Thank goodness that's over

January, that is; such a dreary, fractious, whining month this year! It was 31 days of mostly unremitting grey skies, mostly disgusting weather, mostly unpleasant news - all together a forgettable period. Within a 10-day period friend and sister C2 had a heart attack (she's recovering nicely), friend A's mother died unexpectedly, and a former coworker was diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer. The whole miserable month ended on Sunday, appropriately enough, with a major car problem as we were getting ready to head to Cleveland - but at least it didn't happen while we were on the road, and my beloved Outback was quickly repaired and ready to go again. February is bound to be better.

I'll be heading into town shortly to pick up kitty and people meds, kitty and people food, and a few other things in preparation for the winter storm that's heading our way. I'm not panicked and the larder isn't bare, but there's no reason not to have stuff on hand. Saint H is due to lead a winter tree identification hike on Saturday for the local park district, but we'll have to see if the weather cooperates. Hmmm, seems to me we did this last year too and squeaked the hike in before things got ridiculous. Maybe our luck will hold, or maybe we should think about a different scheduling pattern? Who knows.

I'm compiling all our tax paperwork for the accountant. Last year we put over 10,000 miles on the car for medical mileage, and the stack of medical receipts this year is about 8" high. Egads!