Last Day of Meteorological Winter?

In Minnesota, supposedly, the winter season is really December, January and February. That's what the weather guys are saying, so today, Leap Day, is the last day of winter. Yay. It snowed last night on my way to play tennis, and on the way home I was confronted with freezing rain. This morning, Herb and I shoveled the droppings off the sidewalks. As you can see, the winter has not yet loosened its grasp on my backyard. I wisely waited until today to shovel, so that the ice stuck to the top of the snow, rather than merging with the sidewalk. I have had some exercise already today.



The tennis was good last night. Jerry's sub, Pat, played well and the hardcore girls were at their usual steely best. Barb and I fell behind 4-1 in both of the finished sets, but rallied to win both 7-5, 6-4. The fragment set was 1-4, so you can see that we were consistently slow at getting into the set. Becky, who works at the hospital where Jerry is spending the week, reported that Jerry is doing very well. The pathology report showed no spread of the tumor to lymph nodes, so he is very relieved and pretty doggone happy. He's on his way home sometime today, although he has to get used to eating real food again, yet. I look forward to fighting off his driving, swinging forehand volleys soon. Maybe before the snow is completely gone.

I'm amusing myself by not shaving my geezer visage until spring arrives. In the interest of measurability, that means that the temperature in the Saintly City must remain above freezing for 48 consecutive hours. That's my own personal gauge. So far this season, that span has been far beyond our ability to attain. A shot of the current visage is included for scale.



I haven't reported from curling for the week. Wednesday night was a successful evening for the Miller Rink. The game was tied 6-6 after five ends, but we had the hammer, and thus curled last. We had some good shots from Wireless and Kurt, which left three counting stones in the house. We were able to guard them, with shots from Gino, and the game ended with their skip trying an impossible shot with the expected result. 9-6. The playoffs are starting in about three weeks. We have two more games before then, but we are not in danger of winning the league. Curling is a good diversion for the winter months, but winter is nearly over. See above.

I assume that there is a theme for the March first post. Since it is leap year, I hope that it has something to do with jumping. Otherwise, I have some more pictures of the beard.