Dandy Lion

This is a picture of a dandilion. No big deal right? Some of you in the south may not be too familiar with them. Dandilions are a lawn weed that grows around here, like it or not. Some people like the leaves for salad. Some people make wine from the flowers. Some people (kids) pick them for their mothers. Some people (mostly kids again) like to pick them and blow on them to spread the seeds that float in the wind. But most of us consider them a nusiance, they just are a fact of summer.

What is so interesting about this one is that I took this picture on the first day of FEBRUARY! Again, that may not be a shock to those of you condemed to live in Florida, but IT IS. Some of us enjoy the change of seasons, the yin and yang of winter, spring, summer and fall. We normally do not see dandilions till April or May around here. This has been the third warmest January since they started keeping records around here, about 1880. We had an exceptionally warm and dry summer followed by one of the warmest and driest falls. December started with one of the largest early snowfalls on record then turned bitterly cold. It was 6 the day we left for Florida a week before Christmas. Now we are having an early spring.

We have seen Canadian geese migrating north already. We have been outside playing in the yard when we should ahve been out cross country skiing. Valerie is afraid that this means we will have another warm summer, too hot to go out and enjoy. If we wanted to stay inside all summer we could move to Florida. But we enjoy summer, not too warm, not too humid. We like the fact that when the days are long we get to enjoy them and when the days are short we stay inside and sleep.

Anyway, here is a pretty flower; way before its time