the big guy and i rang in the new year with a few friends, some hearty drinks and a warm kiss. it was a rare treat to be with him on new years, as he has worked on new years eve for the last six or seven years. i can only hope that your evening was as pleasant as mine.

the new year has started with terrible weather in the northwest. sufficiently crappy to make it slippery and cold, but not crappy enough to cancel work or keep most idiots off the roads. a good part of last night was spent marvelling at the local news footage of SUVs sliding into each other on a notorious hill in southeast portland. i just had to chuckle.

yesterday, whilst driving to a fabulously yummy new year's day party (thanks lady j!) - we passed a corner on which there were two prolific forts built of snow. the big guy commented with LOTR seriousness - 'a mighty battle has been fought here ' - at which point we delved into a very lengthy discussion about the architectural strengths and weaknesses of each fort design.

i have also noticed that one snowman just isn't good enough for northwesterners. most snow people appeared in couples, if not entire families - most of them life-sized. i guess when you don't get snow that often, you have to do it up right.

the weather is supposed to continue through the weekend - although we have a wedding to attend in corvallis, and a retirement party in salem. we will see how tomorrow looks... but i am wary.

while god decided to redesign the portland landscape for the new year, i have decided to let the semaphoria design live for awhile longer. (see funny, funny comic about new year's redesigns) i had considered starting anew, but decided that there are other priorities that needed to be addressed in my non-virtual world.