It is cold and windy here.

I can hear the wind chimes on the porch working overtime.

It’s funny how a gentle breeze can produce a beautiful sound…but a gale makes a racket that can be kind of obnoxious.

They should call them breeze chimes…but on the other hand, nobody advertises them as “gale chimes.”

I’ve never seen that.

I haven’t heard the last of our chickens lately.

I don’t mean, “I haven’t heard the last of our chickens lately”….like “YOU HAVEN’T HEARD THE LAST OF ME!!!  I’LL BE BACK!!!”

I mean that he was the last of his breed….the last rooster at our house that was still alive.

Unless he’s lying low somewhere and riding out this storm, I think that the rooster is gone.

I think that a fat coon got him in his hypothermic rooster trance state.

Of course, that’s just conjecture on my part.

I don’t really know for sure…he may be out pecking corn when I get home from work tonight.

You never can tell.

This cold is pretty….cold.

They say on the news that it’s a polar vortex coming down for us.

If I can attach a little bit of science to it, I can let myself know that something a little more extreme than just a cold and windy day is coming down the pike.

“Polar Vortex” sounds a lot scarier than “a cold and windy day” or even a “blustery day”.

“A blustery day”….that sounds like Pooh and Christopher Robin would be showing up soon.

If Pooh was around, you wouldn’t be reading anything about the death of a lone rooster.

I don’t remember any of Pooh’s friends freezing to death in the old stories.

That’s not very kid friendly…whether you call it “blustery day” or “POLAR VORTEX”, it’s not kid friendly to kill off Eeyore with extreme weather.

No matter how many times he moans, “Is it cold in here?….or is it just me?”

But I think this rooster…this last survivor of the group…I think that he’s gone.

He’s gone…or he’s too cold to crow.

I wonder which one it is?

I’ve got a lot more on my plate than sitting at desk and listening for a rooster to crow, though.

I must have something more vital going on than just doing that.

Good grief, I’m a fully grown man (spelled M-A-N)….I’ve got more going on than just being concerned about a frozen rooster.

I did our taxes last night.

I do them online now.  It’s so much easier than sitting with a pile of papers and a calculator and a sharp pencil.

It’s a piece of cake.

Of course, complicated taxes might mean that our financial situation was bountiful and multi-faceted.

That might not be such a bad thing…to have to say, “Oh, nooooooo…I let our man do the taxes. They’re much too complex…what with the house in Montreux and the Virgin Island shelters. I wouldn’t even know where to start to shelter all the cash we’ve squirreled away.  Do my own taxes?  I wish I could…but they’re much too convoluted now.”

“That’s a little bit above my paygrade, you know?!!! Ha, ha, ha, ha!!!”

I wouldn’t know what that felt like.  It takes me about an hour to do both the returns.

Ah, the simple life.

And I still wonder where that rooster might be

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