Morning light and shadows through the trees of our back yard.

For a winter that started out so rough in December, January ended as one of the warmest winter months on record around here and February is starting out with higher temperatures than normal.

A cold front is headed this way but the artic blasts that so often blow down from Canada have yet to plunge the area into the kind of sub-zero conditions we are used to seeing this time of year.

However, that damn grounhog over in Pennsylvania saw his shadow this morning and that, by tradition, means six more weeks of winter. Interestingly, the weather in Punxsutawney, PA, was also far warmer than normal which means the crowd stopped worrying about the weather and started screaming something about Pittsburgh being in the Super Bowl.

Of course, is someone would just shoot that pesky rat we wouldn't have to worry about whether or not he ever saw his shadow again.