Future Poltergeist

I fell asleep on the couch last night while watching a movie.  The cats woke me at 6a so I fed them and turned the thermostat.  I returned to the couch, half listened for the furnace to kick on and fell back asleep.  Around 7a the FP Gal came down and asked if I wanted to head up to the bed.  I did.  About 45 min later she woke me and told me that the furnace wasn't working. It got cold.  The lowest the thermostat read was 52 degrees.  I came down stairs and all three kids were bundled up on the couch, under about fifteen blankets.  The FP Gal called some repair people and made an appointment for the afternoon.  We watched some TV and then I took them to the Y.  After we were done there, the FP Gal told me to take the kids out for lunch. We got home at the same time as the repair guy.  He only needed about twenty minutes or so and he had it fixed.  We need to do a larger repair down the road, but this one wasn't too bad....

Winter has arrived and I'm having trouble adjusting. 

(View from our backyard.)  The forecast says that we're going to get 6-12 inches of snow tonight and tomorrow.  I'm not sure when our first snowfall was last year, but it was too early.  In fact, the past two winters have been fairly brutal.  Here is to hoping that we have a mild one this year!

School is closed for tomorrow due to insane levels of cold.  It will be the fourth day in January that this has happened.  The fourth day so far, because the forecast for Tuesday ain't that hot either.  On some level I get it.  One day last week Relia waited at the corner for the bus for about 15 minutes.  It would be very bad if that were to happen to some kids tomorrow.  On the other hand, that's four days that parents have had to scramble to find day care.  We're lucky, in that I can watch them and the FP Gal will be home too.  I feel bad for the others though.  Man, oh man, we could use some warm weather.

Our icy door adventure continues.  Every day this week we've ventured out to try and figure out which doors will open.  It's a game that I've come to call 'Kia Roulette'.  You see, there is some risk involved.  If you try the door and it opens, you can get the kids in the easy way.  If it won't open, then you have to load them in the front and then climb through and buckle them up.  As you're picturing this, make sure to include all of the bulky winter clothes needed to get through this ridiculous cold snap that we're having.  Loading them in the front had been something of the default. So what's the risk?  Well, if the door opens just a bit, then you have the door sensor go 'bong, bong, bong' for your entire drive.  Pounding on the door might get it to reclose and turn it off but there is no guarantee.  (Pound anyway.  You'll need the outlet.) Worst of all is that the door might open but then not close again.  That would be...

We are only nine days into December and I'm already done with winter.  Until last week, temps were around freezing or so.  We'd had snow, but not a terrible amount.  Then it changed.  We got some significant snow on Tuesday and Wednesday but it wasn't that cold.  That meant lots of moisture on the cars and roads. By Thursday morning the temperature had fallen to just above zero.  I decided to take the boys out to the mall so they could run (or at least walk) around.  We got all bundled up and went out to the porch.  I had the boys wait there while I turned on the car and cleared off the snow.  I did my scrapping duty but there was a problem.  The side doors to the van were frozen shut.  So we stayed home. When the FP Gal got home I told her what happened and she told me that I should have gotten them in through the front door and then buckled them up.  On Friday I decided to do just that.  It was a pain, especially becau...

One of the few good things to come out of last year's awful winter was the decision from the Weather Channel to name the various storms.  At first, I was against it, but it turned out to be useful to have a name that travelers and airlines could use when talking about the horrid things.  Well, I'm late to this, but here is the list that the Weather Channel has picked for this year.  Atlas Boreas Cleon Dion Electra Falco Gemini Hercules Ion Janus Kronos Leon Maximilian Nika Orion Pax Quintus Rex Seneca Titan Ulysees Vulcan Wiley Xenia Yona Zephyr The list was developed by a high school Latin class.  I've got some favorites.  It will almost be a joy to 'rocked' by Falco in a few weeks.  I have hopes that Ion will be a very small storm.  And let's all hope that Pax isn't too powerful of a storm, right?  

The past few days have been very cold up here in the north woods.  The wind is mostly to blame.  It's been strong and cutting.  We don't have any snow on the ground.  The few dustings we've had have not lasted very long.  But oh, this cold!  Makes me want to move elsewhere.  Tomorrow.

We raked up the yard today.  We really couldn't do it earlier than now because the trees around us were still full of leaves.  It's been an odd fall as far as leaves go.  They really didn't come down until about Wednesday.  I'm not sure why.  Seriously, the weather has been pretty normal for the past couple of months.  Maybe a little cooler than normal but not drastically.  And yet the leaves were late turning color and then late falling down.  Is that because we had such a late spring?  Dunno. Anyway, we had snow on Tuesday.  A real snow, though not the winter storm that we were warned about.  Come Wednesday, they started coming down as if there were people in the trees with leaf blowers.  I don't remember ever seeing that before.  Anyway, we've raked and we're ready for winter.

