We are supposed to soar in temperature all the way to the mid-40s today, which is a good thing, since I have to venture out to the wilds of Fairfax County this morning. The roads are passible, but the relative warmth is going to make everything soupy and salty by early afternoon.

I packed up the two phone-book sized legal binder for deliver and looked through the seventy-odd messages that piled up while the gang broke cabin fever at Willow yesterday afternoon in order to celebrate Fat Tuesday, and the end of the long bacchanal in New Orleans. Lovely Jamie is back from Tampa; Ann and Bill are re-united via a Delta connection in Atlanta and Grand Turk Island; Old Jim and Mary were laughing it up with Mary’s Sister and Montana Chris. Kevin the Nieghbor was with TLB and Jon-without, who were preparing for Lent. TLB was wearing here shiny Mardi Gras beads, and Jon has sworn to lay of the demon rum after midnight for the duration. But until midnight, he was sticking with Old Fashions.

The rest of the bar was an edgy mix of the courageous and the fool-hardy. We talked and laughed about Mardi Gras days gone past, and how nice it would be to be strolling around The Big Easy. A big luncheon party had cancelled on Executive Chef Tracy O’Grady, and the Monday lunch special meat loaf was on the bar menu for dinner, sliding Monday to Tuesday due to storm.

We have to adapt, but I really feel for the small businesses whose existence is so dependent on ease of travel, and the hunger of the contractors and bureaucrats who live and work in the area. Several of us hale from the Motor City, and naturally the topic of the ice on the lakes came up. We all still think of the region as ‘home,’ though no one is going back any time soon. Certainly not until the ice is off the roads.

We had noted when Superior in her ice-covered mansion went 100% covered. The last cold snap extended the coverage on the rest of the lakes, and the reporting yesterday from the Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory in Ann Arbor indicated that total ice cover reached the second highest value on record 91%, beating the previous 2nd highest value set in 1994 of 90.7%.

The record of 94.7% coverage was set back in 1979, two years after I packed my sea bag and escaped. Someone laughed about that, or maybe something else, but I heard someone say that the ice was going to linger through the summer if the winds did not pile it up and bring open water.

“Cherry blossoms at the end of the month,” growled Jim. “Can’t come a minute too soon.”

“Think pink,” said Jon-without and waved at Jasper. “I’ll have another, Dr. J. You can re-use the glass.”

“I am thinking about going back to Key West until it is safe,” I said. “This is unreal.”

“It has happened before and it will happen again,” said Kevin. “The ice comes and goes.”

“I just want it to go away from here,” said Mary, and that was something to which we could all raise a glass. And we did.

Copyright 2014 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com
Twitter: @jayare303