Dear Cousin Wiarton Willie,
Many thanks for your delightful letter from last year--how time has been flying.
Phillina and our offspring are all fine, eagerly awaiting the onset of spring. As you may have read in the news, we've recently had some bitterly cold temperatures here lately. I guess that it was not any warmer in Canada. Our friends in Alaska are also writing about the frigid temperatures (like -44 degrees F) there but the Alaskans are used to that, or ought to be. Obviously, we are not allowed to have such cold temperatures here as our thermometers' scales only go to -40 (F/C)! (What a relief).