Did a little poking around online. Our highest temp of the year so far is 52, which we've hit twice in the last three weeks. The last time we had temps higher than 60? November 21. The next day (Thanksgiving) we had snow, and we've basically had it ever since. That means that as of Sunday, we'll have been in winter for the past *five* months.

This has been a tough week of weather.  A tough month, really.  We've had snow and snow and snow.  And also lots of very cold weather for March.  It has felt more like January.  This past week has been the worst though.  It's not just the snow.  We often get big snowfalls in March, after all.  But they usually feel like temporary things.  "Ok foot of snow, you'll be all gone in a couple of weeks."  Not this one though.  This felt like an announcement that we're not done with winter yet. Guh. I keep telling myself that the Twins home opener is about ten days away from now.  Spring simply has to be around the corner. 

We had our first stick-to-the-ground snow yesterday morning.  Relia burst into my room at 7a to tell me excitedly that it had snowed.  She made me go to the window so that I could see it for myself.  She was, not surprisingly, much more excited about it than I was. When I got DF out of his crib, I took him over to the window so that he could see it too.  He looked at the back yard and the neighbors house and simply told me that something happened to the leaves.  I wasn't sure just how much he was aware of snow.  He was too young to remember the very hard winter of 2010-11 and last year was very mild.  But when we got downstairs he looked out a window and started yelling about snow.  He remembers. We had slick roads to deal with.  Relia's bus was more than ten minutes late.  I actually had to leave her there with another student because DF had hurt his hands playing in the snow.  Bad daddy didn't have proper mittens for him. ...

We were right around 80 degrees earlier this week.  Not anymore!  This morning it started out windy.  All day the temps dropped and now it's frigid.  The five day forecast says that we may have flurries in a couple of days.  Good times.

It's not even December yet (not quite) and I'm already having trouble dealing with the weather. We've only dipped into the 20s and it still feels . . . unfair somehow. I think Meigan said we deserve extra credit for living through Minnesota winters and that is certainly true. Unfortunately, I don't know what we're storing that credit up for. Maybe life on the upper plains makes it easier to get into heaven. I feel this way especially in the morning. Our downstairs is very tricky in terms of gauging just how warm it is outside. As a result, I rarely feel confident that I got the kids dressed right. Once we get into true winter this won't matter as much because then you simply load on the clothes and go. During the transition periods it's harder. I keep wishing we had a steam room in our house. Doesn't that sound nice? Not really a sauna as I want something wetter. Maybe like those big Russian baths. Today I actually ran the water in the shower for about t...

We've had more than a foot of snow so far and it's still falling. The wind was pretty high last night but it has settled down since. It hasn't been that cold, lows in the 20's I think. The news just called this the biggest snow storm in February history so we've got that going for us. If I see that groundhog I'm going to punch him right in the face.

Here are some accounts from people who were stranded on Chicago's Lake Shore Drive last night. They talked to one woman who was stranded from 4p until 4a. Which is beyond crazy. There were policemen on snowmobiles taking drivers to warming stations. Cars couldn't be unburied and towed out until this morning. Just a huge mess. I make it a point to always have my cell phone with me in the car in part because of fear of situations like this. It didn't seem to have helped these folks though. And I can't help but think of what I would have done if I'd had the kids with me. Just muddled through, I guess. (I'm picturing DF zipped up against me in my jacket while I hold Relia on the back of a snowmobile.) This has been such a crazy winter both for damage and poor handling of conditions. Which isn't meant as a complaint about Minneapolis snow people. They've about as good a job as they can with snow emergencies and parking problems. But New York City...

I know in the past I've said that it's the cold that bothers me, not the snow. Well, that's true but after some time the snow gets to me too. By my careful time we've had a different snow at least 50 separate days in the past month. Usually a dusting, sometimes a couple of feet. This morning it looked like about two inches. I've had enough of it. Seriously, just knock it off. It's bad enough that we have to enjoy your company for five months out of the year. Do you have to make such a mess while you're here? We've had enough of your snowy gifts and no longer know where to put them. We can find where you live. Don't make us come looking for you. There is a lot more aerosol we can put in the air if you force our hand. You've been warned.

That's all of the degrees that the thermometer could find this morning. I am seriously not ready for winter this year.

The weather here has turned cold in what I fervently hope is the last real cold snap of the winter. I told the FP Gal yesterday that this time it feels personal. Wouldn't be surprised if a weather map showed clouds in the shape of a rather rude gesture. This morning I had to tell Relia that her gauzy ballet type outfit isn't warm enough. She's disappointed but handling it well. I told her that she'll just have to wait until it's warm out. Just like the rest of. Sigh...