more on winter

I think I’m about to put out a contract on Puxatawny Phil, or whatever that groundhog’s name is that damned us all to six more weeks of winter.  Especially since I managed to catch the World’s Worst Freakin’ Cold ™ last week, which totally derailed my plans to get the saddle-stitch tutorial up here for y’all.

However, one of the things I do when I’m down for the count is to peruse the local websites and look for niftykeen new places in my area that I haven’t had a chance to explore yet.  And lo and behold!

Lookie what I found!

This, I might add, is mere MINUTES away from my house.  I knew it was there, and I knew there was a geocache in it at one point, but I had NO CLUE that there were THAT many trails in it.  Miles and miles of them, actually.  Up and down and all around in the Loess Hills, which is probably the only part of this area that has any elevation at all.  (No, seriously — less than a mile away is the famed “Mount Crescent Ski Area”.  With all of its 100 feet of ski run, since it’s a hill, not a mountain, as the name might suggest.)

This is the only part of winter I like — discovering new places that I can pepper with boxes when nobody’s looking.  And considering both a) its proximity to my house (literally a mile or two down the road and a sharp left), and b) all the stamps I’ve been carving….it’s like a marriage just waiting to happen.

Now I REALLY can’t wait for Spring.

Saddle-stitch tutorial coming this week or early next, when we have sun for pictures again.  (Overcast and grey right now….*again*.  Or maybe the word is “still”.  ARGH.)