the church collection plate by his widow, and the philatelist whose valuable stamps were used for postage; of antiques sold at estate sales for junk-furniture prices; of a genealogist's lifetime's worth of painstaking work tossed as worthless papers.

But geologists might have another problem.  Someone's carefully documented rock collection caused panic in a Florida pawn shop. (More)

I wrote earlier about our failing telephone system.  We limped along for a week with all calls forwarded to one or the other of our cell phones.  Actually, it wasn't much of a limp.  It was slightly annoying not to be able to have more than one person on this end of a call, and since my cell phone has no "free" minutes (it's a prepaid plan), I was conscious of the cost of every call.  But it wasn't that much, really.  A definite plus was that the forwarding message, "please wait while we try to contact your party" effectively foiled all those robotic telemarketers!

Still, now that it's fixed (details follow), I'm glad not to be so tied to my cell phone.  I said to Heather, "I feel like a teenager, carrying my cell phone in my pocket all the time," to which she replied, "You're not a teenager, Mom.  You still jump every time it rings."

So, I'm sure you're all wondering:  What was wrong, and how did we fix it?  (More)

Bearing in mind that one of this children is eight, and the other three—can anyone doubt they are related?

  

I know most of my Loyal Readers are shivering, with temperatures in the teens and even single digits, so you'll be glad to know that spring it on its way.  A week ago I was working in our backyard when a flock of robins came through:  bird after bird, alighting only long enough for identification before resuming their steady course—straight north.   As I stood there with sweat pouring down my face—my below-zero wind chill experience of ten days earlier barely a dim memory—I could hardly blame them.  Our highs were in the 80's and a few days later we switched the thermostat from "Heat" to "A/C."

Poor robins!  I hope they didn't get too far north last week.  It's 47 degrees at the moment, and the thermostat switch has reverted.  Then again, I'm sure 47 degrees sounds like a tropical paradise to most of you....

I had an incredible experience recently.  Having been transplanted, through the woders of modern aviation technology, from our unseasonably warm Florida home to some of the coldest Connecticut weather of the season, I was a little chilled.  Our kind hosts provided a fire in the fireplace and a space heater in our bedroom, so we weren't uncomfortable, but going outside was an adventure, despite heavy coats, hats, gloves, and scarves.

That is, until I found it desirable to take some pictures of the low Old Saybrook tide.  Leaning gloveless (I had to operate the camera) against a stiff, steady blow that pushed the wind chill-modified temperature below zero, I was beyond cold.  But when my hand finally thawed, something inside me snapped—or more accurately, some internal fire ignited.  For the rest of the week, I was warm!  Forget the hat, scarf, and gloves; if all I was doing was going from building to car to building again, my coat—and that often enough not even zipped—was sufficient.

On our sledding adventure, I condescended to don hat and gloves (and zip the coat), and the chill never reached me.  What a glorious feeling, to feel the cold without being cold!

Alas—though probably all for the best—my internal fire was quenched by returning to Florida's tropical temperatures.  Our current cold snap (presently 47 degrees outside) has me feeling quite chilly, even though it's above 60 degrees in the house.   I think I'll go fix some hot cocoa while the rest of you laugh at me.

We were in Old Saybrook for what in my personal expert assures me was the lowest tide in his nearly 80-year-old memory.  (We forgot to think about tsunamis.) (More)

If you try to call us in the next few days, please be patient.  All calls are being forwarded to our cell phones, so it may take a little longer than usual to connect.

Our CallVantage Linksys router stopped working.  Well, to be more accurate, the router still works, or I wouldn't be posting this.  But the Telephone Adaptor part no longer functions. (More)