My silly cat is sunning on the window ledge outside my window. He doesn't like to be petted much, but when I put my finger against the window, he rubs himself against it from the outside. He also walked into the house and explored a few rooms before panicking and running out a few days ago. Progress at almost 14? Maybe. He has been so squirrelly since he was neutered; he wouldn't come into the house anymore, wouldn't let us touch him. We don't know what happened, but he stayed and seems excited to see us.

We have found that when we keep the cat house about 55°F, the cats will go in and stay. Warmer and they will go in for a bit, then back out into the cold. We turned it on 55 and put several boxes with nice bedding in there for the coming winter storm. Note on the cat house: my husband has a shop that has two storage rooms on one side. He put a cat door on one of the room and we set up a bed for the cat for when the weather is bad, since he won't come into the house. Later, when we were expecting an arctic blast, he decided to put a vent from the shop into that room since it is just on the other side of the wall from the heat/cool source. He only heats/cools the shop when he is working in it or when the temps get below freezing so that his paints and things don't freeze. Now the cats have a warm place to be when it is freezing. They often bring friends for a sleepover during storms.

My husband is changing the oil in the generator and servicing it today in case it has to run for a few days. Yesterday was test day, and it ran smoothly, except for the need for an oil change.

Our 16-year-old grandson came over to help his grandad for a bit yesterday, on his day off work. He went from working at a restaurant to working in a lumber/hardware warehouse. He was telling us that he really likes working there, but even with thermals, 2 hoodies, and his regular jacket, he was still cold when the temps dropped. He said that He looked everywhere he could think of for a heavier coat on his last day off, but everywhere he went, they were out. My husband called around and found a hunting store with some that were nice and warm as well as stlyish. He even went with him and bought it for him. Grandson seemed thrilled with it. This is a kid who hates wearing coats, so I know that he has been cold to hunt for one for over a week and to even say something. Glad that he did say something and was able to find a warm work coat.

They keep changing the forecast for us. We went from 18"-24" of snow on Wednesday to them saying today that we will possibly have 3/4" or more of freezing rain, sleet, then 6"-12" of snow. They keep saying things like dangerous and catastrophic and mentioning the storm of 1994 that collapsed many, many roofs in the area on homes and businesses, changed the landscape almost as much as a tornado would, and some places lost power for 4 weeks. Anything above 1/4" of ice usually brings down trees, electric poles and roofs. Now they are predicting another arctic blast coming through here late next week too. Sounds like it is about to get real. I was so hoping for snow. My grateful is that we are as prepared as we can get and we will deal with whatever we need to when we need to.