I made it to that peace vigil last night so I don't feel so lame-o. Doug made some interesting points about why civil disobediance can be justified during war, essentially saying that the German people had an international responsibility to be disloyal when their country's actions were wrong. I do not believe that our actions are at the same level as the Nazis in WWII, but it is an interesting point.

Well, today was the first day of spring. The temperature was in the high fifties, and it felt wonderful. It has been a great winter. We had snow on the ground from the end of November right up until this week. I'm certain we went over our average of 80 inches. We had a few nice snow storms that gave the kids a some days out of school.

The last time I can remember it being this cold in the winter was in the 1970s, with several days in the negative Farenheits. We had numerous power outages and one day the winds were so high they had to close the schools because even though no new snow had fallen, we were getting white outs. I bought the first pair of long johns I've owned in twenty years.

We could still get a snow storm in the beginning of April. We've had one for the past two years. But it usually doesn't happen. A very light snow fall in May happens once about every five or six years.

Anyway it's on to the usual brief mud and flood season. The floods are bit unpredictable, but it takes an enormous amount of rain to do anything to us, and then it is typically just a few dozen houses that need to have their basements pumped out. The mud will last for a few weeks and just makes walking a bit yucky.

The other day as I was driving to work I was suddenly hit by "Brainsalad's Sense of Trees"(tm). Back when I was in college I remember overhearing a bit of a conversation. Just a couple of hung over guys on their way to breakfast on a Saturday. One said to the other, "Man your little brother is funny when he's drunk. Did you hear him going on? - 'Point at any tree. Point at any tree. I'll tell you what type it is.'" There was something delightful about the idea of this young man who was so into trees that when was drunk that was all he wanted to talk about. Since then I've harbored this occasional desire to be able to identify trees by looking at them.

So anyway, the other day as I was driving into work I started looking at the leafless branches and trunks of the trees I was passing and I tried figuring out what types they were. I can spot a few differences. Sugar maples have a shaggy bark that is different from red maples. Certain oaks have a boxy sturdy shape to them. Birches have that shiny, papery bark. And the difference between a spruce or fir and a pine is hard to miss. So I got out a field guide on trees out from the library and tried memorizing a bit more of it.

Dull, boring activities like tree watching are good for me. I really need to be able to relax after spending a week worrying about the War in Iraq, and dealing with the endless bloodless battles of that constitute my day job.