1. tonight we had dinner at the home of some really lovely neighborhood friends. this good dinner included mint chocolate chip ice cream in pretty green cups. i think that says it all.

2. on my way from the campus library to said dinner engagement, i passed by the new intramural field. the tall lights were shockingly bright, and i watched a young man in a leather jacket run around with his dog and an orange frisbee. their combined footprints were like expansive free-motion quilting all over the snow.

3. it is so cold, this below-zero temperature, this 30-below wind-chill, that the snow squeaks beneath one's feet and refuses to form into snow balls. from within a coffee shop this afternoon josh and i watched a laughing couple dash and pelt each other with loose handfuls of snow, ducking around strangers walking by on the sidewalk.

4. and finally, i'm wondering who still reads this. my interests are increasingly drawn into pretty non-xanga blogging worlds (as brandi mentioned), and i'm feeling the pull to a new interface. for one thing, much of my silence here in the past few months has resulted from internet glitches that demolish long posts. blogspot automatically saves my drafts, however. i'm also struck by how many of my "subscriptions" are now defunct. the social world seems to have moved to facebook, and those who want to blog, unless they already have an astonishing following (like kim e.) have moved on to prettier, rather more aesthetic places. thoughts? would those of you who still read this be willing to bookmark or RSS me elsewhere?