Good morning. This is my first blog of the New Year. Today is the Iowa Caucus, whatever that is. Why is Iowa so important? I know we have more people in Texas and we never get to meet the candidates. In fact, by the time they get to our primary, the nominee has generally already been decided. Politics is important, though. This election is so very important; the value of the dollar is falling, oil hit $100 a barrel yesterday, America is hated throughout the world, our deficit is greater than ever, all of our middle class jobs are being sent to India, and we have troops losing their lives in the Middle East. Things have got to change and I am not sure that anyone being offered for our voting pleasure will or can make the changes needed.

I am currently trying to complete my dear sister-in-laws afghan. I will post a picture when I finish it. It is a large Granny Square and I am using the new Lion Brand Vanna's Choice thread. I just love this thread. I made my Christmas Scarfs out of it this year. Keep up the good work Lion Brand.

I am currently reading:
For Fun: Sweet Revenge, by Diane Mott Davidson (I love her)
For Class: Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zora Neale Hurston
Listening to: Invasive Procedures, by Orson Scott Card (He is the ultimate in Sci-Fi)

On the Green Front, when I was paying my light bill yesterday, I noticed that there was a graph that showed our energy consumption for the past two years. Last year we changed all of our light bulbs to CFL's as our old bulbs went out and that is about the only energy change we made. It worked. According to the graph we actually used less energy last year than we did the year before. It is a good thing, because I know we had to pay more last year due to fuel costs, so I would hate to know what our bills would have been if we had consumed like the year before.

Happy New Year,
Laura