Freezing rain covering everything with ice today. They're talking about accumulations as thick as 1/4". Yipes! I moved to Texas to get away from winters, dammit!

Caught a bit of the local news last night, and the weathermen was nearly hysterical. A Winter Storm was coming! There there will be a Winter Storm Advisory in effect for counties only an hour drive to the north. It may get Below Freezing tomorrow night. He made it sound as if we needed to prepare to be socked in by a 36" snowfall.

Sheesh. It was almost as bad as when the weathermen in NY freaked out when the temperature got above 90 fora couple of days.

After we bought our house, our realtor said "I'm gonna buy you a donut to celebrate". Then he pulls up to Round Rock Donuts and hops out. "Wait right here" he says. Doesn't ask what kind we want or nothing. A little odd, we think, but whatever. Then he comes back with what looks like a box of a dozen. "Now remember," he says, "you're in Texas now. Everything's bigger here." We open the box and the joke becomes clear.

So of course we have to pull the same thing on the kid. "There's donuts on the table, but you may only have one." "Okay dad" ..... "Whoa! Awesome!"

When I lived in New York, if i tiik a shower and the pilot light had gone out on the water heater, it was rather noticeable. "Holy freaking icebergs, Batman! There's no hot water!" More than once I had to go scurrying around dripping wet to get it restarted.

Well, apparently some boxes stacked outside the water heater closet blocked the airflow and caused the pilot light to go out. I noticed something had changed when, during my shower one morning, I noticed that the water was a little brisk. Hmm. Maybe Brett turned down the temperature on the water heater. Wonder why she did that? It was three more days before I got around to checking the pilot light.

That's how much warmer it is here. Even the "cold" water is fairly warm, at least in August. I'm sure it'll change in a couple of months, but for now it's nice not to have to go scurrying through the house at 6 in the morning, naked and dripping.

Saw one nosing around in my neighbor's front yard this morning on my way to work. It was about half an hour before sunrise, so I assume he was getting one last serving of bugs before disappearing for the day.

Supposedly there's one that prowls around in our front yard, but I haven't seen him yet.