Well, it was cold this morning when I got up.  The thermometer read -19.9F.  Close enough to -20F.   I don’t like getting out of the house when it is that cold.  I am always afraid that something will break.

To take the chill off my feet as I sit and type, I decided to purchase a little electric space heater.  So I headed to Meijer’s (regional grocery chain) to buy a heater.  It had occurred to me that with the sudden cold snap, the selection of heaters may be limited.   Silly me.  They didn’t have a single heater.   All of that stuff had been put away to make room for the patio furniture and grills.  Spring is in the air even if it is -20F.

No church today. It is too cold. It was -1 F when we got up. I don’t know what that is in C but I do know that it is cold out there. Of course, we didn’t get up until about 8:30 so it is hard to say how cold it got last night. Actually, it got down to -2F last night. I just remembered that our handy dandy Weather Channel digital thermometer records highs and lows so a quick check gave me the reading.

A lot of places have closed today because of the cold. The malls have closed and so have most of the area churches. No one really wants to be out in this kind of weather. Plus, the roads are a mess.

The snow plows have done an admirable job of keeping the roads open but when it is this cold, salt doesn’t even melt the ice. So, the roads, without salt, are very slippery.

We usually grill several time a week regardless of the weather. Not so right now. Today we are having pot roast. We started it about 9 am. Last night, the steaks were cooked in the broiler. Besides not wanting to go out in the cold, the oven helps keep the house warm.

The State of Michigan put up and maintains a web site listing sex offenders convicted after a certain date.  If you go to mipsor.state.mi.us and put in the city that you are looking for, it will give you a list of the sex offenders in that city.  Lowell has about 30 listed sex offenders but the list only shows sex offenders convicted after a certain date so it is not complete.  And it does not include sex offenses by minors.
Sex offenses occur in various degrees of severity.  Some are misdemeanors while others are felonies.  And not all sex offenders are sexual.  Indecent exposure is a sexual offense.  So is urinating in public.  If you are convicted of these acts, your name and picture will be listed along with the hardcore rapists and child molesters.

If you check out the list, you might be surprised at what you will find.

I was in the drug store today and ran across an interesting product; Snore extinguisher. It was a little aerosol can with a long adjustable hose attached. When the button on the top of the can is pressed, it delivers a pre-measured amount of snore extinguisher.

The directions on the box were a little vague and the print was rather small, so I am not really sure how it is to be used. But one thing did catch my attention. It read “In case of an emergency, spray directly into the mouth.

Emergency?! A fire is an emergency not snoring. But, I suppose it is a matter of perspective. I guess if you happen to be that hapless spouse who can’t sleep because of the noise, it might be an emergency. In a moment of desperation, you might be tempted to grab the can from the night stand, stick the hose into the mouth of your loved one and touch off a round.

I wonder how it works? Does it have some sort of medication in it that stops the snoring? Or does the event of sticking the hose down their throat cause them to choke which wakes them up? Maybe when my wife hears about this product, she will abandon her ear plugs and stash away a can for emergency use.

I stopped at the cafeteria for breakfast today. Their breakfast special was two waffles and a beverage. While I was not interested in their special, I was surprised at the waffles. The waffles were in the form of a long loaf. The cafeteria workers sliced the waffles off the loaf just like they were slicing bread. I am not sure why they called them waffles because they certainly don’t meet the normal criteria for waffles.

I wondered how they could make such a thing? Maybe they make the waffles the same way as they make cheese curls; extruded.  Sometime, when I am feeling adventurous, I’ll have to give them a try.

In the 18 years that I have worked in Lansing, I have seen a lot of different things.   I have seen people out side of the Capital daily protesting the fact that the dome is no longer lit at night.  I have seen hundreds of motorcycle riders protesting the helmet law.  I have seen KKK rallies.  But, in all of the years that I have worked here, I have never seen a Lansing snow plow.  In fact, it has been my belief that Lansing does not own a snow plow.

That fact that I have never seen a Lansing snow plow is reinforced by the fact that I have never seen the streets of Lansing plowed.  Every time that it snows, both cars and people wade through the snow in the streets until it eventually melts.   In fact, I think city feels that it will all melt come spring so why bother plowing it?

Now, the residence of Lansing claims that Lansing does plow its streets.  However, they are also the ones who complain that the street that they live on hasn’t been plowed.  Go figure.

I think that part of the confusion lies in the fact that there are about a dozen state highways running through the Lansing area.  The state highways, of course, are maintained by the state and not the city.  So, if you drive through snow long enough, you will eventually reach a state highway which provides the main arteries for travel in the city.

If you take a state map and look at the city of Lansing you will notice that some of the roads are gray while others are in color.  The roads that are gray are city streets.  The reason that they are gray is because they still have snow on them.  The roads that are in color are the roads that have been plowed. They are the ones you want to get to if you are presently on a gray road.

Now, having said all of that, I did see a Lansing snowplow this morning.  At least, it sort of looked like a snow plow.  It was a pickup truck with a blade on the front and a salt shaker on the back.  It was certainly not anything heavy duty.  It looked more like something used for plowing a parking lot and not a city street.  Even Lowell has big heavy duty dump trucks with blades underneath, which it uses to plow its streets.  But, so far, I have never seen anything like that in Lansing.

