Ken Graham: FROM THE PUBLISHER

After two days huddled in the house under layers of blankets (except for a few trips out to split firewood), I trudged out through the snow Sunday morning to start the car. Nothing. Dead Battery.

It was 12 degrees. I tried to jump start it with our other car. Nothing doing.

I went into the shop, which also read 12 degrees, and got out the battery charger and a long extension cord. My hands were nearly numb when I decided to put on some gloves.

I got a wrench and went out to disconnect the battery cable – I had to take the gloves back off to do that.

With the car battery connected to the grid, I went inside and looked up the weather forecast. Mid-thirties were expected by mid-week. You know things are bad when a forecast like that makes you smile.

Just for the fun of it (well, actually, to make myself feel worse) I typed “San Diego” into Accuweather. Low 60s and raining. I’ll take it.

Miami? Mid to high 70s and light rain. Honolulu? Low 80s and showers. (Well, the drought seems to be over.)

I don’t suppose our readers would mind missing a couple of issues, I thought to myself, while I take a trip. Yeah, right.

I felt like taking one of the icicles hanging from the roof of the shop and stabbing myself with it.

A little while later, when I went back out to check on the car, I looked over and saw our two dogs wrestling in the snow. They were having a great time.

Then I saw three white-tail dear behind the house foraging around. They looked kind of strange, and I realized that they have a whole lot more fur now than they did in the summer. Come to think of it, so do the dogs; and the cats.

Suddenly I heard a woodpecker tapping (pounding?) on the power pole next to the house. We also have a lot of chickadees flitting around our yard? Unlike me, they could all go south if they wanted…for free. Yet here they are, happy as little birds.

After a couple of hours on the charger, the car started right up. Then I went in the house and took a shower. I decided all those rainy places down south didn’t sound so great after all.