Drips and Drabs

Well, I thought I would update since I haven't in a little while. Other than the dog, there hasn't been much to say. Fievel is getting along great, but we continue to work on training. He is figuring out how to sit, although he doesn't like it. My coworker suggested clicker training (positive reinforcement with a clicker) but in my laziness, I have not looked into it yet. We are happy with Fievel and are keeping him, though.

Let's see, what other projects/things have I talked about in the past?

• skiing: haven't done much lately, either downhill or x-country. I might go x-country skiing today though.
• family history: well, that took a back seat to school. Recently though, my dad sent me a list of funny sayings from my great-grandmother that he found in my great-aunt's house. I found one on there that I have picked up over the years "It's raining hard enough to make a lightered knot float". I guess a lightered knot was a heavy dense piece of wood they would use to start fires back in the day. If it was raining enough to make one float, it was raining really hard.
• mosaic tables: I have been working on the center mosaics. I picked out tiles, created a design, and glued the tiles to the board. In fact, I am almost finished with one, which I should be able to show off next week. That means one of my tables will be completely finished!
• school: Well after some red tape/drama surrounding classes being cancelled and me starting my final project, things are progressing again. I am working on a project in conjunction with work that has to do with the way we forecast relative humidity. The good thing is, my boss and a lot of my coworkers are on board. Of course, this doesn't remove the concern that the data is going to be crap, that my advisor won't like it, etc. But I guess that's what comes with the territory when you get your Master's.

Um, what else? I went snowshoeing the other day. It was pretty cool. I am unafraid to snowshoe by myself (unlike hiking) because all the bears are sleeping. I went down to a trail I hadn't done before. My ex-coworker ("Crazy Dave") told me that this stream that runs through town had a Class V whitewater rapid on it. He said that you could take this side trail that went down to the canyon. So I looked for it, and sure enough, there was a canyon -- a large one, in fact. It was probably about 100 to 150 ft. I was quite surprised because it really is right on the edge of town, and no one really knows about it. I would like to take Ethan down there at some point. And, I ended up being really glad I went in the winter, because I don't think I would have seen much if I had gone in the summer due to the leaves being on the trees. Next time, I'll take my camera to show you all.

Which leaves me to my final thing: a picture for today. I wanted to take a picture of the little birds that come to my bird feeder. They are mostly redpolls, although this picture only shows one with a really red head. They used to come twice a day. Now, though, my next door neighbor got a new bird feeder that they like, so they pretty much hang around all day. I have mixed emotions about it. It's cool to see the birds on her feeder, but there's a lot of crap (literally) all over my car. Anyway, here are some winter birds for you:


Well, off to enjoy some hot tea and an episode of Martha Stewart (oh, how the mighty have fallen)!