Happy St. Patrick's Day

Conditions at 5:00 am: 2' and overcast (although it had rained earlier)
Expected later: mix of sun and cloud and +4'

To all or our friends of Irish descent, Happy St. Patrick's Day. Once again the Old Dublin Pub is hosting a traditional St. Paddy's Day breakfast in aid of charity. From 8:00 to 10:00 you can sit in a pub and enjoy a full Irish Breakfast!  Unfortunately I won't be able to go but I'm sure it will be something Lloyd will support when he gets here!  Lloyd, don't forget to mention it to Nile.

A curious sign of spring??? Last night when I got home from work, I took the dog for a walk down the road, and I encountered dozens of little fuzzy black caterpillars along the side of the road. They were only about an inch long and had faint yellow stripes running from one end to the other, not around like others I've seen. They were spread out all along the way but only on the sand at the side, not on the pavement. The really curious thing about them was the fact they were all on one side of the road only - the side closest to the river (which is still quite a distance away, so I can't imagine that makes any difference). On the way back, I walked on the other side and only saw one the whole way. It seems early to be seeing that sort of thing and I've never seen them before. Wonder what that means.

I also stopped and had a hamburger on my way home - not something I would usually do. But I was very hungry and just had a craving for a burger. The last time that happened it was a few months ago on a Saturday after work, so I stopped at Wendy's. It was a disappointing experience. So last night I stopped at the Peter Pan. I've never been there before and I recently learned that one of the fellows at work owned it for many years. He sold it after his children were grown. He said he it was lots of work, and he would never have gotten rich but he raised a family and put them all through school and you can't ask for more than that. He hasn't owned it for a number of years, but he says it's still the same. One day I was recently driving a couple of people back to the dealership and as we drove by, I mentioned that I'd never eaten there and they both said the food was really good. So last night I decided to check it out. I ordered the burger basket - with cheese. It had a cheeseburger, fries and coleslaw. Well I knew it would be good when she took out a clump of REAL meat, and flattened it on the grill and began to cook it.Because it was real meat, cooked fresh to order, I had to wait a few minutes. But it was worth it. The burger tasted just like I hoped it would - like  a real hamburger - not the processed, artificially flavoured discs we've grown accustomed to. I'll have to bring the kids here the next time they come to visit. Now I can't wait to get the BBQ out again. But I still have to wait for more snow to melt before I can do that.

Now I think the weather network is just messing with our heads. Most of the week they were predicting a total of up to 25 cm of snow between Friday and Saturday. Now they've got mixed precipitation (just a little) for Friday and sun and cloud for Saturday. BUT, if you look ahead to next week they are again suggesting we may receive 10+ cm on Tuesday.  Let's hope they're wrong ----again! I'm kind of getting used to the mild temperatures and sunny days.