And lazy as a sleepy hand that scarcely moves on the clock's face the day drags on for centuries holding us fast in its embrace B. Pasternak - 1960

Was he was confused and thinking of the vernal equinox why else the melting icicles, the puddles the nesting boxes steaming in the heat and lazy lovers strolling arm-in-arm hardly a December scene and yet he clearly wrote of the sun's mid-winter turning here in Oregon the winter weather also varies year to year and differs east to west from Idaho to the Pacific coast today Grants Pass is overcast but hardly freezing it's good to know the days will start to lengthen and spring creep up on us even before we're ready to let the winter go