We picked up Mary at the airport early Monday morning. She had a great ski trip to Utah. The combination of a two hour time change going east in conjunction with the arrival of Daylight Savings Time gave her some jet lag.

We have had an amazing weather week. Every day has been blue sky and warm always at least mid fifties and a couple approaching seventy. With Jim's help, we got a real head start on spring work. We were able to clear a hedgerow between two pastures giving us a great spot for the cattle to get shade. All we did was clear the low brush leaving the trees etc. We also found an old abandoned barbed wire fence. Obviously our pasture was pasture once before. It is important not to have an old fence where the cattle are since they could easily get tangled or cut.

No new calves this week. The ones we have are doing very well. The red belties have been moved in with some black belties. They certainly are eye catchers.

We planted some garden peas today. I had always heard that it will bring good luck to plant them on St. Patrick's Day. I thought it was a little wet then but the conditions appeared perfect today. I have a friend who planted some on St. Patrick's Day a few years ago. He says that they really did bring him luck. They didn't come up and he thought that it was lucky since he doesn't like peas.

Things are pretty quiet at the diner. The big topic at the moment is the NCAA basketball. The marina restaurant has made it through their first winter and it looks like they will have a busy spring.

The ice went bout on the lake this week. The paper says that we had the driest winter ever. So I guess that explains how a few warm days did in the mud season at least for the moment.

Tonight, Mary and I went to a neighboring Fire Department Awards Banquet. It is always a pleasure to share this dinners and recognize the good works of our neighbors.

Jim goes back to school tomorrow by plane. When he was about eight years old, he always spoke about getting a Dodge, diesel engine , extended cab pick up. This week he got one. A 2001 just exactly like he always wanted. Mary and I are going to drive it to Iowa at the end of this week. He has three lacrosse home games next weekend that we look forward to watching. Then we will fly home. He'll have the truck at school for a month or so and then he'll be home.

He is very excited to have made it into the second round of interviews for a internship this summer with a major farm equipment manufacturer. They have sent him technical questions such as what would you do if this part failed etc. He has to get them the answers and they use them in their final evaluation.

Eileen is continuing to do well in France when she is in France. She has also been to Spain and Italy. She will also get to Tunisia, Ireland and Greece before returning home. In my junior year of college, I did get to see an away basketball game in Canton, New York.