Down by the river, snowdrops have been up for a couple of weeks and yellow crocuses are popping. In the park near me the tiny lawn was planted with purple crocuses last year and they're all up, with pigeons napping between them. The daffodils are all about six inches high and ready to open, except for the one that opened yesterday, the only spot of yellow where soon everything will be yellow. The tulips are starting to come up, too -- will be interested to see what colors they've planted in that park this year. It's always different. In the backyard, nothing's blooming yet but Squirrely, Squeeze and the winter litter are racing around like crazy. One of them -- he has a fairly flat tail, I'm going to call him Squish -- just now dashed along the fence, took a long leap onto the big tree, and clung like a statue while the one who was chasing him kept zipping along the fence to the next yard. Pretty good trick. I've seen cardinals and a lot of titmice back there over the last few months. On the river, buffleheads, red-breasted mergansers, Canada geese, Brant geese, mallards, Gadwalls, cormorants, gulls and at least one loon are sharing the water. The snow last night turned to rain and is now all dried up. Could this really be it? It seems like a very long winter here in NYC, because it really started with Sandy at the end of October. We've had a couple of serious snowstorms and lots of plain old bad weather. So maybe, on the full moon that marks Passover and Easter, we've made the crossing? Hope so! Meanwhile, happy holiday, whichever is yours.