Friday, February 20, 2015                      9:56 AM

Looking at a possible record for coldest day today, I woke up, went to the kitchen and turned on the oven to 425 with the door open, turned on the plasma TV in the bedroom (plasma TVs act as space-heaters, which helps in winter, but is not so good in summer) and put the space heater on full blast in the foyer. It’s still pretty chilly in here, so I’m sitting at my PC with a scarf and Elmer-Fudd-hat on. The only way to warm my hands is by holding them over the open oven door, but then I’m breathing in the heat coming straight up at my head, so I can’t do it for long.

Winter takes a lot out of a guy. Whenever I think of spring, I feel an overwhelming weariness at the thought of all the days between now and then, all the hours of chilled bones, stiff muscles, and runny noses. I hung one of those seed bells from a tree branch outside the window yesterday—I’ve been putting it off because it’s been too cold to run outside, but then I thought of how hard it must be for the birds to find food right now, so I forced myself to get out there and do it. I couldn’t tie a good knot with that nylon webbing they come in—I expect it to be on the ground, being gnawed at by squirrels, before the day is out. Even then, the birds will still get the small seeds that the squirrels leave behind, so it’s not a complete waste.

I wish I could, with a snap of my fingers, hang ten of those things from squirrel-proof wires all around the property and just make our yard a bird’s winter paradise—but all that ladder work is problematical when there’s more than a foot of snow on the ground, so that will remain a fantasy. Tough luck, birds.

I’m expecting a visitor or two today, but I won’t be surprised if no one shows up. It’s tempting to think of just going back to bed and calling the whole day a wash. Winter always makes me politically incorrect—there’s nothing sounds so good to me right now as ‘global warming’. Warming, did you say? Bring it on!