I Love Mondays

I love my children. More than anything in the world. And now I'm going to sound like a Very Bad Parent... because today I wanted nothing more than for them to go away for a few hours.

And they did. Thank God for school.

You see, due to the Snowpocalypse (a.k.a. Snowmageddon 2012), there was much cabin fever here at Chez Gamers' Babes. On everyone's parts. Especially mine and Lizzy's. While it didn't escalate to last March's debacle-level frustration, it was No Fun For Anyone. Nothing particularly bad occurred; no blood was spilled (except when Kiki overwiggled her loose tooth) and we're all safe and sound. But boy, am I glad that's over!

Cabin Fever: Symptoms include restlessness, irritability, paranoia, irrational frustration with everyday objects, forgetfulness, laughter, excessive sleeping, distrust of anyone they are with, and an urge to go outside even in the rain, snow or dark.

 I couldn't even write.

Now today on the other hand, I was able to Get Things Done. I did my schoolwork. I looked for a job (and got some responses, unlike last week, when everyone with sense stayed home). I worked on the laundry and the dishes.

I reviewed Lizzy's report card. OMG - sooooo cute! And the only thing that surprised me is that they think she's left-handed. I'm not sure on that; she uses both hands, but I think I've only seen her use her right for drawing and for her spoon or fork. But she is only four after all. We shall see.

I renewed Abby's MedicAlert subscription. She is now covered for another year, which means that if you see my lovely daughter unconscious and you look at the flip side of the bracelet with the caduceus, call that toll-free number... they have all her medical information. And they're a non-profit besides; consider them for your charitable giving. They do good work.

I read for fun.

I took a nap.

This has been a Good Day. And any minute now the kids will come home, and now that we've all had a break, it will get even better.

Restoratives

What? Two blog posts in one day? This doesn't happen very often.

It's been a rough week. There's been snow and ice, and school snow days and cabin fever, and sleepwalking, and a lack of Abby's and my favorite Netflix DVDs (until today, yay!). There's been the usual joblessness coupled with a lack of people in offices from whom to inquire about jobs (you'd think they'd be more telecommutey here in Seattleish, but not always so). There's been the fact that I ran out of my anti-depressants (winter in Seattle, you know) on Monday, and it didn't cross my mind until today that my lovely spouse could refill them for me).

And today was the worst of the days thus far. It was full of things like, "but she said she won't like me anymore if I don't help her clean up!" and, "Tell her she can throw her own gum away, Mom said so!" One of those days, when one wants to drop the children, no matter how much we love them, down a well.

School's been good, but I could not concentrate today. I had grammar exercises to do (and yes, I did end up getting 99%, thank you very much, and the remaining point is arguable, having to do with punctuation as it does). I could not deal with the kid-nattering noise and do my grammar at the same time. So I took advantage of the Hubs being home and played with my new Windows Phone's Zune functions a bit. I bought my favorite symphony (because it's instrumental and therefore I can concentrate on words), plugged in my earbuds, and shut out the kids for twenty minutes.

It was glorious.

The chocolate Laston brought me from the pharmacy when he picked up my prescription didn't hurt any either.

Snow Day Take FIVE

This is ridiculous. I am not a fan. When the kids have a whole week off school due to snow (albeit Monday was a holiday) this is not normal. Global cooling over here in Seattleish. It's finally warming up a bit, but it's not precipitating, so the melt is very very slooooow. Lizzy and I are completely stiry-crazy (Laston's made it to work every day except Wednesday, and Abby gets outside a bit every day, but I don't want Lizzy out in that icy-wet if I can help it). We aren't allowed to take our garbage out until Monday, because the garbage truck people can't make it out here.

Yesterday Afternoon

I fully expected Lizzy to have a night terror last night; she's been getting overtired and not sleeping well, and that usually causes night terrors for her. She didn't, but she did have a sleepwalking episode last night (which is related). She wandered out to the living room, yelled, "I'm not tired!" at the top of her lungs, and went back to bed. It left me a bit nonplussed.

So we're hoping to get Leanna today; again, this depends on accessibility. Major roads are bare and wet with patches of snow and ice. Minor roads are mostly the patches of snow and ice. Leanna's half-mile driveway is apparently impassable by car, but her mom says they can walk out to the road. Job hunting has of course been slow, because nobody's been in the office if they can help it. I scraped up my three required applications for the week, though; usually it's more like three a day!

Today Noon

School has been great though. Nothing like an unseasonable snow storm to give you lots of fodder for an Environmental Science class! And I might even finish the laundry today (insofar as laundry is ever finished, that is...). I've been writing just for fun a lot too, so I have been getting stuff done; it's just that the insulated sensation is wearing thin on me here.

