Spring springing

Yesterday I decided to shovel my way out to the front yard from off the deck. It may take several days, but with each fling of a shovelful of snow greeted by open mouths of leaping Border Collies, I consider myself one more inch toward spring.

Of course, a snowstorm could come along any day and fill up all my work, but for now, it's an exercise in hope.

I noticed yesterday at ten minutes to five, while putting the horses in the barn for the night, that is was still daylight. Love the time when we can clearly see that the days are getting longer!

Plus, I've observed other signs that spring could be springing earlier this year than last year. While walking to the barn yesterday around 9 a.m., I heard my first "Cheeseburger" bird aka chickadee. Cheeseburger birds tend to start singing later than early January, so I took the melodious sound as a good sign.

Speaking of singing, "American Idol" begins its new season tonight. What better sign of spring could there be! The show is in its eighth season, and it's been around long enough now for me to consider its return as one of the rites of the early spring---or, at least, a refreshing diversion from the humdrum of a long January.

I see from a news story this morning that they have tweeked or is it tweaked?----I never seem to know . . . . maybe the early birds of spring can tell me---anyway, they've made some small changes in the format, lest it suffer from too much stagnating sameness. An extra judge, fewer rounds of pathetic wannabe singers like me, more finalists, etc. I love the show, and it just puts me in a good mood, knowing it's coming back.

While shoveling out there in the barn this morning listening to my favorite country station and on several other occasions---or should I say millions of other occasions when they're reminding us incessantly on every channel known to man and on every streaming banner they can find about the nationwide HD TV conversion, I'm hearing the word FEB-YOU-ARY.

Of course, the English teacher in me cringes with every mispronounciation or was that mispronunciation? (remember it's a covert nun in the CIA, not an obnoxious noun). I'm thinking about contacting Idaho Sen. Shawn Keough and asking her to introduce some bold new legislation in Boise to cut the first "R" out of February. Seems like a reasonable thing to do since they're cutting everything else in the state.

And, since the governor has announced a cut in the education budget, my idea seems like an efficient way to make the system work with less. After all, think of the time in education minutes saved for elementary and English teachers who work long and hard to teach kids how to spell.

Learning to pronounce and to spell FEB-BREW-ARY takes up a lot of time and a lot of prodding by teachers.

So, we cut out that "R," and we eliminate a whole lot of factors that take up valuable teaching time. Plus, people like me don't have to cringe anymore as we hear the language massacred.

And, we can go on looking toward spring, thinking how nice it is to know that FEB-YOU-ARY is just around the corner.

While I'm on the subject of Shawn Keough, I want to wish her husband Mike a speedy recovery from the heart attack he suffered over the weekend. All reports are positive, including a suggestion that he'll be back to work at Sandpoint Middle School in two weeks---just in time for the calendar to turn over to FEB-YOU-ARY.

Note: And, this posting is late today because my computer decided to freeze up, and I had to type the whole thing over again. Thank goodness, it stayed on the screen.

Guess I'll go out and listen for cheeseburger birds. Happy Tuesday.