Going Inkless

     I think every blogger has written the sorry-I-haven't-written-lately post, in some fashion at least.  I've done it before.  I'll do it again.  I'm kind-of doing it now.      When you commit to writing a blog, there's a certain expectation of regular offerings that breeds a certain guilt when those are not forthcoming.  I could make up a lot of chatter, a quick and mindless post of nothing. Still, I'd rather say something with these posts than merely fill a page.  So at times like these, it may get a little quiet.  Right now, there are big changes happening as I had hinted in my previous post.      For one thing, I will be leaving the job I have loved for the last 12 years in order to start a new position at the library.  There will be new things to learn and new working hours.  But even before that, there is all the business of extracting myself from the department I headed, the one where I have personally built up procedures and tailored them to fit th

     A long, bitter winter has a way of pushing things to their breaking point.  This winter has been one of the harshest on record in the United States, sending snow and ice storms into even the normally balmy southern states.  Where we live, there has been a pattern cycling between arctic temperatures and heavy snowfall and back again throughout the past three months.  Every time it warms to 20 degrees or so (-7C), we get another blanket of snow before diving back toward zero (-18C) again.  We have had our occasional, isolated above-freezing days when icicles grow and meltwater collects on sidewalks only to become a dangerous sheet of ice with the following cold snap.  The sun beats on snowbanks by day, pushing fingers into the less hard-packed edges.  Then, cold winds turn the work into a natural masterpiece like frozen surf- beautiful, but sharp and unforgiving if you fall.  Water will seep into cracks and pores when it warms, straining as it freezes and the ice expands.      So