Happy New Year.

The old year ended with a fog that hung on all day long. After the sun retreated we had an unexpected rain shower. The nice thing about that was we can expect little in the way of damage from the fireworks to celebrate the end of the old and the beginning of the new.

Today dawned overcast and dreary looking…Let’s hope it’s not an omen of the year to come.

I am already missing the dry weather we had last winter. I guess the figure that drove home to me just how much rain we have been having was in today’s Chronicle…We are less than 3/4 of an inch below our normal rainfall total for a year where we saw almost no rain for 8 months…How odd is that? Even without any tropical storms we managed to reach our normal precipitation totals. Now December has turned out to be cooler than normal with a snow record for Houston that will probably stand for a long time…The earliest recorded snowfall in the history of the town. It was also the first time Houston has had measurable snowfall in two consecutive years…And with the prognosticators calling for more of this cold, wet weather going forward in the new year, I wouldn’t be surprised to make it three consecutive years of snowfall…Climate change is upon us, just not what most of the public is expecting.

2010

This year has always been on my calendar as a year of changes. Back in the days when I had a job, I had planned to leave that job in March anyway. From the looks of things I hung on just a little long…Instead of waiting to be laid off in 2008, I should have left that spring…It would have saved my retirement account a few bucks. Sad to think, that last half year cost me more than I made.

I guess I should be thankful they booted me out when they did, had I made it to my thirty sixth anniversary I would have lost even more. But I had really looked forward to making the 40th Earth Day the day I changed my life…

The Blue Ridge Dream

Will this be the year of the dream? I would like to think so…But, the closer we get to the actual decision, the more my better half seems to have reservations. Mostly she worries about being so far away from family…I can understand the feelings. I just look at it from a different place.

I guess you could say it’s a move I’ve put off most of my life…And now I am feeling it calling.

So anyway…As I said at the beginning of this post…

Happy New Year