MCAP Party Friday night which was fun. Went to the cottage Saturday morning. No snow in the city to speak of but Muskoka has about 60 cm on the ground already. Joe, who plows the road and our driveway, has done so 6 times now, including Sunday morning as we had another 8cm overnight. Winter begins in a week.

Skied into Keyhole Lake along the Johnson trail to Saw lake then along Clear Creek - about 7km return - once Saturday and once yesterday. The first one was tough through 25cm of untracked powdery dry snow. My cousin Pete was on snowshoes and we traded the lead several times, stopping to knock the caked on snow off the hemlock boughs along Clear Creek. Sunday's ski was a bit easier through the 8cm of new snow and took 90 minutes - 20 less than Saturday's. The forest looks transformed - like a surreal movie set - with all the trees heavily laden with so much snow. Many smaller trees are still bent over from the rain then ice then heavy wet snow which fell overnight on November 9th.

With rain in the forecast, I decided to shovel the roof. I did this once last year - in February, I think, and one other time in the last 5 years but certainly never in mid December. An even bigger workout than the skiing actually, and it's a bit more dangerous too. I survived and got the whole north leaf done which is where it had drifted up to 80 to 100cm in places. I then had to shovel the snow off the back porch which creates a cool sort of tunnel effect leading from the driveway to the back door. It was a fairly heavy calorie burning couple of days.

The Bills lost again. Dick Jauron personally took responsibility for calling the fateful play on second down with 2:06 to go in the game and Bills leading by 3. JP Losman executed it in his own special way (I used to think, mistakenly, that Drew Bledsoe was the best at this), and the Bills are now 6-8 after showing some promising signs in the running game on this day in the Meadowlands, but finding another way to lose in the end. Going from 5-1 to 6-8 isn't necessarily indicative of a coaching problem but it would not make you want to sign him to three year extension, would it?

At Denver next Sunday if anyone cares, as we begin thinking now about our position in the April draft and, once again, about the revenue disparity and the team's long term future in Buffalo.

We will will go next to the cottage on Boxing day - 2 days before the Bills last game of the season against the Patriots.