I’m sitting on the couch next to a snoring Hazel on Sunday morning, pleasantly full of warm Texas tamale and coffee. It’s gray and rainy outside. We’re getting the warm edge of a winter storm that is now dumping ice and snow on upstate New York; Finn and I hit the road yesterday, a day ahead of plan, to avoid lousy roads and ice through the elevations in the middle of Pennsylvania, and I’m glad we did.

Thanksgiving was great. Sadly, Finn and I left Mama here with Hazel, who is still not prepared to travel long distances or deal with cats she doesn’t know. We drove to Mom’s house on Wednesday and had Thanksgiving at Renie’s house in Ithaca, which was cozy and fun. The food was delicious, the beer was cold, and the football games were entertaining. We went back down for brunch on Friday and took a long walk out in the woods to work off some of the food. Then Mom and Finn and I headed back to Syracuse and a screening of Frozen 2 at a bistro movie house, where I was able to enjoy a beer with my movie. My verdict: definitely not as good as the first one, but still entertaining.

Saturday I helped Mom reorganize her garage to take better advantage of storage and the new door she put in, and just as we finished Renie and Tony stopped in with a cooler full of leftovers for lunch. Then we hit the road ahead of the storm.

Today’s agenda is pretty light; I’m enjoying not driving, and especially not in this lousy weather. I just bought a bunch of Christmas gifts on Amazon, so that’s checked off the list. I’ve got a carful of slide carousels that I need to hump into the basement for future archival. We’re headed to the church across the street for the advent feast later this afternoon; at some point I’ll need to shower and organize all of my gear for work tomorrow. There’s football on at 1, and I have some painting and other housework to take care of.