Hey Ewen ... nice to hear from you!
Can't believe it's nearly two months since an update. Very slack. Guess you got most of the photo updates in the Christmas letter ... enjoyed Christmas with my neighbour Dave - so thought I'd include a photo. We went out to a State park (Afton) about 45 min drive. Not many people about. Took the trangia to cook soup ... which was much needed ... though it was a bit of a hunt for metho which, of course, is not available in the US ... by that name. Took Jane's advice and googled it - it is called either 'denatured alcohol' or 'gas-line antifreeze' - not something that sounds like you'd want to use it for cooking! But I gave it the 'sniff' test before filling the fuel container and it smelled like metho ... and we didn't blow up anything!
Also included a pic or two of the local dog park ... well - it's also about twenty minutes drive, but worth it to let the dogs off and burn up some energy. About 80 acres that's owned by the major local airline who are happy to let dog-owners use it as it has proved to make the adjacent staff carpark more secure!
And ... for good measure, the view outside my study window a few weeks back. It's much warmer this week, should get up to the 40s - apparently it's the January thaw and will drop back to sub-zero pretty soon. Not so much the cold that gets you down, but the lack of sun - grey skies much of the time.
