CafeChatNoir

for some sign/indication of the weather to come.  Given that they didn’t have a reaction strong enough to wake up my brother in the moments leading up to the earthquake, they might not be the best indicators of weather-related things that may become reality.  But I’m watching them anyway.

Carmen is getting high off her catnip butterfly I bought for her at the beach.  Lily is testing the specific gravity of every item that lies in her path.

Moxley is (as usual) actively chastising both felines for their behaviour.  (I love him to death, but he is a bit of a narc.)

So, in short, it’s a 110% normal night here.

But hey, we’ve got working flashlights,  3 1/2 days of water, beef jerky & snack pack puddings – so I think we’ll be OK.

The snow started at about 3:30 and it’s been going like gangbusters and it’s heavy, heavy, wet snow.

School was cancelled for tomorrow at 7:30 PM.

It has taken one of my friends a good 5 hours to get home.

The power just went out a few minutes ago – there are now 107K people without power in the county.  I doubt we’ll have it back anytime soon given that the transformers over the hill have been exploding.

We have a tree down in the backyard – of course, it went into our neighbor’s yard.  Fortunately, thanks to it being a rather light and bendy tree (despite it’s overall size) it is resting gently on the fence.  I do not own a chainsaw.  There is another tree leaning a bit – we knocked off as much snow as we could, but I’m guessing it’s going to go over as well.  That one is at least facing the yard.  And the house…

I can’t say I remember a snowstorm that did this much damage this quickly.  Thunderstorms, yes, but not snowstorms.  And it’s supposed to keep snowing until midnight.  Yay.

About 3 inches in less than two hours already…

And a great example of why kids think adults are idiots.  I’ve got 5th graders this week and next week, and yesterday before dismissal I gave them the big speech about “don’t count on a snow day, it’s going to be rain and then change to snow much later in the day, so do your homework.”  Fast forward 14 hours, we have an impressive amount of sleet and a day off.  I’m sure their parents also said, “She may be a substitute, but your teacher is right, now do your homework.”

Now, while I’m sure some of the kids are happy they have the day totally free to do whatever they want because they did their homework last night, I’m quite certain there is a large segment of the student population thinking, “WHY did I bother with my homework last night???  The adults didn’t know ANYTHING.”

This is why Jack Weinberg said, “Don’t trust anyone over 30.”

During the break in the weather this afternoon, I headed up to the market.  We need milk.  Not because it is snowing, but because we are out of milk as of today – I would have been hitting the store no matter what.  However, it would seem that a LOT of people in the neighborhood had the exact same idea of taking advantage of the weather pause.

Now, when I am at the store and I know we’ve got snow coming, I find I can’t just get the one or two things that are on my list.  All semblance of good nutrition and meal planning go completely out the window.  I suddenly want things absolutely crammed with fat, calories, carbohydrates and any other thing that is particularly unhealthy.  It’s like I’m bit possessed as I roam the aisles.  Fixings for cheese dip!  More stock for cheese grits!  Mexican cheese for tacos for dinner!  Decent tortillas!!  (Why I bought Piñata tortillas the last time I was out is beyond me.)  Kielbasa!  Potatoes!  Cinnamon bread for French toast!  Taquitos!  Mini chocolate frosted donuts!  (Those just appeared in my cart.  I don’t know how they got there.  Some 3 year old must have tossed them in and run away.)

Knowing that this nutritional debacle was looming ahead for the next 24 hours, I did at least have a salad for lunch.

In other snow related thoughts, I have found that in my role as substitute teacher, I am happy to defend snow days.  Yes, I do like the bonus day off – I am human after all.  Yes, I know it totally screws up things for parents, especially with so many families with both parents working.  However, I am fairly certain that on days like this, the Superintendent doesn’t get up at 4AM and dial VDOT for road conditions thinking, “Let’s see how many people I can completely and utterly inconvenience today!”

There are employees that are already en route to work by 5AM, so they’ve got to make the call by 4:30.  If the roads are crap, they can push it back 2 hours if they really think things will improve, but if it’s still crap at 6:30 – the day is done.  Lots of teens drive themselves to work.  Do you enjoy being on the road with 17 years olds on a GOOD day, much less in sleet?  I didn’t think so. :)

I was up at 6:30 this morning – still too much sleet to be safe at that point, and I’m sure it was much worse out in the western part of the county.  We had some rain in the middle of the day today, but it’s just now turned to a snow/sleet mix again – right when the buses would be back on the roads trying to get the elementary school kids home.  I think the closing was a good call today.

Or maybe it’s just that freakishly hot week of weather we normally get right smack in the middle of spring just about every year.

Two days of 90 degrees, today is 80 degrees, it’s sunny, there is NO SNOW, and frankly, I don’t mind it a bit. (Though I do know that my allergy prone friends are in a bit of agony, but that is DC in spring.) Though it did throw me a little this morning, as I had read that today would be rainy & cool and instead I woke up to 80 and sunny, and discovered that the rain forecast has been pushed off to this evening. I’m not sure what it says about me that I can be thrown off by a change in the weather, but what can I say – I’d went to bed mentally prepped for a cool and rainy day!

Today’s challenge is seeing how close I can come to spending $152.57 at Costco. (Annual Costco cashback thing from my AmEx card.) I need Turbo Tax and AA batteries. The challenge of filling out that amount with things I actually *need* rather than just go “Oooh, good deal!” and then not spending another $300 on top of the $150. A challenge indeed. (And if nothing else, free lunch via samples!)

Well, off to blind people with my insanely white legs – sorry world, I have to wear shorts today.

I feel so bad when I read status updates on Facebook about people still shoveling snow. This spring is very, VERY welcomed. It’s so nice to have the back door open and the dog can come and go as he pleases during the day. (Though he is having a bit of trouble remembering that he doesn’t have to ask every time he wants to go out.) So far the cats have shown no interest in the dog door other than sniffing at it, and don’t seem to understand that the dog can’t actually walk through walls. Lily has figured out that if she sits in front of the dog door, Moxley will just stand on the other side and not try to come in until I intervene and move her. (Yes, she is a bit of a brat.)

HR 4872 may or may not happen today, aka health care. This should be interesting. I just hope that perhaps this can stop some of the nastiness going about. (Last I heard, Gerry Connolly was on board, deem and pass had gone out the window, and the fence-sitters were finding themselves in quite the spotlight.)

In other news, I am an Avon rep!! (Been dying to try the Anew line, didn’t know a rep and decided I would just be my own rep.) Thank you Melissa for being my awesome first customer! To that end, I have a meeting with my District Sales Manager tomorrow, a “Division Rally” next week and a sales meeting the week after that. Basically, more meetings in the next 3 weeks than I’ve been to in the last 4 years. At the risk of sounding like a sales pitch, I will say the online ordering and direct delivery they have now is pretty spiffy.

Now I am going to figure out what I am going to do with the rest of this absolutely gorgeous day. Well, after lunch.