Evie gave me this painting she did for Christmas. Adds a splash of color to the decor, don't you think?

Ernie gifted me some fantastic antique toy cars from his mother's estate.

And the Gilkster made us this coffee table that is so beautiful I am just about speechless!

Awesome x-country ski today along the Machias River with Greg B. We're both fit and trim, I think, in comparison to all the big-bottoms we saw on snowmobiles. Probably about 50 snowmobiles zoomed past, but we didn't meet up with a single other skier. It's always that way, and I know it shouldn't bother me, but I can't help but wonder why others don't think it's fun to work that body. Yeah, I know, I'm a fresh air freak--but isn't that the "way life should be" when you live in Maine?

I walk alone--or, more precisely, I snowshoe by myself in the bitter cold. Loudly I invited all comers in my packed house to enjoy nature's goodness, but the response--deafening silence--said it all, by of course saying nothing at all. I'm laboring over this post because my strength was sapped trying to load the above photo of the heath. You see, all these Internet hogs, who are hard wired to their laptops, are gumming up the Wifi works here at Chez Rottersman/Cirillo. Please, young people, get outside for some exercise and fresh air!

But. But, but, but--Jake, Jessie and Cara all joined me this morning for a jump rope bonanza in the woodshed/sugar shack/Muhammed Ali Fitness Facitlity.

News flash: Cara got the most beautiful haircut. She's lookin' hot!!!!!! I've been begging her to get a short do for 22 years. It was worth the wait--and once my battery (well, not my battery, but the camera battery) is charged I'll take a head shot.

Jake works the speed-rope...

Rocks some pull-ups...

And busts out some push-ups...

All as part of the Crazy Man Workout in the blizzard. We had a good time, though there might have been more heavy breathing than conversation. Nothing could make this dad happier than working up a sweat with his best fella.

Oh, and by the way, Max said he was going to come outside with his camera. But he never made an appearance, and when we came into the house he was eating pie. No surprise, I know, but I figured I should provide a full report.

Merry, merry Christmas!

Jake and Jessie are pictured in front of my mother's lovingly decorated house. Evie is not in the photo because she declined to go on the group walk of Lucy--even though my mother strongly indicated that the walk was not optional.

Eye gave us absolutely beautiful pillow covers from Thailand; Hieu and Amila gave us books and assorted other goodies. So I guess Cara and I made out like bandits. Plus, Easy can now rejoice as my mother gave us a new compost bin.

But I have to say that the ultimate Christmas moment was when Amila opened the Manchester United sweatshirt from Pop and Debbie--she was giddy, for sure, and put that hoodie on like it was a fur coat. Hieu and Eye and Amila have never celebrated Christmas before, so I think they are getting a kick out of the whole enterprise.

Having our own children home with their fantastic friends is, by far, the best gift.

Is this the best Christmas Eve ever? The Colby Mules, a Black Bear and Eve loaded firewood into the basement, accomplishing in an hour what would have taken me days. I don't want to be president, but I would like to have a staff.

Jessie packs it out past Pinhead the Snowman.

Nothing more fun than a good wood toss on a sunny Winter day!

The Colby contingent enjoying the great gray day. Not to paint myself heroic, but I saved them from being swallowed by their laptops. Yes, the addiction to Facebook is universal--so let's stop complaining about American youth. There I go: talking to myself again.

Maybe there can be a sci-fi movie where laptops turn into snapping turtles, kind of like Hitchcock's The Birds. Then some old-school salty character rides to the rescue on his horse. I know, I know... I'm losing it.

"Pop" Cirillo gave me this cool Western Union sign for my sunroom--or, as Debbie calls it: my "happy place." Did you know that Abe Lincoln used to walk across the street from the White House every day to the Western Union office to check in with his generals during the Civil War?

Jake and I did a most awesome workout today with a "heavy rope," which is a jump-rope made out of rubber hosing filled with sand. It weighs 4 pounds but by the end of the workout you'd swear it's stuffed with a 50 lb. bag of concrete.

As I share this most interesting info our visitors are in the kitchen making dinner. We're going to have home-cooked Thai food. Dream come true...

