Buried in White Stuff

Twelve inches.


That's right.


It was at LEAST that much.


I honestly think it was more.


Appeared more like a monster fifteen inches to me.


Utterly buried in white stuff.



Snow, of course.

What did you think I was talking about?


And we had to go over the river...

And through the woods to Grandma's again...

Which was an interesting experience, now that we live in a rural area. They don't plow dirt roads.

They barely plow the paved ones.

Even when we got into the closest "major city"...


We saw several cars stuck in the ditch on the way there.

But we, luckily, weren't one of them. Lots of tractors out plowing their driveways. Michael was jealous. He had to use the snowblower. But it was better than a shovel!





We made it to Grandma's and back again without incident.

And it was a truly lovely drive...

Blizzard!

And I don't mean the Dairy Queen kind.

We actually have a real live blizzard warning in effect for our county. Is that cool, or what? I wouldn't be saying that if this wasn't a Sunday, I suppose, but it's kind of nice to be out here in the middle of nowhere with all this snow around. And since I don't have to shovel it (yay for husbands!) or even go out in it...

The weather outside is frightful.

But the fire is so delightful.

And since we've no place to go.

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

This is the normal amount of snow we usually get. Three to four inches or so at a time. But this picture is just the blowing snow on the porch, which is under an overhang!

This is actually how much snow we have.

Cars? We have cars?

The kids playing in our backyard.

OOF!

PULL!

Long way to go!

Hi Mom!

The wind is swaying the trees like twigs, gusting up to 50 mph.

And what would a blizzard-y day be without hot chocolate and mom's homemade cookies?

Nine more days until Christmas... the kids are counting down... Maybe we'll have a white one after all!

A-Hunting We Will Go

We spent yesterday tromping around in the snow, looking for the perfect Christmas tree. A friend of Michael's from work lives with pigs and chickens and goats and cows... the whole farm deal. They also have a bunch of evergreens that the prior owners planted to start a Christmas tree farm. Many of them are getting too tall to even sell.

They offered to have us come out and cut our own tree. So we bundled up and went out to find the perfect tree. The three kiddos ran around in between the rows (Michael's friend from work has a four year old daughter) until we found just what we were looking for.

Daddy cut down the tree - but Dmitri insisted on "helping."

Timber!

Then we dragged it off to strap it to the top of the car.

Dmitri insisted on "helping" again.

They have a new puppy - the kids loved the puppy!

And their new calves were fun to visit, too... although as Zoe said, "Cows are stinky!"

Who me? Stinky?

Moo!

I guess I can't put it off any longer... gonna have to drag out all the Christmas decorations this weekend and put up the tree... Wish me luck!

False Alarm?

There's nothing like waking up at two in the morning to the sound of an emergency siren...

We immediately thought "Tornado!" but the weather channels said nothing. And it isn't really tornado weather around here lately, although you never know.

I flipped through local channels. What would a siren at two in the morning mean besides a tornado? Nuclear war? A terrorist attack? What!?

We looked outside and saw all the neighbors had their lights on. Clearly, they'd heard the siren, too. It must mean something!

Michael called the local police. And got a recording. Hmph. I looked up the number for the county police department. (I wouldn't let him call 911--it wasn't an emergency. At least, not yet!)

There, we found our answer. Apparently, the local fire department is completely volunteer, so when there's a fire or emergency they need to respond to, the siren goes off to let them know.

Oh.

So it was a false alarm--well, maybe not false. More like... misleading, or at least, misunderstood. Because this is apparently a one-size-fits-all-siren sort of town.

At least now we know where to call when it goes off to find out if it's a fire...or a terrorist attack...or nuclear war.

Good to know!

Falling

I love this time of year. The leaves turning color has always thrilled me. My son, Blake, captured this tree halfway there...

Down the road a piece (that's what they say around here... "Down the road a piece...") they keep horses.

There's nothing to see but gorgeous fields and farmhouses...

for miles...

Ah, but here's the reason we really chose this house... and why Michael has been playing lumberback for the past few weeks. All his hard work has paid off, and we now have a fire to sit in front of when the autumn nights grow chilly...

Dmitri loves helping Daddy make fires. Zoe and I just like snuggling in front of them.

Winter's going to rock this year! :D

Immaturity: Caught on Tape

I have a camera phone. I never thought I'd have one (I couldn't imagine a use for it!?) but our cell phone network offered us a deal on new phones, and since mine had been broken for three months and Michael's cell phone case had just cracked, I decided to try them out. So far, I've taken pictures of the kids and the dog to put on my screen saver. That's about it. What else can I use it for, really?

Then I saw on the news this morning that a teacher in Arizona was recorded doing a cheerleading routine on a camera phone by a student in her classroom. The student then decided it would be fun to share and put the video on YouTube. The teacher was consequently put on administrative leave.

When I was in school, there were no cell phones. We weren't even allowed to use the phones in the office, unless we were sick. When I worked as a secretary to the assistant principal in a high school office, they didn't allow cell phones in school. I used to be in charge of putting confiscated phones in our office safe, where kids could get them if their parents came in with them, or they could collect them at the end of the year.

