I am in strong agreement with the one in the office who wrote last week’s editorial. The overkill of advertisement on TV for political candidates has kept my remote button busy whenever I have tried to watch a program. Now that the World Series had ended, there isn’t much choice after the news at night. I have voted by absentee ballot and didn’t need the silly, nasty, far-fetched political ads to help me choose. The money spent on political media of all kinds would go a long way to help feed the world’s hungry people.

Everything we encounter seems to be stretched to extremes. Salaries of sports participants are so out of whack it almost spoils the desire to watch a favorite team. Various kinds of health insurance have made it necessary to choose between buying medical protection or ample food, for some persons with small incomes. And Andy Rooney made Sunday night when he commented on the high cost of purchased Halloween costumes rather than home fashioned ones. Some of the excesses in today’s world make it difficult for old New Englanders like I am to accept.

The nature writer whom I read faithfully in a daily newspaper hit the bull’s-eye last week in his column, noting that the Juncos arrive when snow is due, in our area. His Friday column was followed by snow Sunday. I expected to see a small flock of Juncos in the yard this Monday morning when I pulled open the drapes. There were none, but I imagine they are on the way.

After a birthday weekend for two family members, daughter Laurie headed home Sunday afternoon, for Vermont. She called at 8:30 pm to say she was home, greeted by three inches of snow on the ground, and as we talked, snow plows were going by her house. Her trip home was not too bad, but not too good, either.

Granddaughter Jessica had on her birthday list material to make another quilt. She received money to buy the materials, and her Aunt Susan is planning to take her Saturday on a shopping trip to select them. Who says the folk art of days past is gone? She learned to do the quilt-making in school, last year, and impressed us all with the finished product. Bouquets to the teacher who included that project in her planning.

I feel wealthy, in a way some people would never understand. I’ve been getting out and about a little, lately, walker and all. I can only get a very few items in the little basket on the walker, but it is good to be able to do that. When Laurie called to say she was coming this past weekend, she told me to make out a list and we’d go shopping.

Boy, did I make out a list. I “stocked up” on foods for a long time – with only needing milk and bread in the next few weeks, which I can manage, getting the large order put away was a challenge, but we did it. Laurie brought several “homemade” frozen dinners, so the freezer is full, also. A blizzard wouldn’t faze me a bit, right now. My upstairs neighbor Estelle has introduced me to a new kind of milk that lasts a long time. It is available in a quart or a package of small servings. One of those is in the freezer. Also check with your supermarket, that’s a very good item to have on hand, along with a loaf of frozen bread – both saving a winter trip to the store.

Until Sunday when it turned cold and windy, the “resident” Blue Jays have come every day at about 5 pm. The male has taken a very thorough bath in the water dish. Sunday when he came to drink he walked around the edge of the dish and looked and looked at the water. His better judgement told him it was too cold, but he came back twice and looked and looked, then flew off. With both a weather change and a change in the time, Mr Jay had to adjust his schedule to meet circumstances.

The quotation last week was by Eleanor Roosevelt.

Who said, “Laugh and the world laughs with you, snore and you snore alone”?