Winter has finally arrived. My neighbor was out putting blankets over his bushes, which I assume means that it might even freeze tonight. I haven’t bothered to look that up, of course, nor will I make any effort to save my bushes, but I don’t think he was doing it to dress up the house.

Given that it’s the middle of November, I suppose it’s about time, but it was really nice to get to swim so long. Summer swimming was pretty miserable this year, because it rained so much and so long. If I hadn’t swum by about 10AM, chances were that I wouldn’t get to swim at all until late August. One can, of course, swim in the rain, but in Florida, rain generally comes accompanied by thunder and lightning and swimming with possibility of lightning is a no-no. I assume if the pool gets hit by lightning while you’re in it, you basically get cooked, but I have never looked it up.

Huh. Now I have a gory fascination with the idea. Off I go to google… well, I did not find any graphic descriptions of people dead from swimming during lightning storms, but definite internet consensus that yeah, it’s stupid to swim outside during a storm and yeah, the lightning will kill you if it hits the pool.

Side note: why do we call them thunderstorms when the thunder is meaningless? Noticeable, of course, but lightning storm feels so awkward and yet the lightning is the dangerous part of the storm. Storm alone could, of course, simply mean heavy rain and wind, so I understand the need to clarify that we’re talking about electricity, but I think its strange that we think the thunder is the meaningful part.

Ahem. Moving on! B was a very good dog at the vet yesterday. He had many things done — blood drawn, his ears cleaned, an ultrasound, a biopsy of the liver — and apparently he was well-behaved throughout, even when he was getting his ears cleaned. I assume they put a… whatever their fancy name is for a muzzle… on him because he has a clear notation at the top of the file warning the tech that he may not be so nice. But he was nice. I’m proud of him, but it’s funny to try to explain to your dog that you’re proud of him for behaving well. B gets that I’m talking to him and paying attention to him and thinks that means he should try to lick my face a lot, which disrupts the glow of good behavior pretty thoroughly. Still, two years ago, he would growl and snap and try to bite, so having the vet tech tell me he was a sweetheart pleased me in the same way that parent-teacher conferences used to please me.

Words… well, didn’t do much yesterday. I did make it to some understanding of why I’m stuck, but I didn’t get unstuck and today — well, it’s 5:39 and I’m still writing my blog post. But I’m hoping to get a solid hour of writing in, so I’d best get to it. Good luck, fellow NaNo’ers. I hope you’re doing better than I am!