Snow day

Hey there! Seems like Mother Nature has a way of changing one's plans. I was gonna work in the garden area yesterday ... maybe turn the ground over some and start getting it ready for spring. Since it's been so warm this year I thought maybe that groundhog was right after all and Spring was gonna come early just like they said. Heck, I had all sorts of stuff moved around in the barn getting the tiller ready to go. Made some sketches on how I wanted to arrange the crops for this year. Even gave some thoughts of maybe trying to get a new hybrid or two out of the seeds we got from last year.

But wouldn't you know it, soon as I got stuff just the way I wanted it and stopped for breakfast, it started to snow. Thought at first it was just gonna be a light sprinkling where it just put a light dusting on top of the ground ... maybe coat the trees some ... make it look real pretty, like one of them Currier and Ives pictures ... but noooo, it had to go and snow all day. Laid down a good three to five inches of that wet, heavy stuff, the kind of snow where your first step is fine but if you put your foot back there a second time it's already turned to ice. Well that just put the kybosh on any plans I had t get anything done. Had to close up the barn and look for something else to do.

Course the Naugas loved it. They romped and played all day. Barely took time out to eat the stuff I threw in the pen. One of them would get a running start ... well as much as a Nauga can of course ... and then it'd kinda fold them legs of its down and away and sorta jump onto the snow slidin as far as it could. As soon as it finished and lurched up to its feet again the next one would follow straight away down its wake. Amazing how fast those critters can slide once they'd got the snow nice and compact and slick as ice. Must be some sort of natural instinct built up over generations out in the wild. What with the snow and all being pretty heavy in the north where their range used to be, I imagine they just worked it out for themselves as a way to get back and forth from the streams Sort of like game trails through a forest. Boy oh boy, I can just about imagine a whole bunch of Nauga sliding down a snow run. Probably built up a pretty good speed in places. Guess it'd kinda be like going down a bobsled run ... only without the sled.

Well like I said, that snow pretty much ruint any plans I had for working in the garden so I spent some time watching them Naugas. Gave me an idea. I wonder ifn maybe next year we can do a winter version of Nauga riding. You know, make a snow run out back somewheres and harness up a few to see if a fella could manage to stay on long enough to finish the run. Might just be fun. Oh I'm sure there'd be a lot of slippin and sliding and folks would probably fall off a lot. Or if that just don't seem practical ... maybe we could make it a race between Naugas ... see which ones was fastest ... yeah that just might work ... 'specially since they seem to enjoy it so much. Bet they'd look forward to it. Have to put something nice for them at the end ... maybe some radishes or a nice splash down in a pool. Yeah ... that just might do it. Hmmm ... I'll have give it a good thinking on.

Anyways ... 'til next time. Jon