Barb’s Burblings

I lived in Connecticut during the winter of ‘93-’94. Now, the thing to understand about where I lived in Connecticut is that the town was pretty spread out, very hilly, and the roads were all very twisty and turny. And protected by trees. What I’m saying is that it took a bit for roads to be passable after snow, even with decent snow-removal budgets.

You also need to know that in Connecticut, we got a vacation in February and April.

Now, the winter of ‘93-’94 was not a good one. Not only did we get snow fairly regularly, it frequently came with ice. It was the winter of the ice storm, and we got snow day after snow day. I want to say that total, we had something like 12 snow days.

It was the one time of my life that I remember my mother coming into my room, telling me I had a snow day, and being pissed off about it. Because only 5 days were scheduled into the school year. So each snow day after that was one taken out of the April break. When that was gone, days were added onto the end of the year. SO not cool.

(And pointless, because a lot of people already had reservations for April, which meant that school was practically pointless for those of us left.)

The last day of school that year wound up being something like June 21. The next week, my family moved to Montana. (Which, of course, does not get snow days. But then, the roads there are largely FLAT and STRAIGHT.) I started school there and had to listen to people complaining how short their summers were.

Their last day of school the previous school year? June 6 or so. Yeah.

Anyway, there is something exciting about a large snowfall. The problem here is that we had that in December. Less than 2 months ago. Two huge snowfalls in such a short period of time? Less fun. Of course, at least I don’t have to worry about losing vacation should we have to take a snow day from work. So, there is an upside to being a grownup. (The downside, of course, is that I don’t have a summer vacation from which to take the snow days.)

Unlike the last time–a mere month and a half ago–that I was trapped in my apartment for days by a snowstorm, I don’t have a huge project to work on. So, naturally, I’ve been mentally going through projects to work on for the next couple of days.

1. Work. I have some page proofs to finish reviewing and a catalog to update.
2. Vacuum. The apartment is pretty gross (except the bathroom, which I cleaned recently).
3. Clean the litter boxes. I made a special trip to PetSmart for litter last night. It will be used this weekend. That trip cannot have been in vain.
4. Update my filing. I need to clean out the past couple years’ worth of bills, etc., sitting in my filing cabinet. Totally forgot to do it last year.
5. Catch up on at least one of the two shows sitting on my DVR. I have something like 10 episodes of both The Mentalist and Flash Forward just taking up precious storage space.
6. Make it to Level 8 on New Super Mario Bros. I can do this. I can.
7. Label the pictures on my computer.
8. Sleep a lot. Yay!

I just hope I don’t lose electricity for long. Of course, I do have a large stack of books that need to be read…

What? I would NEVER cause trouble!

I wrapped Christmas presents the other day and put them into the second bedroom, mostly so I could make sure Pem wouldn’t be around them without supervision. And I was impressed, because it took her a couple of days before she took an active interest in them. (How could she not? All that paper to be chewed!) And it was only just now that I realized her plan–a slight modification of her evil morning plan to wake me up.

Step 1. Do something that will definitely annoy Mommy (e.g., get into bag of presents, play on nightstand).
Step 2. Keep doing this until Mommy takes notice.
Step 3. Once Mommy’s attention has been gained, continue until Mommy stops whatever else she’s doing (sleeping, working on computer) and focuses solely on me.
Step 4. Lure Mommy into petting me, etc.
Step 5. Run into other room.
Step 6. Run back to where Mommy is, repeating all steps as necessary until Mommy realizes that it’s feeding time.
Step 7. If running back and forth doesn’t work, sit on her and meow until food is given.

Now, normally I have no problems with snow. I’m OK driving in it; after all, I got my driver’s license in Montana. In December. Shoveling isn’t a big deal, I think snow is pretty, and there’s something special about wandering around in the quiet that accompanies a snowstorm. But I’m not too pleased with this snowstorm. It conveniently waited until 9:30 on a Friday to start, meaning that it wouldn’t interfere with work. And it totally screwed over my plans for today. My day was full and it was going to be awesome. But no, now I’m stuck at home, doing work. (Which, OK, I really should’ve been doing instead of gallavanting around. And I really should’ve been doing for the past few weeks instead of doing the panto. But whatevs.)

