You Can't Say We Missed Anything

To round out the week of winter excitement this morning we had Freezing Fog. We started out with a bit over 1/2 inch of ice, followed by about 2" of sleet mixed with freezing rain, followed up with 8" of snow (mixed with freezing rain), and this morning garnished with a bit of freezing fog. Freezing fog paints the edges of leaves with little point of frost, like frost on a window pane. It can really only build up like this when there is not wind. Considering that the default here in Oklahoma seems to be a 10 mile per hour "breeze" we don't get the full effect often. The fog has mostly lifted now, and light snow is falling. It rather gives the lie to the TV weather claims that our weather today is clearing and warming. No matter, by later this week we'll be back in the 50's with rain.

(Ice and) Snow Day

We're "enjoying" another round of dramatic winter weather this week. Yesterday we got freezing rain turning to sleet, and back to freezing rain. This morning we had light freezing rain changing to mostly snow mixed with a smidgen of the ever popular freezing rain. With the schedule of probable weather in mind, the office was scheduled to close yesterday at 2:00. Anyone with poor winter driving skills or easily terrified by other drivers was welcome to leave earlier. In OKC we changed over to sleet earlier than expected, so we "only" got about 1/2 inch of freezing rain. This was a total pain to get off of my car, but not enough to bring down many power lines or trees (YAY). One reason few trees are coming down in OKC is because we had a major ice storm two years ago and everything fragile broke off then. Just a little bit south of the metro area there was about 1 1/2 inches of ice, which was just devastating. Whole trees were taken down, and no one in Purcell has power. The roads all over the state are awful with trucks jackknifed and some stretches of I35 closed because of power lines coming down over the road. This morning I called the office hotline before I went out to start up my defroster so I'd be able to scrape my car. The announced status was that the office would be open, so out I went to do my duty. I had to go right back in to get the hair dryer so I could get into my car to start it. Once I got to work (only a little bit late) I was greeted with the information that the office was now closed. I got this information from a friend headed back to her car, but she got the information on her office email. GAH. As an example of how Oklahoma weather works, the high temperature Wednesday was 65.

It's a Good Thing She's Pretty

...because she is The Worst Dog Ever. As an act of protest when we left her at home while we went to Evil WalMart the Evil Wild Dog of the Prairie ATE A BOOK. Well, not the whole book. She ate the spine off of Open, the autobiography of Andre Agassi which Shana had been reading. No dog I have ever had has ever eaten a book. If Roxy was hoping I'd blame it on Skippy she's got another think coming because Skippy had almost no teeth. It was an ordinary hardback with no bacon slipped under the binding. Since I always have a large number of books about the place I am rather alarmed. Later in the day I pulled her happy butt out from under my bathroom sink where she was apparently searching for some suitable patent medicine for some undiagnosed condition. This morning she pulled an assortment of things from the surface of my craft desk. Of course it was only things of burning interest to most dogs: three wool pillow covers from Greece, a cookbook by Guy Fieri, and three vintage brooches. It is also clear that she had her head in my knitting bag, although the lack of alpaca therein must have been a grave disappointment. She didn't pull anything out of there. This time.

Christmas 2.0

One of the lovely gifts I got for Christmas 2009 was two skeins of fingering weight Surino (alpaca/merino) from Flaggy Meadow Fiber Works that Jennifer had purchased at some kind of festival in Georgia. I was thrilled that she had been thinking of me and selected such a perfect gift. I wanted to knit it up right away, and I did just that. I think the hat and mitts came out really cute, and used up nearly all of the delightful yarn. The hat is slouchy and quite honestly was kind of a pain to knit - most of it was 192 stitches around on #1 needles. It seemed like it was the same size after hours and hours of knitting. I did it using the Magic Loop to avoid dropped stitches at all costs. In stockinette every flaw shows, although the handspun nature of the yarn provides a little cover for minor discrepancies of tension.

The crafty spirit continues at home. Shana is honing her baking skills, and typically chose a very ambitious recipe to practice on. She made us an Italian cream cake with an orange curd filling and cream cheese frosting for Sunday dinner. It turned out beautifully and tasted just as good as it looked. The remains went to work with her the next day and disappeared down to the last crumb, with suitable compliments to the chef. I supplied very little help and advice on this one; she's getting much more comfortable with the baking process and her confidence is growing with every attempt.

I am adding a spam filtering strategy to my comments. Sadly, even bloggers like me who receive few comments get some spammy ones.

Just When I Think I've Seen Everything

This morning I walked into the kitchen as usual, and my eye was attracted to a sack of potatoes. Cancer Potatoes. Breast Cancer Potatoes. Apparently cancer sells in the same way sex sells. Disgusting.

Saturday in the First World

Alex and Vivian met me for dinner tonight at Jason's Deli and we had a nice visit, as always. Vivian was more interested in goofing around than in eating dinner, but that was fine with me because it's so much fun to hear her laugh. She's changing so fast now - wearing her Big Girl Pants and repeating everything she hears in complete sentences.

I've been having a week of pleasant expenditures. I

cashed in my Christmas gift certificate for a car detail today and ordered my Boston outerwear early in the week. I am anticipating the need for rubber wellies and a real winter coat for next fall/winter because Boston has a climate completely different from Oklahoma. You can manage for years in Oklahoma without any kind of waterproof footwear, and rare is the week even in the dead of winter when there is not at least one day over 50 degrees. I knew I'd need better gear, and I figured I could score a better deal ordering at the end of the winter sales season than I would waiting until I am in dire need. They arrived yesterday, and I think I will be able to walk around Boston in winter without freezing off any important part of my body.

I've also been knitting up some warm cozies for myself, partly just for the fun of it , and partly because I know I will need a few more warm garments for next year. So far I have only one pair of socks completed. I also knit a pair of mitts and a hat to match is on the needles. Jennifer treated me to some fingering weight alpaca/merino for Christmas and I've almost got it all knit up. Pictures will have to wait until it's all complete. The mitts went fast, but fingering weight on size 1 needles makes for a rather slow hat.

Like everyone else, I've been following the heartrending events in Haiti. My contribution went to Doctors Without Borders because they were already there for another mission and therefore in a position to put the money to work quickly, but I hope you will send what you can to any organization you feel comfortable with. While we sit here comfortably in our cozy homes worrying about our hairdos and digital toys lots of people in the world are doing without basic needs.