That evil, evil, rodent!

Well, if relying upon a furry North American rodent, the groundhog, to deliver accurate meteorological forecasts for future event planning, his prediction is a six week extension of winter. Myself, I prefer a more optimistic outlook for the approach of spring despite the mammal's illogical fear of its own shadow, which happens to be unrelated to weather in any way. Yes, despite the groundhog's prediction I'll be looking for the sun to prove him wrong earlier, rather than later. Once again, I will be attending the Lutheran Church's goundhog feed with the Johnson side of the family in Humboldt. I'll take my family, of course, and I'm excited about Jack's reaction. He went last year, but I don't think he remembers it. We plan to go down to Humboldt on Friday night and stay with mom and dad, then leave directly after breakfast to go to Lawrence to a friend's birthday party for her son.

Both boys have had a time with stuffy noses and coughing these last couple weeks. Jack couldn't hold down a plate full of spaghetti one evening, and we officially "broke in" the new couch mom and dad had given us. Jack reacted quite drastically to his body's reaction and ran around the kitchen table crying for Mare to "make it feel better!" The new couch looks worse after a month in our house than it did for the nearly 10 years it was used by mom and dad. Jack also experienced his first case of diarrhea, which he found equally distressing. Leo, was having difficulty sleeping through the night because of his little cough and stuffed up nose. Marian even battled that for a day or two. I'm the only one who has remained free of virus, bug, disease, etc. Probably because I gave it to them, compliments of the student body at OHS.

Jack surprises us with the things he says and remembers. Marian recounted him singing some sort of made up song of his and looking directly at her and saying "that song was in your eyes the day I was born." Very poetic!

I was given the opportunity to be the announcer at the varsity basketball game, which I accepted. I did alright, I was told. I only made one blunder during the introduction of players in the girl's varsity game. I soon recovered and became at ease. I'd done this before, but for the junior high football games. There, I was in a box nearly by myself, removed from the small audience. The basketball game was quite different. I was surrounded closely by a fully packed gym full of people. Ottawa won handily in both games.

I've been riding my bike to school each day, despite the sub- freezing (not sub zero) temps. I've been utilizing a front battery operated headlight mom got for me some time ago, and a red blinking led light on the rear. I installed a couple of metal wire collapsing baskets on a rear rack so I don't have to carry anything on my back any longer. That's nice.

I've been reading these really good books written by a man named Chaim Potok. I'm surprised I like them as much as I do. Each book features a Jewish religion called Ladover Hasid. They're really quite informative. They are all fiction. I enjoy learning about their absolute dedication to Torah and their perspective on secular and religious aspects of life.

That's enough for the day. Best wishes and health to all!