So it goes...

 I'd like to believe we're on the downside of winter, but I'm afraid to for fear of more snow. It has been a brutal last 6 weeks after a fairly mild, almost snowless December. There were some things to appreciate about this season, starting with that snowless December. January had a lot of days near 30 degrees which made for good cross country skiing and decent walking weather to maintain some semblance of fitness. Then Late January and early February rolled around and as often happens, things got ugly. Lots of significant snowfalls, usually followed by the predictable cold temps that seem to follow most storms.  Throw into that fun, the last 10 days of what I'm calling a Polar Vortex, (I don't know if the meteorologists are, but I am)  and it has most of us thinking spring can't come soon enough. Temps are creeping into the thirties in the next few days so, I'm running with that victory. After my walk in 17 degree weather (and daylight, bonus!) yesterday, I...

Well, we are in the heart of the winter season and so far, so good. I always get a serious case of dread in October and November knowing what is in front of us, namely darkness, snow and cold. So, this winter I was determined to make things better, determined not to hate every day of it. And maybe it's because it's been a fairly tame winter thus far, but I also think a lot of it can be credited to attitude and some other adjustments I've made. Probably the biggest problem I had with it in the past was the early darkness. I'm an outdoors person so being cooped up indoors after work every night cramps my routine. What I've done to remedy some of this is come to the realization that there is a season for high activity and a season for rest. I've come to look at winter as my season to dial my outdoor sports back a bit. The problem with this is it typically means I gain 8-9 pounds every winter which makes me feel like a fat boy. To remedy this, I try and walk...

Well, it's finally happened. It's that time of year when I am officially done with winter. DONE. We had the most boring super bowl game ever and now with regards to sports, I have nothing to look forward to until next fall's football season. To add to that, the quirkiness of the weather we've had the past few weeks has pushed me right over the edge. The problem is, we still have 38 days until the official 1st day of spring (March 20th.) This seems entirely too long, but at least we can see the light at the end of the tunnel. When this time of year hits, I fall into my power-through-it mode. Having said that there are some things I pledge to between now and then to get me through it. I HEREBY PLEDGE TO: Continue to drag myself out of bed in relative darkness, do my stretching, and drink my coffee as I plow through my workdays. Work is good. Well, it's warmer than my house, anyway. Keep over dressing to almost clownish proportions at home on the cold...

But hey, it's sunny. It's a little cold where I live. Just a bit. Most of the Midwest is in the grips of another polar vortex. These are weather events caused by aberrations in the jet stream which are caused by melting polar ice, which is caused by too much carbon in our atmosphere, which is caused by years of fossil fuel burning, etc, etc. And I don't care what your stance is on global warming, I do know that this pretty much sucks whatever is causing it. (From my perspective, I agree it's caused by what they say it is, but that's my editorial perspective.) Yesterday and today temps hovered around -25 Fahrenheit with a feel-like of -45. As you may know, my house is 97 years old. It breathes like a bag of onions in the winter. While this transfer of interior air to the outside might be good for air quality, it makes it just a tad drafty in here. My workplace closed the past two days due to the temps, so I have been on modified house arrest. Yesterday ...

Well, it's officially 2019 and we are in the dark cold months of winter. If you know me, you know I am a shorts and t-shirt kind of guy. I like to come home from work, get shorts on and take a 45 minute bike ride to decompress. In the spring/summer/fall months I do that as often as I can. So when winter rolls around, I go into a sort of inner-funk. It's not a depression per-se, but I can certainly see it from here. There's something about the dark/cold combination that wears on me. If I had an unhealthier nature, I could become a real slug and never do anything from November until March. I've found I have to work at staying active or pay the price with pants that are too tight and butt prints embedded in my living room chair. Not good, either of them. In an effort to keep my sanity and not sleep for 15 hours a day, I do a few things. All of them are "fake it till you make it" solutions to staving off the blues. So far so good. I walk to work pretty muc...

I would consider myself a fairly active adult for my age. I fake my way through a 20 minute yoga routine every morning, walk or bike to work every day (3.2 mi. round trip) and do a fair amount of biking and kayaking during the spring-fall seasons. Winter is typically hard for me because I tend to dial my activity back and pack on a little winter fat. I might not show it, but trust me, I feel it. I carry around five to eight pounds every winter that I just can't seem to shake. Not a ton, but enough to make my pants annoyingly tight. In an attempt to alleviate some of these issues and maybe keep the winter blues at bay, I got some new cross country skis for Christmas this year. I love to ski, but my old skis were just that, OLD. Ironically enough, when I got them, I jokingly said that everyone could put away their snow blowers for the year, because it would mean no more snow - this prohibiting me from skiing. Well, it almost happened. Until this week, we've only had probably ...

Last Sunday I was getting a bad case of cabin fever before the start of the Packer playoff game against the Cowboys. I was tempted to try out the new skis, despite the probable poor conditions at Lapham Peak, a park that boasts a small system of trails where the snow base is man-made. The park is a 20 minute drive from home, and I wasn't sure I wanted to commit to what might be a disappointing experience. So, instead I went skating. We have a park near us that constructs a rink every winter. It is not huge, but I knew it doesn't take much to tire out this 55 year old skater, so I thought I'd give it a whirl. I was trying to determine the age of my hockey skate and I narrowed them down to being about forty years old. When I googled them, one eBay site labelled them as "Vintage Bauer Big Chief Skates." I'm the proud owner of "vintage," I guess. I think I got them in about 1977 and, because I never skated more than a few times a year, I never saw ...

... or the Preservation of Frigid Faces in the Struggle for Life. For as long as I can remember, I have tried to deny the coming of winter. I am not a big fan, and this denial is a good example of that. To illustrate I have to detail my annual winter coat transition routine. It is an evolution of sorts, albeit an involuntary one. When I bike to work in the summer, often times, I won't wear a coat at all. As fall approaches, I work my way up the coat chain. I start with my "blue coat" that is an unlined wind-breaking kind of coat that says "Yeah, there's moments of chilliness, but it'll pass. " It also rolls up small enough so it can be packed in my backpack in case the day warms up. Near the middle of October, I usually upgrade to my "black coat", a slightly heavier coat that is an admission that August truly is over and September ain't coming back, either. Unlike the blue coat, this coat says "Yep, I guess fall is here and you...

Me and my Niece Gray-Gray. So it's been 3 months since I last blogged. What's a guy to do? I'm a little bit lazy, a little bit busy and my kids dominate the computer. In this busy Christmas season, I wanted to get some of the thoughts from my head onto paper, albeit virtual paper. Did I gripe about last winter on this blog? As I recall, I did...quite a bit. Well, some things never change. Old man winter has struck hard with a vengance this December, and we're still two weeks from being into January. We just dug out from a 12" snowfall yesterday (for 29" in December thus far.) and are looking at another 5-7" tonight into tomorrow. Oh, and Tuesday some more. All I beg for is mercy. Some observations from the storm yesterday. I saw a guy on Fountain Ave. using a shovel on the hood of his car to dig out. A shovel, not a broom. It makes me laugh to think that this may be the same guy that washes his car once a week in the summer. Or, maybe not. Winter seems t...