But as you can see, it is melting. Very very slowly.

Snow Day Take Three

Today is snowy enough that the Hubs didn't even try to get to work. My mom lacked power for an hour or so this morning. The kids are willing to stay indoors. Abby is playing Illusion of Gaia (yes, I know that link is dead the day I'm posting this. That's the sort of thing that will happen if SOPA passes) for the first time (and reading most of the text herself, yay!). Lizzy's running around our nice cozy apartment wearing panties and ponytails, bouncing to the window (and occasionally kissing it before we can stop her) every couple of minutes to see if the snow is deeper.

I'm not a fan of snow - as you may have guessed - but this storm does have the upside of giving me lots to talk about in my Environmental Science class; this is highly unseasonable weather for us. Our typical annual snow accumulation (for Seattle proper) is just over five inches. We have more than that already... and it's still snowing. When the Pizza Hut is closed for inclement weather, you know it's bad. We're utter wimps in the snow around here... it's hilly, and the snow here is wet and slippery, and there are entirely too many people who think a) they drive better than they really do, and b) that four-wheel-drive automatically equals safety.

Credit: Lori Christopher via
woodinville.patch.com

News flash for you. It doesn't. Certainly not on the ice crust that usually occurs with Seattle snow - it warms up and melts the top layer (or God forbid, starts to rain on top of the snow), and then freezes over at night.

I can drive in the snow, but not well. I almost always choose not to. The Hubs is more willing, but as stated above, even he didn't make it in today. As I write this, the kids are getting a little stir-crazy so we're going to break for lunch. But the Pizza Hut is closed. Dang.

Snow Day!

It's Seattleish. It's snowing. More importantly, it's still snowing. And it's sticking.

Abby & Lizzy in the tub, 2008

I had the girls take a hot bath this morning. Abby got all the indigo boot dye off her feet. Then, after drying her hair, she bundled up and went out to make a snow fort with her friends.

Purple boot dyed feet

When she came in, the blue on her feet was from the dye, but her lips were faintly azure too.

So I served them a hot lunch (french-bread pizza and steamed veggies) and nixed her going outside again until her boots and coat are dry. She was feeling chilled enough that this did not even cause tween angst.

So far.

And Kiki came over to play (indoors!) until it's time for her lunch. They're all using Abby's Paper Jamz Microphone and it sounds rather like Indian Love Call in there, while our lovely maintenance guy is repairing... wait for it... my freezer. In this weather, yes, the freezer of all things went kablooey. He says the defrost thermostat blew, causing ice buildup in the cooling fan casing. I think. I'm no mechanic; I'm better with software. But he is, and I'll take his word for it. And he said the stuff would not be out of the freezer long enough to thaw, so I'm content. And he says he changes the defrost thermostat on freezers about once a month (the complex and most of the appliances are ten years old, after all).

Ahhhh... the lovely quiet purr of a properly-functioning freezer....

And warm children.

And the smell of wet mittens...

Thus is a snow day.

Timelessness

Although it's been established that I am a Doctor Who fangirl, that's not the kind of timelessness about which I speak. It the timelessness that comes from a snow day in a place where it doesn't happen all that often.

Seattlish is one of those places.

We generally get one or two a year, and today doesn't even count because it's Martin Luther King Jr. Day and the schools are closed anyway (that link may black out a couple days from now, for 24 hours, to protest SOPA. Just so you know). But there's about three inches of snow up here in the Convergence Zone, and it's started snowing again, and the kids are bundled up, and there's slush that they've tracked up the stairs by the front door, and damp mittens all over the place, and the lining of Abby's boots has turned her toes a lovely shade of indigo, and Lizzy's thrilled about being allowed to play "outside with the big kids" (I only have to open the door to hear them; they are required to stay close when they have Lil' Liz with them), and the cat is not sitting under the dining table as usual; she's curled up by the heater vent.

And this, plus our lack of "Regular TV", and my joblessness, and the fact that I'm getting all my news from Google Plus and Yahoo News and SchoolReport.org lends a feeling of being separated from the normal march of time. I'm doing my usual daily routine - job hunting (slow on a holiday), laundry (rather more socks and gloves than usual), dishes, school - but it just seems different somehow. As though the snow was blanketing time as well as the trees and the streets, insulating me from it.

It's kind of nice, really. In a timey-wimey sort of way.

ETA: And our school district has notified us that school is closed tomorrow. They notified before the day in question, and on a Federal holiday. This is gonna be a big one, I think.