My car tires? Mostly buried. From around 1 this afternoon:

I finally accepted that I wouldn’t be going anywhere and settled in. I thought I’d take a glance outside, so went downstairs and opened the door:

Yeah. The snow was higher than the bottom of the door. I’ve since shoveled a little path to the door, easing my concerns of getting snowed into the building.

And the fun part is, there aren’t any signs of it slowing up! Whee!

Yes, I still exist. I’m just very busy. In the meantime, look! When I was in Oregon visiting my parents for Thanksgiving, we went to Astoria (because my dad likes to drive to the coast–about 2 hours away from where they live. Yes, he’s a bit insane that way–but I’m like that, too), and since we were going there, I insisted we visit sites used in filming The Goonies. Without further ado…

Jail the Fratellis escaped from!

Where Mikey and Bran's dad worked

You can visit the Walsh house, but you have to leave your car at the bottom of the hill

Goonies never say die!

The owner of the “Walsh house” actually was taking out the garbage as I was taking pictures of the house and part of me wanted to say something, but I wussed out. On the positive side, my dad wasn’t familiar enough with the movie to require me to do the Truffle Shuffle before taking my picture in front of the house.

I was feeling cranky, and you know what makes me happy? These videos:

P.S. Discovery, your building is ALSO awesome. Please invite me to the taping of the Puppy Bowl next year.

I was stuck at the Louisville airport yesterday–very unhappily, mind you, because I was supposed to be on a 10:21 flight that would get me east in time to make it to the Orioles last game of the season, for which I had very good seats, but nooo, stupid mechanical difficulties meant the only part of the game I got to experience was the last half-inning, which I heard on the radio; I’m glad they won, but I was supposed to be there, dammit!–when I noticed that the little girl next to me was reading a biography of Eleanor Roosevelt. I was in a pissy mood, and that just cheered me right up, because she looked to be about the same age I was when I first read a biography of Eleanor. Turns out I was right; she was in third grade, and I had been in fourth grade. She said she was enjoying it, and I was just so glad. Eleanor rules! Yay!

And then, today, I saw someone link to Eleanor’s appearance on What’s My Line?. It seems so bizarre to see the former first lady on a game show, but it is really neat.

Of course, she also did commercials.

I guess the maintenance of Hyde Park must’ve eaten up the money she got from her newspaper column, etc. But can you imagine Laura Bush shilling for some random company?

Anyway, happy early 125th birthday (Oct. 11), Eleanor!

I’ll be happy if I’m not greeted with a scene like this when I arrive at conference this year:

Snow in Salt Lake...October 12

I’m a bit clumsy. I can’t imagine myself in heels or anything of the sort; I tend to trip when wearing flats. And by “flats,” I mean “Birkenstock sandals.” I do OK when I’m wearing my Chucks, but that’s about it. But more than tripping over nonexistent things on sidewalks, I’m very bad with spatial relations. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve walked into the corner of my coffee table. I guess I’m convinced it’s not as long as it is? I also have a tendency to walk into doorways. Maybe 90% of my body is fine, but that left or right 10% (usually left side–hmm, I wonder if that means something?) will *wham* right into the door.

You know, now that I’m thinking about it, my problem generally is the left side. The latest example is yesterday, when I went to lunch with some colleagues. I noticed a fire hydrant in my way, and dodged right. However, I managed to forget about the nozzle (or whatever that thing on the side is), and I slammed my leg into it. Absolutely clobbered. Don’t believe me? You can come see the huge bruise just above my left knee. It kind of hurts to walk.

Maybe I should just wearing full-body padding from now on. Do they make bubble wrap for people?

There’s a video on YouTube that’s stirred up quite a bit of interest around here: Arlington Rap. I love it–it makes me laugh and it’s pretty darn catchy. Plus, the guy has some great facial expressions, particularly when reacting to the Green Line suggestion and the Starbucks bit at the end of the video. I don’t live in Arlington, but I’ve been there enough–and know the region as a whole–to think this is awesome. Oh, Ballston Mall. You really do suck.

(The song actually reminds me a bit of “Parents Just Don’t Understand.” Which also is awesome.)