The only photo I managed to get of the blizzard in progress that was halfway decent was this one. The snow isn’t really sticking to anything because it’s too windy. But it’s drifted to about a foot deep on the sidewalk, and if the forecasts are to be trusted, we’re only about 1/5 of the way into this.

I can’t believe I left my Galaxie 500 cd at work, because right about now would be a good time to hear snowstorm.

Since we’re expecting a blizzard, it seemed like a good time to point out this excellent museum of snowflake photographs; more details here.

Terri and I went to Letterpress Things in Chicopee, Mass. today. Very glad we did. The owner/operator John Barrett was a gracious host and easily spent over an hour teaching us about the basics of printing and the basic things we need. As I suspected, I have almost all I need to get started, and he gave me some good leads on where to find the things he doesn’t stock, or, like rollers, that are harder to find.

His space is a floor of an old paper factory, and he has dozens of old presses, and all sorts of various equipment that he’s purchased from closing print shops. But the big attraction is definitely John’s storehouse of information and his interest in helping newbies like myself.

Unfortunately, the snow started a little earlier than expected, and we had to head back home before we managed to get to Lenox, Mass., to go to the yarn shop Terri wanted to go to. Well, there will be other trips to Western Mass. in the near future, I’m guessing.

The ride back was another pretty snowy drive; not as bad as our snowy trip back from Portsmouth last week. But it was also quite pretty.

The pictures below are from the snow a few days ago. There’s supposed to be another foot or two tomorrow. After years of unsatisfying snowfall in Boston, we’re finally getting our share.

In preparation for being snowed in with my honey, I’m envisioning renting Dr. Zhivago. I know Julie Christie’s perfect tan is pretty un-Russian, but it’s still the all-time best romantic snow movie.

A pathologically comprehensive history of heavy metal umlauts.

Maureen’s post about being the only Maureen Passmore couldn’t be more timely.

As long as I’ve been around, I’ve pretty much been the only Ezra I know. Tonight we had dinner with Simi, my very good friend from my high school, and her significant other, yes, Ezra. It being an uncommon name, I haven’t built up the psychological equipment necessary to hear the word which is my name without instantly equating it with me. Also, not being in the habit of talking to myself, what’s really weird is saying it out loud. I always think it just sounds funny coming out of my own mouth, even when I’m just introducing myself or answering the phone. When it’s coming out of my mouth to address someone else, it’s super weird.

I have known of other Ezras, but I’ve rarely had to have much interaction with them. The one other Ezra who affected my life in any significant way was a fellow “camper” at CTY, who apparently had a reputation for being a little weird. People would say “Oh, you’re actually really nice. Everybody says you’re a freak,” and I’d have to point out that they must have been hearing about the other Ezra. I never really met that Ezra, but years later I met his sister, and got along with her well (she was indeed weird herself, but in an intentional, self-conscious kind of way– she would open conversations saying “Life is but a prelude to death, and all that we dream of lies beyond. I pray that you die young.”)

Anyway, It was very good to see Simi again after many years, and the new Ezra seems swell. (And yes, I’m only saying that because I know you’re reading this, Simi. Ha!).

Incidentally, Simi was also in the production of The Importance of Being Earnest I mentioned earlier this month.

Ed points to this bit in Slate about the Kennedy inauguration, which is about how since Kennedy in 1961, people keep waiting for the next great inaugural speech. One of the reasons it posits is the general trend towards informality in American culture. But what it doesn’t mention is that Kennedy’s hatless appearance that January is often cited as a watershed event towards the end of more formal dress. According to this NPR story, the hat was on its way out because of its simple inconvenience.

From the BBC: Cuttlefish wimps ‘dress as girls’

Thanks to the magic of RSS, Ed’s aggregator grabbed the lost post and he was kind enough to send it along. It’s been restored here.

Yesterday, we hit the outlet malls of Kittery, Maine, and had dinner in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. They’re lliterally 5 minutes away from each other, and only an hour north of here. While we were there, it started to snow, as you can see in the picture to the left, of Terri in front of the Portsmouth Brewery. The Brewery is one of the many Portsmouth sites of early Terri & Ezra show festivities.

Terri took these two pictures with my camera while we were at Uncommon Grounds, right in the main town square.

It was snowing hard enough that driving back was a bit slow going, even on the interstate. But it was very cold and swirling and pretty.

Yesterday at about noon, people were protesting in front of the church which is diagonally across the street from us. Now, maybe I’m being dense, but I had absolutely no idea who was protesting and exactly what they were trying to say. The only thing that was pretty clear was that the protesters with the biggest banner were opposed to Israel’s wall. Beyond that, I couldn’t tell if there was more than one group of protesters, whether they were from the church or against the church, whether the people with the people with the palestinian flag and the people with the Israeli flag were on the same side (maybe, we support both political entities, but we’re just against the wall), and whether it was Israel or Palestine which are really terrorists.

I do know that the protesters are the probable cause of the big accident between an SUV and a sedan at the big intersection we live at. That was what alerted us to our existence in the first place, when we looked out the window to see what the big crashing noise was. So, I guess they were successful in commanding the full attention of the traffic passing by.

Bugger. I lost my brilliant post about Paul Harvey and the plate of shrimp due to a screw-up with w.bloggar, the blog client that I use to write my posts. Totally my screw-up, not w.bloggar’s. Time to start doing backups!

I don’t know if other people experience this. I don’t know that there’s not already a word for this that I just don’t know about (like my discovery of “The Narcisim of Minor Differences“, which I observed, but didn’t realize was a relatively well-known concept).

But there often seem to be these uncanny things that will pop up all at once in the course of a single day. (I can hear Helmecki already start to blather about a plate of shrimp, a la Repo Man…).

Take yesterday. I got a haircut first thing in the morning before work. AM news radio was on in the barber shop (story for another time: I deeply believe in only going to old man barbershops: none of this unisex crap for me). This station carried Paul Harvey, which is about par for the course for an old man barbershop. He was talking in his ridiculous Paul Harvey voice about the most ridiculous Paul Harvey stuff, the most jaw-dropping of which was a story about a bunch of old men playing golf in Florida stepping over their friend who had a heart attack and died on the 17th hole and playing through.

Then, after a long, busy day, as I was on my way out the door, a co-worker and I were talking about fat free snacks that use olestra, which inevitably made me bring up John’s Olestra prank (how I miss the early days of the web!). Which also got me talking about Computer Stew, his daily ZDNet webcast which was funded by overt sponsor plugs, a la the early days of TV. Which made my co-worker mention how Paul Harvey’s on-air ads must do more damage than good to their sponsor.

So after not thinking of Paul Harvey, probably since the Simpsons episode which contains a fictional book-on-tape by Paul Harvey called “Mr. and Mrs. Erotic American”, I am confronted with Paul Harvey twice in one day.

Plate, shrimp, plate of shrimp.