I hope it doesn't sound like I'm bragging on it: but I am one lucky man.

Notice the beautifully decorated tree. I didn't lift a bulb!

But it was a worldwide effort. Eye (Thailand), Jessie (boring old USA), Amila (Bosnia) and Hieu (Vietnam) did all the heavy lifting. Yes, it's good to have a staff--especially one that's so youthful, smart, well-traveled and good-looking.

Of course, Jake (which rhymes with Max) isn't all that enthused about tree-trimming; so he got the distinctive pleasure of lugging firewood. Everybody works!!!

I did the photos backwards--Jake, the manchild wonder, and Cara, my lady love, were supposed to be walking towards you. It would be like one of those flip books from your childhood. I thought I did it right--in the mode of the last will be first--but, you know what?!!!--I messed up again! Another exclamation point? Are you kidding?? BAM!!!!!!!

Today I texted like a teenager. Apparently Jake changed his relationship status on Facebook, and even though I'm the last human being alive who doesn't have a Facebook page and spend as much time as I possibly can alone in the woods, the peeps thought I was the one to contact to get the scoop and the skinny.

Well, I suppose it would have been pointless to contact Jake himself; he just doesn't believe in the blah, blah, blah...

Greetings from 71 Birch Ridge Rd.

Early start to the weekend due to the "storm"--really it was more a delightful feathering of fluffy snow. I could barely feel it on the Wovel; it was like tossing cotton. Well, being a bit sleep-deprived, the early release was a lucky break.

You know what? I've been pausing frequently in my daily life to think about how much I love my family. Especially my children: Jake, Jessie & Eve: you are pure blessing.

Do not pray for easy lives. Pray to be stronger men.
--John F. Kennedy


Never heard that one before, but I'm diggin' it up and down, on both a spiritual and physical level. Funny way I came across it: 8th grader wanted to show me an excerpt from the new Call of Duty game. It's a scene that in the end is stolen by a zombie, but starts out in a war room with JFK, Richard Nixon, Fidel Castro and John McNamara. Good stuff and you can find it on You Tube.
Even though the world is passing me by, every once in a while I beam on to a flash of techno light that blasts me in the solar plexus.

Is it more global weirding? Buried in snow and ice and then--pow!!--a blast of tropical air with sheets of rain finally tempering down to good old fashioned thunder and lightning. I had to dodge the rain indoors as I went to fetch kids today, the school had sprung so many leaks. I guess that's the state of public education, right? For regular folks, anyway; I don't mean you rich people in posh locales such as Brookline and Hanover. I love the kids so much who I have the privilege of working with--if only there was not so much poverty and deprivation. The holidays always bring it out in me: thankfulness for the abundance in my life yet this disquieted feeling about the suffering in the lives of so many children.

Wow. 3 comments: made my day! But, alas, no photos. Cara and I went for a walk on Eldon's road, but didn't get far because it was like a tunnel of snow with all the bowed-over trees. Looked so cool that Cara said we should go home and get the camera, which I had of course forgotten. But then when we got home I decided I had to wash the cars and never went back out. Too much information about nothing? Well, that's about all I got in me during the Sunday afternoon swoon. Sometimes it is just very, very important to lay down on the couch.

Beware of hip book reviewers in boxy-framed glasses. I read a raft of glowing book reviews of Life by Keith Richards in the New Yorker and the Times, etc. so broke my 3-buck-a-book rule and plunked down 17 dollars for the degenerate rocker's life story. Unbelievable to me that not one of these reviewers called Keef on his unmitigated BS. Every other page he's bragging about what a tough guy he is--"had to show him the blade" and other crap like that. Have you seen Keith Richards? He's a shriveled up string bean. Hard for me to believe anyone would fall for his tough guy talk if he wasn't flanked by body guards. Plus all the good stuff, like how he and his girlfriend were propositioned by Marlon Brando, was in the reviews. So I really didn't need to read the book. Well, as promised, I will ship it off to Alice--and be glad to have this time-wasting tome out of my life!

You see how the icicles practically touch the ground? Quite the tableau, I'd say, and makes you that more appreciative of the toasty fire. Nice way to decompress from the work-week, sitting by the stove and enjoying a poor man's latte.

