Spring is in the air in the country...

Believe it or not, we have actually had 3 days in a row over 60 degrees now with plenty of sunshine. What a treat. So far, I've cut the grass and rolled the lawn once, played 18 holes of golf (89 -- not too bad for the first 18 of the year), hit balls at the driving range twice, and fished once (got skunked there). Not bad for three days, huh. I resisted the urge to call the guy who replaced me as principal at the high school to see if he was having a nice day.

I took some pictures around the yard to show you what I'm so happy about. I think I showed you pictures of these three particular trees in an earlier article about the ice storm in March.

This reminds me of a joke from a friend named Dave who used to work with me at Troy High School. It's called "Pearly Gates" and goes like this:

A curious fellow died one day and found himself waiting in the long line of judgment. As he stood there he noticed that some souls were allowed to march right through the pearly gates into Heaven. Others though, were led over to Satan who threw them into the burning pit. But every so often, instead of hurling a poor soul into the fire, Satan would toss a soul off to one side into a small pile. After watching Satan do this several times, the fellow's curiosity got the best of him.

So he strolled over and asked Satan what he was doing. "Excuse me, Prince of Darkness," he said. "I'm waiting in line for Judgment, but I couldn't help wondering. Why are you tossing those people aside instead of flinging them into the Fires of Hell with the others?"

"Oh those . . Satan groaned. "They're all from OHIO, They're still too cold and wet to burn."

Now I'm sure the Chamber of Commerce wouldn't see any humor in that, but we Ohioans know of what the devil was speaking.

Anyway, just one more thing. We've got lots of fish in the pond and the bass look pretty good. We've also got a persistent robin who built a nest in one of our front windows. I threw it out of there once early on when she was just building it. Didn't want the neighbor's cat to get it. She rebuilt it and dropped an egg in there to mark her place. We now have 4 eggs and she doesn't go very far from it. I'll keep you posted on their progress.

To paraphrase Henry David Thoreau -
“One attraction in coming to retirement is that I should have leisure and opportunity to see the spring come in.”

Hooah