Of course, the Lansing snow plow pickup truck wasn’t actually plowing snow.  It was parked in front of a donut shop.  And I pay city taxes for……?

When we first moved to Lowell, there used to be a Dog and Suds just down the road from us. A Dog and Suds was a drive-in chain where you could enjoy a hot dog and a root beer in the comforts of your own automobile parked underneath a metal canopy.

But, since no one really wanted to sit in the comforts of their automobile in the winter time, the drive in soon gave way to a sit in diner. The Dog and Suds was tripled in size and renamed “The Disco Dungeon”.

Now, the Disco Dungeon did not have any thing to do with Disco. The closest it came to any thing Disco was the large picture of John Trivolta painted on the wall. But since it opened a year or so after Saturday Night Fever, The Disco Dungeon was as good a name as any.

The food at the Disco Dungeon wasn’t bad and was more of a family orientated establishment with all of their meals coming in the form of a basket. Unfortunately, the Disco Dungeon closed after a couple of years.

While the owner of the Disco Dungeon was collecting FICA from the pay of his staff, he neglected to send it to the Feds. The Feds took a dim view of this practice and he had to leave town rather quickly. He moved out of state, became a minister and then fled to Canada but that is another story.

Next, the Dog and Suds became a meat market/deli. Since this business did not need seating space, the opening to the addition was bricked up and turned into a quarter car wash.

The meat market/deli was a nice change for Lowell. After all, at the time, the only other place to buy meat in Lowell was at Eberhards which was rather poor. So, the meat market/deli was a hit and business was good. But the guy that ran it got tired of the long hours and closed the place up.

The Dog and Suds next became a pizza place. You could order your pizza and wash your car while you waited. But, the property owner had a dispute over the rent so the pizza place relocated into cheaper digs.

Currently, the Dog and Suds is a cell phone store. And while it is the only one in town, GR is only 10 minutes away so I wonder how long it will last. Maybe the next business will be a tanning salon and car wash. Who knows.

When I first started working for the state, custodial services were contracted out to a vocational rehab business. This business specialized in training mentally impaired people for custodial work. And so, it was not uncommon to have a mentally impaired person emptying the trash or sweeping the floors. But, as time went on, apparently there was a shortage of mentally impaired people so the program moved towards habitual criminals.

Now, these people were not really all that bad, it was just that they had criminal records and therefore suspect to most employers. So, you never knew what the person ,who emptied your trash, had done time for. Hopefully, it was for drugs or prostitution and not something violent. But even this program approach had limits and began moving towards immigrants.

Some of the immigrants are easy to spot because they don’t speak English. But, I suppose that a speech problem could also be the result of mental impairment. Anyway, I have to wonder if that pretty young woman who empties my trash is impaired, a criminal, an immigrant or all of the above. I suppose it would be rude to ask.

In some areas of GR, we have drive by shootings. Apparently, rival drug gangs can’t get along. To counteract that, some people have started drive through payings.

The idea is that when you are in the drive through lane at a fast food place, you pay for the person behind you as well as your self. In short, you pay for the food of a total stranger, in the name of Christ. It creates a chain reaction. You pay for the food of the person behind you and they, overwhelmed, pay for the person behind them. In a time when there is so much hatred and injustice, this simple act states that yes, there is still human compassion even for a total stranger.

I ran across a recipe for roast pork that sounded very good. You start out with about a 6 pound pork shoulder called a Boston butt. At about $2 a pound, it is considered to be a poorer cut of meat. However, after it has been roasted for about 7 hours, the meat becomes very tender.

After the meat is through roasting, it is allowed to cool. Once it is cooled, it can be easily sliced without falling apart. The sliced pork is then rewarmed and covered with a sauce made from apple jelly, apple cider and apple vinegar.

While I had the apple cider vinegar, I knew that I would have to get the apple cider and the apple jelly. And I figured that it would be relatively simple to get the two items that I needed from the store. So, when I got to the store I grabbed a cart and started out.

I always grab a cart when I go to the store even if I only have a couple of items to purchase. Shopping carts not only serve as a means of transporting food during the shopping event, they also serve as a means of self defense.

If you don’t have a cart and step out blindly from a side isle, you could get hit with a cart. But, if your cart emerges from that blind isle first, it is the cart that gets hit and not you. Or, you could compare the cart to the bright orange flags that dune buggies fly high above them warning others of their presence.

I digress. Apple cider and apple jelly. That is what I need. The cider is quickly located in the produce section right next to the pomegranate juice. Check. Next is apple jelly. So its off to the condiment isle.

I stroll past olives, and pickles and catsup and mustard as I make my way to the jellies. Ah there they are, the jellies. This should be simple. I quickly scan the shelves looking for apple. Yes! Apple! No wait, its apricot. Rats! Where is the apple?

As I search the shelves, I can’t help but notice the abundance of grape jelly. I wonder if grape jelly is that popular or if there is just an abundance of grapes. Number two appears to be raspberry. Certainly apple must be high on the popularity list.

Boysenberry, Currant, Goose berry. Goose Berry! I haven’t seen a Goose Berry since I was a kid. Mango, Mint, Pineapple. Do you think that the people in Hawaii spread pineapple jelly on their toast in the morning? Ah! There it is. Apple jelly! But it is the store brand and limited at that.

I would have thought that apple jelly would be more common but I guess not. I load my jelly into my shield and head for the check out. Mission accomplished!