Here's an odd development: I have a black eye and Cara didn't even punch me or anything. What gives? Am I being jabbed by some phantom boxer? Was I so wiped out from those mountain climbers that I fell on my thumb? The body breaks down with no provocation; but what's a bloke to do? I wish my family had stayed in England--then I could call myself a bloke without sounding like a poseur.

Haven't heard from my brother or my sister this week, and I seem to miss them more every weekend. There used to be a tape of Max and me speaking to each other with our little British accents--how I wish that hadn't got lost to the tides. Now Judy has given us a tape of Jessie reading a book when she was about six years old. I haven't listened to it yet, but I'm pretty sure it will set off a paroxysm of bittersweet tears.

Soon it will be Christmas and I'll have my three beautiful cuddly children home around the artificial pink shag tree I'm moments away from purchasing from Amazon.com--marked down to $34.95 from 99 dollars. And free shipping!

It's good to be kitcshy... in moderation.

When you eat at a place like this you must be punished. Of course, it was a week ago now that I ate there--first place Cara and I hit on the road--but it wouldn't surprise me if the sludge is still running through my veins.

So anyway, Jake didn't do anything wrong--no reason for him to suffer; but it's all about timing, don't you know. He happened to walk through the door (just home for tonight) at the exact moment I was about to begin my cheap-motel-room-workout in the comfort of my living room. Jake now calls it "Dad's crazy workout." Whatever.

Here's what we did:
Squats with 25 lb. barbells at each shoulder. 10 sets x 10 reps.
Burpees. As many as you can do in 30 seconds. 10 sets.
Bicycle situps. As many as you can do in 30 seconds. 5 sets.
Atomic situps. As many as you can do in 30 seconds. 5 sets.
Moutain climbers. Non-stop for 30 seconds. 3 sets.
Pull-ups. 12 reps x 3 sets.

Then you drink the smoothie, eat the eggs and curl up on the couch.

A crowd of kids hangs out in my office every day at snack time. This morning they were talking about plowing snow with their 4-wheelers, so of course I had to tell them about my magnificent Wovel. At the end of the day one of them stopped in to give me a new sign for my office. Not bad, ey?

As I waited to board my plane on Friday there was a report on the blaring TV that people were stuck on I-90 in Buffalo for 20 hours due to the "lake effect" storm. This, of course, was the exact route Cara and I would be traveling. But luck was with us all the way: we skirted one storm after another. Cleveland, Erie, Buffalo: we dodged them all. And then, still rolling 6's, we woke up to a snow day. After 24 hours of driving, we needed it. Plus I got to try out the Wovel (pictured above); it did a stellar job, as you can see below. It's a bit time-consuming, but the advertising is true: you can move a ton of snow with no sore back. It is a workout, though, which in my book is a good thing.

You won't have Birch Wisdom to blame for your boredom for the next few days. I'm going on my whirlwind tour of the Rust Belt. Yeah, me and the little lady will be tooling back to Maine in Grandma Easy's silver bullet. Hail to the turbo!

View from the dooryard, post grunting and groaning in the woods. You people probably heard of my sister's 3-day fast--awe-inspiring, if perhaps on the kooky side. Well, in my current bachelorhood I decided to try out my own program of self-denial. A bit ironic, I guess, since it's when the wife is away that you should feel free to gorge on greasy cheeseburgers. At any rate, I've spent the last couple of days essentially subsisting on green smoothies. The thing of it is, though, it's so tasty that the "suffering" is a treat. The recipe is as follows (you'll notice there are no measurements; I just dump stuff into the blender):
frozen blueberries
banana
frozen spinach
fat-free yogurt
pomegranate juice

I'm not sure if somebody could puff me up more than Camille with her last comment--though it was really Cara and Jessie who engendered the compliment-fest. I remember that picture of Jessie and me on the swing. I believe I might have once had a framed copy of it--or do I just remember seeing the photo at Jaime and Lorena's? I wish I had it in digital format so I could put it on the blog. If I could go back in time and sit on that swing with Jessie in my lap... makes me want to cry.