Now, though, the laws are changing. Kids are allowed to bring their phones to school, and their phones aren't just phones anymore--they're also cameras, both still and video. And apparently, high schoolers are much more creative than I am--they're definitely finding a use for their camera phones! Like recording their teachers without their knowledge and putting those videos on YouTube...

This is becoming a more and more common phenomenon. We've all had the experience of having some strange or funny YouTube video forwarded to us from someone. And you have to know, if you put yourself out there, you run the risk of someone calling you on your actions. For example, there was a teacher in Virginia who created art using his buttocks who was fired after he posted his method on YouTube and was identified in spite of his disguise.

But what about videos taken without a teacher's knowledge or permission? Here's another video of an angry teacher that identifies the school and the teacher by name. I have no idea if any disciplinary action was taken against this particular teacher--or if any of the other teachers listed when you search "angry teacher" on YouTube were discovered online and paid real life consequences for their surreptitious appearance on the net--but the question is, how are these clandestine videos being used to hold teachers accountable?

It's interesting to me that it's this particular video getting all the attention. Why? Because this is a young, attractive teacher performing a cheerleading routine? Because it has a slight hint of sex? So because some high school boy happened to record his wet dream on his cell phone, now we pay attention to what's going on in schools?

My god, are we that immature, as a culture?

If you take a look at some of the other videos listed under "angry teacher," you'll find much more inappropriate and shocking teacher behaviors. Teachers having fits, teachers throwing things, teachers out of control. Teachers who look like two year olds having tantrums.

What's wrong with this picture?

We have raised generations who believe it's perfectly okay--in fact, it's "normal"--to abdicate the responsibility of raising their own children, and have given that power to the schools. Most kids weren't really raised by their parents--they were raised by the public institution of schools, teachers, and their peers.

Where do kids spend a majority of their waking time? Schools. Who do they see more of: peers, teachers, or parents? Those three, in that order. Parents, especially working parents, see their children the least. Time spent makes a huge difference, and I think the concept of "quality time" is just a rationalization on the part of working parents. Quantity matters. What we see and do every day, that's what influences us. How can we deny that?

What results is that no one is personally invested in the development of each child. No one is the adult. Teachers are just doing a job. Schools themselves are bureaucracies. The two people who should be personally invested in the child--the parents--have the least influence and time spent. That leaves peers, who teach each other nothing about being adults, but rather perpetuate the endless infantalizing of one another, sustaining the selfish, narcissistic behavior of the child, generation after generation.

Is it any wonder we have teachers doing cheerleading routines in front of their students? "Look at me! I'm young and immature, just like you!" And we have students recording that behavior and putting it on the Internet to pass around like we used to pass notes to giggle over?

The school itself passes judgment and places the teacher, who is "supposed" to be the adult, on administrative leave. The bureaucracy plays the role of parent. And what have we all learned?

We aren't adults. We have no self-control. We're all children who need someone to tell us what to do.

Does this scare the hell out of anyone else but me??

Migraine Train

I've got a migraine coming on. It's both the change in the weather (it's an unseasonable 86 degrees today. Quite funny, with all the leaves turning and the kids going to their cider mill field trip today!) and "time of the month." I can count on twice a month migraines now, at least. Sometimes more.

Before I started getting migraines, I admit, I was very unsympathetic to people who did. I mean... it's a headache. How bad can it be? You take some aspirin, maybe lay down for an hour. Don't be such a baby!

Ha. Karma wheel turns, see? It seems I'm now paying for my rather callous an uncompassionate view. Migraines don't just hurt. Migraines are evil incarnate running lose in your head. Imagine a giant pulling open your skull and squeezing your brain out of all its juices once every two minutes or so. For two days. Now times that by ten.

Yeah, I know, I'm such a baby.

I felt it coming on this morning. Michael and I were up too late, then Zoe got a bloody nose in the middle of the night (that's been happening out of nowhere lately) which meant more interrupted sleep, and I woke up feeling dizzy, head fuzzy, covered in sweat (we had the windows open then, but thankfully we didn't take the window air conditioner out of our room--it's on full blast now and I'm chilling, literally, in front of it!) and I just knew. Migraine's coming.

I get that Johnny Cash song in my head whenever I know it's on the way. Michael listens to him all the time, so I actually get Johnny Cash ear worms stuck in my head quite regularly. But one of his most famous songs, Folsum Prison Blues, is just so catchy, and fits nicely into my head just before the brain-squeezing giant arrives:

"Migraine a train's a comin

It's coming 'round the bend

I ain't gonna see the sunshine

Til I don't know when...

I'm stuck in Migraine Prison

And time keeps draggin' on..."

The thing about it is, I won't know if the medicine is going to work for a while. Migraines also come with nausea and sensitivity to light, so I'm often on my knees in front of the toilet bowl hoping I don't puke while digging through my purse, looking for my Great God Imitrex Fix. Once I've washed it down, then it's just a matter of waiting. Is that light at the end of the tunnel... or is it a train?

