Well there’s no partying for me tonight, unless you count Jimmy and me shaking our shoulders to Dick Clark’s New Years Rockin’ Eve.

I have succumbed to the winter crud. I don’t know if it is the flu, pneumonia, some foreign undiscovered disease or the common cold, but it has snapped the ‘party’ right out of me.

It is winter and `tis the season so… Que sera sera. I [or we] have to stay positive and find something to look forward to.

So here is a little something out of Getting Me Back for the home-bound whether by choice or circumstance. (The rest of you pArTy oN!)

Winter in Texas

The first frost arrived this week

Spit forth from the infinite stars like a sneeze leaving sprinkles of sugary ice on the landscape.

The remaining blades and leafs gave way and withered at daybreak leaving nothing but the scattered evergreens to give us hope…

No blooms worthy of expectancy.

However there is hardly anything more beautiful than a berry laden Juniper dotted with Cardinals; the Christmas tree with all of her ornaments pales in comparison.

Oh Christmas, we have that to look forward to – with the Santa Claus fable, the forgotten Jesus and colorful lights draped over bare limbs and the cherished red-nosed reindeer standing pretentiously on brown turf.

And New Year’s Eve – ah, the kissing; corks and fireworks detonate in unison to commemorate the failed promises yet to come. We gorge on black-eyed peas and cabbage, not earnestly expecting anything more than flatulence.

Let us not forget Valentine’s Day – the heart shaped holiday; a cardboard cutout of romantic blossoms; proven love with sentimental cards and candy and flowers…

 V-day — a cruel occasion for the lonely and broken hearted who would today be happy with

that so-so dinner date and obligatory sex.

The days are so short – yet so long.

Alas, a reason to utilize the fireplace – don’t forget to plant your potatoes.

Gaudy clumps of snow, bulky and shaped as if they had been intended for hail, tumble down like chopped feathers. The pansies are happy, their pastel petals rise and smirk beneath the thin white blanket of ice mocking the frost bitten flowers beside them.

Next week’s forecast is warm and dry.  We will take it, we have no choice.

We will ride the weather-coaster, counting the birthdays of dead leaders and full moons and scattered days of sunny and seventy-five while we wait for the ides of March to come marching in.