My niece is a soon-to-be-famous film maker. She recently won a grant from the IFP Minnesota Center for Media Arts that enabled her to film and produce her original screenplay called "Hole in the Wall". It is a short film about intergenerational tension between a father and a son.

I had the privilege of shooting still set photography on the movie set. Exteriors were shot the first day and interiors were shot the second day. The interiors were in a totally dilapidated house in Minneapolis with extremely small rooms. I shot with an extremely wide lens and mostly from the hip to try and capture the tightness of the set and also to minimize camera intrusion.

It was a fascinating and tedious process. Everything was captured with real film, which is in itself a true challenge. A single overhead jetliner can ruin a shot. And you never know if there was a light leak with the film until after it is processed.

My niece Mandy is on the left of the top photo and she is reviewing a shot set-up. The bottom photo is the primary room in which the father confronts the son.

A rule of thumb in the creativity industry is that if you hit a creative mental roadblock, run as fast and hard as you can into the nearest wall. This head-on collision will reset your entire mental wiring and you will either have cured the writer's block, or you won't even know writer's block is anymore.

Or, look out your window and write what you see.

I have a small mountain of snow immediately outside my work window. It has been larger and was actually completely removed at one point. It will probably just melt in place for the rest of the year. It won't be pretty, melting snow usually isn't.

But it is a hopeful sign of spring. This winter was typically atypical. We had several significant snow falls and a couple of serious deep freezes. We will have flooding and it will be a messy spring.

And the weather forecast today is for more snow.

Back in early December 2010 there was a blog entry that discussed the love-hate-love relationship with the Minnesota Winter (The paradox of the Minnesota winter...).

This morning the temperature dipped to -25 degrees Fahrenheit. That falls squarely in the "hate" category, although it does have a certain scientific curiosity.

Weather this cold has some very unique properties. You can take a cup of coffee and launch the coffee in the air and it will freeze before it hits the ground. Also, because the air is so dense, all kinds of ground effects occur with exhausts fumes. Animals continue about their business and almost seem unaware of how cold it is. However, the dog didn't care for it. It was impossible to keep the car warm.

This photo was taken at 6:30 in the morning. It was the only bank that had a working clock/thermometer, as the cold weather made the other electronic signs fail.

But outside of the science, weather this cold kind of sucks.

Winter in Minnesota is an emotional roller coaster of love-hate-love.

Winter begins beautifully. It is the whitest white, very light and very gentle. Everything looks different and fresh. This is the first 'love'.

This first 'love' will last hopefully through December. Or until the first day in which the high temperature doesn't get above zero. Or the first time you have to jump-start your car. Or change a flat tire.

This is the first 'hate'.

For six to eight weeks you need to be able to tolerate this because there is no escaping it. You can try heading south for a couple of weeks, but you are only running away from reality. And reality will be here when you return.

And you know you will be returning.

And then very suddenly, things begin to feel positive again. Usually it is a bright sunny day in March or the first time you hear a robin sing, but it is enough to give you positive momentum. This is the second 'love'.

Minnesota winters have a sinusoidal rhythm and there is a comfort in that regularity.