Happy Valentine's Day!

No great plans around here for the most romantic holiday of the year. I’ve never been much for Valentine’s Day. I’m keen on the chocolate intake synonymous with the holiday, but I find it hard to attach real sentimental attachment to the day. I suppose you could say the same of Christmas and Easter, but I do have sentimental attachment to those two holidays and while I hesitate to go down the road of calling Valentine’s Day a “Hallmark Holiday,” it kinda is. Only Secretary’s Day (or is it Administrative Assistant Day now?) means less to me. What I truly dislike about Valentine’s Day is that it’s one of those holidays that girls assume is only worthwhile if they’re in a relationship. When they are in a relationship they place so many unfounded expectations on the day that they always get their hopes dashed spectacularly. While I was in college, the day always seemed to end with a cranky lot of girls. But maybe that was just from too much chocolate. . .

The extent of the romance today will be not fighting over whose turn it is to do the dishes (we’re attempting to clean up the kitchen every evening so I stop coming down every morning to start the day screeching about what a mess it is), saying “I love you,” and, if I get around to it, I might make a loaf of banana bread. Last year, I sent Andy this card.

It’s a little water-pocked because it’s hung on the outside wall of the shower. Although the shower’s entrance is in our bathroom, the shower itself juts into the kitchen, bordering the stove on one side and serving as a wall in the kitchen on another. When we need to dry cutting boards after we’ve washed them, we balance them on top of the corner of the shower’s walls, probably how the card keeps getting splashed.

Speaking of showers, last night, the space heater in the bathroom seems to have died. Either that or it just doesn’t feel like heating above 53 degrees anymore. Luckily we have another space heater on hand that puts off a ton more heat anyway. However, I’m pretty sure the plug-in only has two prongs and you’ve just got to be careful with any appliance that has the equivalent of a goalie mask on its front.

Yesterday after work, Andy and I set out on a hike to explore a snowmobile trail the lodge musher discovered the day before. Someone’s been snowmobiling where they shouldn’t be, or at least a trail’s popped up in recent days away from the established system of snowmobile trails. Regardless of how the trail got there, and despite some whining about how much my knees hurt, we had a great tromp down the lake, up a ridge and then across a small lake that before has been accessible only by ski trail. As usual, I forgot to bring my camera with, but we followed the sunset west on our walk, the sun sitting golden on the horizon and rays of light filling in the cracks between dark gray/blue clouds, like a golden cup of light that runneth over. Just before we hit the main road to circle back to the Shack, we found a beaver lodge with a wintering beaver, or two, in it. Andy smelt it first – there’s a distinct musty smell that comes from critters living close quarters for several months – and when we clamored up to get a look at the top of the lodge, there was a melted away portion of snow where the warm air of their breath and activity escapes. The beavers aren’t actually hibernating. They have plenty of food stored up and from their lodge they’re able to access the open water of the frozen lake we’d walked across.

There’s a light snow falling outside so I’m going to stay in and try to get a bunch of work done. I need to finish a draft of chapter and of a commentary and there’s also a bit of research to get done as well.

Have the loveliest of Valentine’s Day, wherever you are and not matter how you choose to celebrate.