Anxious warmups

Gettin’ ready. Maryland was 1-0. Syracuse was 2-0. Somebody had to fall. My school had won the last nine meetings between the two teams. I watched my Maryland Terps warm up in our home city of Syracuse with some nervous butterflies fluttering in my stomach. No. 1 vs. No. 2 …

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Life

Hopeful Terp fans

Pre-game cheer. One of my Christmas gifts from my dear wife Karen was tickets to see my Maryland Terps play men’s lacrosse in the city we live, against the Syracuse Orange. I waited patiently for February to roll around for game day. Lo and behold, on that night, my squad was ranked No. 1 in…

Life

Side-by-side

Happy wife. His-and-hers mani/pedis was our choice for Valentine’s Day presents this year. My dear wife Karen picked a place down the block and reserved us a time a couple days before the holiday. Like a king. They sat us side-by-side, pedicures first, each with our own specialist to take care of the procedure. Easy…

Life

His-and-hers

Yes, we will. After some lively discussion, my dear wife Karen and I agreed on what we might like for Valentine’s Day this year. She said the gift would be on her. More to come tomorrow …

Life

Quite a meal deal

Tasty twice. Yes, I was able to wolf down two franks with sauerkraut on out annual February visit to Heid’s of Liverpool. And a dill pickle for good measure. My dear wife Karen our friend Marie chose fries to go with their franks. We all appreciated the twofers.

Hot dog, it’s February

A good month to visit Heid’s. Liverpool hot dog joint Heid’s puts out a great special every February. Sign of the month. Brave the cold, visit the stand, and you can eat two for the price of one. See how good my meal looked tomorrow …

Trying it out

Izzy approves. One night during our wicked below-zero cold, terrific daughter Elisabeth and fantastic George Three heard an unfamiliar cat calling out on their back deck. With Izzy and Vinny already calling their house home, no, sorry, can’t come in. So Elisabeth quick ordered a shelter box online to put on the deck. Comfy enough,…

Cold front

Don’t want to go out much when it’s this cold. To be an equal opportunity picture-taker, I opened our front door, too, when I discovered it was -3F at 7 a.m. where we live. Yup. Central New York, not anything with arctic in the title.

Brrrrrrraving the open door

Pure cold. It’s not often that your trusted weather app tells you that it was -3 F when you got up at 7 a.m. That’s what pure cold looked like out our back door. Not wind chill. Temperature. Not overnight. 7 a.m. Yikes, is what I say about winter 2026.

Still there

Circling back. The corkscrew evergreen looked even more stately with our flag poking over its shoulder as I wound my way past the Onondaga County Parks and Recreation offices and toward the Village of Liverpool. I was glad I braved the snow and cold to take in a stroll at Onondaga Lake Park, for sure.

There’s the sun

Bright spot. My winter weather stroll diligence at Onondaga Lake Park was rewarded when the sun worked its way through the morning gray. No, it did not feel any warmer.

The other way

Why the fence? As I cold-strolled at our Onondaga Lake Park, I noticed that a lot of my most familiar stops were blocked by a chair link fence. You can see it blocking my path down yonder toward the marina. There were construction vehicles inside the fencing. Maybe I’ll see some changes next visit …

Far side in the cold

Trying. I could see more of the far shore, I thought as I reached a clearing in my so-cold walk at Onondaga Lake Park. And is that the sun trying to announce itself over there to the left?

Two proud trees

No takers. I could have worked my way to the two benches sitting beneath the two winter-stately trees. But, too cold. Had to keep going.

Still a path

Walk that way. Some worker had been up early to clear a path from the big snow at our Onondaga Lake Park. I showed up just a few hours into daylight and more snow had gathered. I forged through in solitude.