I start another month with the childhood invocation to bring about luck or fortune, and like I did last month, add other animals into the mix. Last month, it was the groundhog, the prognosticator of the season who told us we would have six more weeks of winter.

The first few weeks, here in Connecticut were fairly mild, but it seems like the groundhog has gotten to getter with the lion. March, you will recall, is said to come in like a lion and go out like a lamb. Well, we have a winter storm watch, bringing us the winter weather the groundhog predicted coming in like the lion.

Yet these winter advisories didn’t stop the Scum Beach Polar Bear Club from taking a dip yesterday. As we were driving home from a cold windy picnic at a park in Guilford, we saw a large group of people gathered on a beach. It was the Scum Beach Polar Bear Club gathering for their yearly party. I’ve put a few pictures up on Flickr and hope to have more up soon, as well as some reflections on the party.

Polar bears are not the only bears that have been seen around recently. The bears have also been dominating the markets on Wall Street. Will the Obama administration come in with a bear and go out with a bull? We shall have to see.

For some reason, it makes me think back to the late seventies when President Ford launched his Whip Inflation Now campaign. People would take the WIN buttons and flip them upside down to get NIM, No Immediate Miracles. President Obama is warning us against expecting immediate miracles, but I sure hope to that we can flip the no immediate miracles into a win.

So, another month starts. It isn’t the cruelest month, that is coming, but we have a foreshadow of what is to come, memory and desire.