New Year's Eve Day, 2009

It's been getting as cold as -30 here at night, making it a pretty tough winter, especially if it's your first one ever. This deer kid has been hanging around the house lately. We didn't particularly think anything of it, other than trying to keep the dogs from giving it a hard time. Apparently though, it had become desperate to find any kind of food or shelter from the cold. We found it this morning curled in a ball near one of the measly exhaust vents of the house, where it must have just succumbed to cold and hunger. It missed the sunrise by no more than a few hours.