Warming Trend

After days and days of waking up to temperatures in the mid to low twenties, thirty-five this morning seems almost balmy.  Just another example of "take what you can when you can and be glad that you got it."  I'm sure I'll find some excuse to work outside today. 

Apropos of absolutely nothing, using the term "balmy" in a weather context made me think of my Aunt Hilda, who used "balmy" as her word for being a little bit crazy.  My mother's family came from Peoria, Illinois, just outside of Chicago.  Aunt Hilda's speech always carried the flavor of Chicago, and even when she wrote, she wrote, "Youse guys."  Aunt Hilda and Uncle Kenneth did not have any children, and I think they rented me when they needed a kid fix (or perhaps my mother needed a break).  Unlike Mother, Hilda doted on animals and always had a fat Spaniel and one or two Siamese cats, and put out pans and pans of milk and stale bread daily for a multitude of stray cats from the training race track across the road.  She also raised canaries, cockatiels, and cockatoos in a large aviary, in addition to chickens, geese, and turkeys.  Writing this, I wonder if I was born to the wrong sister!  (There actually was a mix up in the hospital when I was born, and if the other girl baby had not had black hair...who knows what the outcome might have been.)

Tree Guy and Son worked on the oak yesterday while I was a lady of leisure and watched NASCAR.  They figure they have another day's work to take down the rest of the endangering limbs.  I just hate the changes in my landscape.  The oak hid from view so much of my neighbor's equipment and accumulation of broken this-es and thats one keeps behind the buildings.  Ah, well...it is what it is.  One thing for sure, I won't have to worry about firewood for a long, long time.