I hate it when it happens on visitation weekends, too. Poor Blake. He gets a drugged out, blind-with-pain mom to visit. How fun!? That's just what I was thinking this morning. I don't need this! Right. Like I ever need it? There's lots I'd rather be doing.

In fact, here are ten things I'd rather be doing instead of having a migraine today. Wish me luck.

1. I'd rather do childbirth again. All four times.



2. I'd rather clean the bathtub. With my tongue.



3. I'd rather have kidney stones. (Yes, I have had them, I do know how much they hurt.)



4. I'd rather have gall stones. (Yes, I've had those, too.)



5. I'd rather watch back to back three-day marathons of Family Matters and Full House.



6. I'd rather be on Fear Factor eating bull's testicles.



7. I'd rather be locked in a room with Anne Coulter and Bill O'Reilly.



8. I'd rather have sex with Newt Gingrich. (Wait... maybe not... well... it would be over quick, right?)



9. I'd rather have Gilbert Gottfried's voice in my head all day.



10. I'd rather read both K-Fed and Britney's biographies. Twice.

See! I told you they were bad.

Timing

So I'm paranoid and pick the kids up from the bus stop every day. It's not even a block. It's three houses. But around here, three houses seems like a long way.

When we lived in the suburbs, the kids played only in the backyard, because we lived on a pretty busy street. The cars flew down our street (and we had a school right across from us!) We had one of those speed capture things on our street practically once a month. Cops pulled people over all the time for speeding. But people still did it anyway.

Out here, though, while we have less vehicles, people actually go FASTER. Less traffic, more speed. They also don't stop at stop signs. Especially at night. They turn off their lights as they're coming to a stop sign, and if they don't see lights coming the other way? Well, they just keep going!

But even during the day, they go fast. And don't like to stop. And everyone out here owns a truck. So we're not talking little cars. These are BIG cars. One of these meets a five year old in the middle of an intersection, and it's just over.

In fact, enormous farm vehicles go down our street at least once a day. And when I say enormous... I mean, like, bigger than elephants. Like two elephants, maybe. I don't even know what these things are and definitely don't know what they do. I just know they're big, they're loud, and they go pretty darned fast for being so huge!

There's no sidewalks, the dirt roads are narrow, and I worry about the little ones making it home without going into the road. So I drive three houses down to the stop sign at the corner to pick them up. I know, how pathetic is that? I don't even walk... I DRIVE! I walked the first day, thinking I would teach them to walk home... but when Dmitri ran across the street to pet the neighbor's dog and Zoe tripped over a tree branch and fell into the road, I decided it wasn't the best idea in the world to let them walk yet.

The second day, though, Michael picked them up (I had a migraine and he happened to be home) and he drove down to the corner. The lightbulb went off in my head... hey! What a good idea! Granted, a lazy idea... but I'm all for lazy! So now I drive.

Only I never know when the bus is going to come for sure. They said at the school office the bus would be by at 3:30 p.m. But I waited and waited and they didn't show up until almost four! After a week of waiting there starting at 3:30 and waiting at least until 3:45 p.m. for the bus to show up, I finally started leaving later and getting there around 3:40. That seemed to work just fine.

Except the time, last week, when they called just as I was walking out the door to say, "The bus is waiting at the corner."

Wow. Now that's service. Boy, was my face red!

So yesterday, I pulled up and the bus was waiting there. At 3:40. Damn. My time gauge was clearly not working. So today, I left just a little bit earlier. When I pulled out into the road, I saw a bus in my rearview mirror. Which I thought was weird... because no school busses go down our road that I've ever seen? When I pulled over, the bus pulled up next to my van and sure enough... it was the kids' bus.

"We didn't have anyone else to drop off today," the bus driver said, pointing to the cross street. "So I was going to drop them in front of your house."

Doh! If I'd just waited a few more minutes! And... hey! They couldn't have called? What happened to that service?!

So I drove home (three whole houses) and stopped to pick up the mail (still in my car... I know I know, how lazy AM I, right?) where I found the second notice that the post office had attempted to deliver a package, registered mail from India (it's from Bookmooch) but I "wasn't home to accept it."

What!?!?

The ONLY time I left the house was the time it took to drive three houses away to pick up the kids from school! HOW could I have missed the postal carrier!? I didn't see the postal truck pass me, coming or going. (Out here, it's a red Ford F150 with an orange flag on the antennae. No, I'm not kidding.)

Out here, when there's a package, the postal carrier drives her truck up our driveway... and honks. She waits until I come out (so she doesn't have to get out of the truck... see, everyone out here is just as lazy as I am!) and then hands me the package and the rest of my mail. But I didn't hear anyone honk today?

The only thing I can imagine happened is she dropped off the mail and the notice in the scarce five minutes that I was down at the corner ushering kids into the car? Or... she shunted into another dimension to deliver the mail? Either way, the timing today just sucked!