I started off this morning looking out the window and seeing a beautiful snowfall... those big, fluffy flakes coming straight down, the absolute stillness of the silence interrupted once with the sound of thunder.

Soon, there was about an inch of white stuff on every surface... the winter wonderland, replayed. And again, the squirrels were having a heyday, running, skidding, jumping, frolicking in general... and an amazing game of either tag or follow-the-leader, consisting of seven furry little red bodies skampering through the trees single file, just as fast as they could go, from left to right across my field of vision.

Within an hour, the snowflakes are quite a bit smaller, and quite a bit wetter. In fact, every other snowflake has melted into a raindrop. The layer of snow has become slush, and it's falling off the trees in clumps that leave perfect round circles on the deck, with a little peak of ice/snow in the middle... just like a stop-action photo of a drop of water hitting a liquid surface.

Pretty damned neat.

A little later, standing outside smoking: the snow on the smaller branches and twigs slowly move from the tops of the branches to hanging from the underside, looking like white worms. Then one end will succumb to gravity and the rest will follow, plunging to the ground in an unbroken line.

I seem to be fascinated with detail this morning. OK, enough about snow, it's only interesting to those readers in Hawaii, anyway, and there are none of those here.

Back to what's on my mind: getting my arteries reamed out. I'm in a quandry about this. My doc won't get the results of the ultrasound until Monday... well, his office will get them, but he won't be there until Monday. Then the decision will be: have the work done on the 31st at Stormont-Vail, the other hospital, or get it done on the 2nd at my hospital, St. Francis.

If it's done at Stormont, it will be completely paid for, because all of my deductibles have been met. Plus, I will have just completed my seven-on with a 12-hour night, and I will be much more susceptible to the various drugs that they will surely use. I will have a full seven days to recuperate.

That, however, will fuck up any plans for New Year's Eve.

Waiting and having the procedure done at St. Francis, though... I'll be amongst friends and co-workers, who would, I hope, take better care of me, and be less likely to let me die. (that's a joke, folks... they wouldn't let me die easily at the other place, either...)

Another complication would be... they usually have a surgeon involved, just standing by "just in case" a clot or something goes down the leg or some other complication arises that might require his services. Getting this arranged might not be possible in the time frame mentioned.

And still another factor... I want to get it over and done with. And J.D. and Tyler will be here on the 2nd or 3rd, and I really want to be done with it before they get here, so we can have some fun!

But I won't know anything until Monday, at the earliest.

I have a really hard time being patient with something like this. OK, with damn near anything.

The little kitten will be leaving on Friday. Marva's sister, who just lost a cat, will be taking him. Karen is going to be gone, and the only time that she can pick him up is in the middle of the day Friday, so I guess I'll get up in the middle of my "night" so that this can happen. I think that I will miss the little bugger, but things will be better for the other two... and that's where my loyalty lies, anyway.

Well, I've got some errands to run
and a poem to write,
and some sleep to get
before I go to work tonight.

Well, I inadvertently wrote a poem already! That wasn't really what I had in mind, though. I want one for Karen, I've been falling down on my poems to her lately....

More tomorrow..... Have a safe and happy one!