Good morning, everyone.  We touched zero yesterday for a couple of hours before slipping back into the below zero range.  Just not as cold as yesterday.  Tomorrow we will tackle the patio and the cars.  Thankfully the parking lot and sidewalks are well taken care of by our landlords.

The first thing I saw on MSNBC, which diverted me as I was going for my e-mail, was this little story.  We hear very little of how the economic crisis is affecting others or about other problems elsewhere in the world.  If anyone thinks that the we will come out of this recession any time soon and with little pain, they should think again.  Given some of what is happening abroad, we may yet count ourselves as lucky.

Does anyone out there find themselves with a collection of metal bottle caps.  Here is a cute idea if you crochet.  Mom says that she knows a different way to make trivets out of them.  But since we don't get much any more that has metal caps I doubt I will be trying either method soon.  I wonder how the method would work with the plastic caps from, say, milk jugs?  I would not want to put them under anything rally hot but they might make some nice heavy duty coasters for plants or the like.

Just one little comment on the up-coming inaugural. Mom and I were listening to one of the morning news casts over coffee as the news readers described the various reporters who are either on their way to D.C. or already there to cover the events.  I remarked that the hype this year was far more intense than I can ever recall.  I wondered how much is because of Obama and how much comes from the fact that everyone is so very, very, very, very happy to see the end of the Shrub's administration.  A hefty dose of both I guess.