2004-01-09 - 2:33 p.m. - ice, ice, baby, ice, ice

This is entry number 3 for me today – a catch-up day in Diaryland for me.

There was excitement in the air on Monday - our first day back to school after our winter break….we might be out on Tuesday for a snow day!!!! It’s now day 4 of our winter storm of 2004. We’ve been on the national news, on the Today show – or so I’m told, but wouldn’t know since the only thing on our TV channels outside of prime time is the news about the storm. I say ENOUGH ALREADY!!! Only for so long can you look at cars getting stuck, people trying to walk on ice, people stranded at the airport which has been shut down for 3 days…Hourly updates would be fine, but continuous coverage for 14+ hours on end is ridiculous.

So I haven’t had the TV on too much. On Tuesday I graded a bunch of zoology reports I hadn’t gotten to over break. I also wrote thank you notes and walked to a friend’s house to see "A Mighty Wind" which was pretty funny. I liked "Best in Show" and "Waiting for Guffman" better, though. I also shoveled my walkways and moved my car to the street since I feared it could slide into the brick wall alongside my short but very steep driveway when I backed out.

Wednesday I awoke to news that we were out again! I graded some 9th grade papers I had yet to do and pretty much finished all the work I had brought home with me. I kind of wish I had brought some other books home so I could plan ahead, but alas – I found plenty of other things to keep me busy. I put away all my Christmas stuff and organized things around the house a bit. I took photos of the winter storm and emailed them back East so they could all see what’s going on out here. There was now a coating of ice on top of the snow, so you could walk on it without falling through. It brings back memories of my childhood where this would often happen during East Coast winters. My car also had about 1.5 – 2 inches of ice all over it – a Toyota-cicle. When snowed in, it’s time to bake cookies – so now I have oatmeal chocolate chip cookies to help me through the storm.

Thursday I awoke again to news of no school. I just wished they could tell us the night before. I took one step outside and practically had to crawl back into my house – it was that slippery! I don’t remember that happening too often back East. It was like a zamboni had come by overnight and given a nice new sheet of ice to everything. There was sleet on Tues. night but last night it must have been freezing rain – precipitation that freezes upon impact. You really needed ice skates or crampons to get around safely. The warm air mass that supposedly was coming in to clear things out got shifted up on top of the cold air which was taking its sweet time moving anywhere; thus it delayed the thawing out that should have started Tues. night. I decided to wash my kitchen and bathroom floors and dry mop my hardwood floors – damn if this house isn’t going to be clean. I also talked with a number of friends on the phone – it was great having time to chat and relax a bit. I’m in the middle of reading "Diary" by Chuck Palahnuik. I started it over break but was too busy to read much from it during my two weeks off. It’s OK but not one of my favorites of his thus far. I did spend a couple of hours outside chipping away the ice on my front steps once it got a little warmer (34 degrees!) in the afternoon. The de-icing of the car was fun….I would gently whack on the ice with the wooden handle of my garden spade until enough cracks had formed for me to push/pull it off whereupon it would crash to the ground with dramatic flare. When the last big piece fell off the top, it felt and sounded like a calving glacier.

It’s now Friday and finally we were alerted of our no-school status last night. Nevertheless, I awoke at 5:30 a.m. to the sound of my answering machine clicking…we had lost power briefly and it was just turned back on. So much for NOT waking up at my alarm time. My goals for productivity today are to update my diaryland journal and work some more on the essays for my overseas applications. More on that from a separate entry I’ll write and most likely will post before this one.

I must say I’ve enjoyed my time off – I’ve been both productive and have relaxed a bit – but now cabin fever’s setting in and I NEED to get out today. Time will tell what I’ll do. I’m presently listening to Josh Ritter, and when "Snow is Gone" played, the sun came out and droplets of water from the thick layers of ice were falling as if they were dancing from heaven - it was something to behold.

30-something - 2005-03-01
the holding back the the flow of tears - 2005-02-20
song survey - 2005-02-15
song for the day...or perhaps the year... - 2005-01-25
something new - 2005-01-24
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