Out Like a Lamb.

We hit 60 -- repeat 60!-- on the 29th and 30th for the first time since Oct. 13, and only the rain today kept it cool in the 40s.

I saw a robin each day as well, my first this Spring. The dog got a haircut, nails trimmed, the works... so easy now to hose off the belly and paws in the sink. For a smaller one, we do get out "stretching our legs" and it is officially mud season.

I start temp work next week -- grading scoring the state achievement tests as they roll in from the schools; the precursors to the Common Core. It's enlightening, but confidential.*

We've finally turned the page** up here, from what has no doubt been the longest, coldest winter of my life. The snow cover came in November, then more and more, though most of it was weightless, waterless, and fluffy. Then it got cooold.

I don't snowshow, but at most temperatures this year, I could walk on the snow banks that got to be 2 and 3 feet, deeper in the drifts. Now, and for the few sunny nice days we've had earlier, if you step off a trail, you can sink knee deep. Today, I momentarily lost my shoe lifting my leg out (yes, this is why we wear boots...) It was pretty fun, like cracking the edges of the ice off the sidewalk, or stomping through a good clean puddle... ('git snow! begone!)

My Mom wrote of being out doing yard work weeks ago; the snow here has receded only about 2 feet from the sidewalks into the lawns now, but is still a good foot or two deep, and there's no sign at all of any buds, or flowers, or green shoots coming up that I can see. I'm keeping looking though; but not out all that much...

So in closing, here's a tune that's been in my mind, a nice one to close out March, no?:

It's a world of laughter
a world of tears.
It's a world of hope
and a world of fears.
There's so much that we share
that it's time we're aware
it's a small world, after all.

Here's another (on your feet now):

"And righteous men
must make our land
a Nation once again."

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* Label your answers!
Show your work!
(Paul gets it.)

** Also, good news: street parking restrictions are lifted tonight!
(It was getting soggy in my spot.)