Donne with poetry.

O Winter! be not proud
Though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so...
For those whom thou think'st thou dost freeze,
Freeze not, poor Winter;
Nor yet canst thou freeze me -- I have a space heater.

Thou art slave to Dry Layers, Moisture Columns, Pressure Systems,
And desperate Meteorologists,
And dost with hype, chance, and Doppler dwell.
Ice Cream Headaches can make us freeze as well,
And better than thy stroke; why swell'st thou then?
One short, iceless two to four inch fall, then we wake with relief,
And Winter shall be no more;
Winter, thou shalt, um... wint.

(I figure a Winter should be that which wints.)

At any rate... it is winter here.

Without, the Skull & Pumpkin endures this:

Within, we have fun being warm and mellow and among family, making sure we have enough to eat and drink, playing games, staring at snowfall, listening to favorite songs, and even redecorating.

Over the holidays I received a fabulous gift from my nieces and nephew in L.A., but due to the mores (or lesses, really) of traveling, I did not want to try flying with these gifts. Too important, too fragile...

So I made plans to have them shipped when I got back home. They finally got here in the last week or so, and I knew I had to show them around.

Now I have the time.

Check out these incredibly cool, hand made/painted Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein ornaments!:

Aren't they simply awesome? Am I not the luckiest pub-keep

you've ever known?

They occupy elevated places of honor among the ghoulish bric-a-brac adorning the S&P's Monster Shelves:

Thank you, good nieces and nephew...

Oh, there's a whole weekend of this 'Wint-er' weather to slog through. I am assuming there will be some reading going on --

-- and I think there might be a few write ups of some of these amazing books (those I haven't mentioned in previous posts).

Blessed laziness.

Stay warm, stay safe, and if you can see your way clear, come on by over the weekend.

ZOM-beeeeeez!