Things released from the melting snow

With temperatures rocketing 20-30 degrees (F) higher this past week--and with a bit of rain to help--the snow has been melting remarkably fast, revealing grass, walkways, wider roads, and several other little surprises, some of which are more pleasant than others:

1) The lady who, at any given moment, can be seen walking her dog around the neighborhood. They disappeared for a month or two during the worst of it, but like all hibernating creatures, they are now are back at their usual routine. I feel very stalker-esque here, but the pair will, without a doubt, be spending a good several hours outside our apartment every day from now until probably mid-December.


2) Rubbish freeing itself from the once massive snowdrift outside our apartment. It is pretty gross, but I am sure when the winds pick up this afternoon they will be blown free from the sidewalk's icy grip and flutter off to bigger, better places--probably to the neighbor's yard, or the church parking lot across the street.


3) Prospect Hill, littered with poopies. Much to our distaste, 'dogs' (actually more like horses, judging by the size and quantity) usually like to do their business right in the best path to run, and seldom do their owners heed the signs at the park entrance to clean up afterwards. Luckily, during the all-too brief period when it snowed fairly regularly, they would get buried and hidden under layers of fresh snow, just like fossils in a stream bed being covered by sediment. However, now that the snow is receding, the perfectly preserved poo is more like woolly mammoths being exposed from melting glacial ice. As if trying to dance around icy patches, slush, and generally uneven snow wasn't hard enough...


4) Fair-weather runners. Even on very nice days, it is rare to see joggers in the park, but when it was cold and snowy they are extremely few and far between (I saw one or two the past few months, and I think Seth saw another). Like the birds and the beasts, here is a person waking up from the deep freeze, and most likely trying to melt away those extra pumpkin pie pounds. (Yes, I already admitted to being a stalker).




And happy 200th birthday to Charles Darwin! Even after all his good work, it's too bad he couldn't have an even bigger impact on the typical American:

A Gallup poll released this week shows that 39 percent of Americans say they "believe in the theory of evolution," while a quarter say they do not believe in the theory, and another 36 percent don't have an opinion either way.

This follows an earlier Gallup poll on the issue, conducted last May, that found only 14 percent of Americans believe that humans developed over millions of years from less advanced forms of life. Forty-four percent believe that God created human beings almost overnight within the past 10,000 years, and another 36 percent believe that God guided humans' evolution from animals over a much longer period of time. (From CNN)