Good early morning GH. It is just past 12:00 AM "The City," with a current temperature of 21 degrees under snowy skies. We are heading down to a temperature in the teens, where we will stay through most of this week. We might, and I stress might, get to the low thirties by Saturday. By low thirties, I mean 31 degrees. The snow that was expected on Sunday never materialized. However, today snow is forecast at 50% and then 60% on Tuesday, New Year's Eve. Thursday has a forecast of 70% for more snow, but no prediction for how much.

Mary and I finished our work late Sunday afternoon. I think it was nearly 6:00 PM before we were done. Just in time to see the Bears lose, as I expected, to the Packers, 28 - 33. So, as my barber and I predicted, the Bears finished 8 - 8 and out of the playoffs for the third year in a row. Like I said, wait until next year.

That's what I am doing, waiting until next year, but now I am waiting for the boys in blue and my beloved Red Sox and the Tigers. New Year's Day football will be good, as the MSU Spartans face off against the Stanford Cardinal in the Rose Bowl. This once storied game used to be the "Big Game" on New Year's Day. But with the advent of the BCS series, which ends this year, it became just another bowl game. Hopefully the playoffs scheduled for college football next year will be an improvement. I am tired of teams with losing records getting  bowl bids. I know why the teams accept, money, but enough already.

Speaking of the increase in money expected under the new playoff system, I hope that the athletes get some of it. They play, they pay in injuries, and the colleges profit. Something is wrong with that. I don't want to compromise on what I love about college football, but a scholarship is little compensation for what they give. If the new playoff system goes wrong, college football will really become just a farm system for the NFL.

Of course we didn't get out on Sunday, no time. We had hopes of getting to Kentwood on Monday to check on a new to me guitar, but the weather may preclude that. We'll have to look out the window and at the weather forecast in the AM to decide. Kentwood is about a one-hour drive southeast from GH, and a very easy drive. However, neither Mary nor I want to be out driving in bad weather.  Our next day would have been Thursday, but as I noted above, that day looks dicey too. Oh well, that's Michigan for you.

Sunrise today will be at 8:16 AM and sunset at 5:19 PM. Tea time will be whenever we get up and going this morning. Mary and I had banana nut bread for breakfast on Sunday. However, it is time for me to get to work on those remaining boxes of Cheerios. Amazingly, I find that I miss them, even though I have to eat left-handed during my convalescence. My dad spent nearly 70 years doing that, but then he was left-handed in the first place. My older brother was ambidextrous, but I am very right- handed. I guess that this rehab will help me be a better guitar player in the future.

So that looks like about all for yesterday and today. Ciao.