white christmas

and in my not so humble opinion... it's highly over-rated!  there's at least 18 inches of it on the ground and more was drifting down from the sky when i got up this a.m.  At this point i've lost track of how long this weather event has been happening.... and how many times we've lost electricity, how many times it's come back on for how many short periods of time.  in other words i'm awfully damn tired of it.  i think probably even the weather forecasting guys have lost their enthusiasm for it.  i do get a laugh at how excited and into it they get when there is a "big weather event"!  but... enough already.

and all of this being snowed in for probably 2 weeks, and reaching serious cabin fever state has given me pause (i love that expression).  this was by far the strangest xmas day i've ever had... nothing bad in the whole scheme of the world... just unusual and strange.  i really missed the ritual and the usual conveniences (like electric power, for instance)... and most of all i missed spending the day preparing for the big gathering of the tribe, and their arrival, and the excitement of the kids.  i miss the kids and the mayhem and chaos and flying wrapping paper.  i had plenty to eat... warmed up on the woodstove left-over soup was tasty, i was warm enough,  and had a couple of gifts for Jim tho there are several still out there somewhere that the USPS and UPS haven't been able to deliver yet.  And i felt so bad for my dad.  when i called to wish him a merry xmas, he wasn't quite sure that today was the 25th.  sounded like life was very quiet and lonely at his assisted living place and not a thing i could do about it.  all i could do was assure him that a warming up is coming and i'm hoping for/planning on being able to get out of here by monday and i'll see him then!  

I talked to Chris and Kate while we still had power (and phone!) and they're very snowed in also!  mostly, it's quite lovely to live in a rural area with space and nature all around... but there are times when it's a pain in the ass.  but in the end, the lovely outweighs the pain.

and the dogs LOVE the snow (Huskies are like that).  this being a dome house, the accumulated snow finally slides off the roof into huge piles and there's a big hill of snow in their play yard. when i let them out there today, Meika went charging to the top of the hill and challenged Tasha with a bark and that stance that means "come on and play".  Tasha took the bait and they were off, with wrestling and racing around and charging back up the hill o' snow til they were both grinning and panting!  looked like great fun!!

winter solstice

and we celebrate the coming of the light and longer days.  and here's the irony of the day... it's the longest night of the year, right?  our power went off at 3p.m.... meaning there was about 1 hour left of semi-daylight ("semi" because the sky was dark grey with snow clouds), making this certainly and literally the longest night of our year!  so, jim went out into the 12 or 14" of snow to bring in some firewood for the woodstove so we'd at least have heat, then built a warm and lovely fire, and i brought out a futon and quilts and pillows for naps in front of the fire (our living room is pretty sparse since we started - ummm - downsizing in preparation for moving).  we had pretty well resigned ourselves to being powerless... and lo and behold, after just 3 hours.. the power came back!!!!  and this is quite ok with me.  i'm totally happy with humming along to the not-so-longest night of the year.

i'm wishing everyone a bright and warm winter solstice, and joy as you dance naked around the bonfire.

it keeps on coming

just because it's there, i took some photos of the snow today!  there should be some lovely photo ops in the next few days... when we get more snow and then freezing rain.  it is just beautiful how it coats the trees and is all sparkley... and then the branches break and take down the power lines... and then we have no electricity or phone.  any guesses where i'd rather be right now?  like where the temperature is in the high 60s and it might be raining, but it's WARM dammit!
this is the view out the living room window.

life

well, my macbook had its hard drive replaced, i had to stop feeling smug about having back up for all but the 2 months i was in Crete, all that back up doesn't seem to be available to transfer onto this empty macbook, after a couple of days back and forth to the mac store (45 min. each way and dealing with parking lots FULL of frantic people out shopping like crazy) i just gave up on transferring anything and started rebuilding my address book and book marks etc.  (do i get the prize for the longest run-on sentence???)

we have been snowed/frozen in for about 4 or 5 days, which doesn't really bother me much as i'm into a kind of hermit mood.  Jim got the snow tires on the little truck and made the adventurous trip to Banks to the supermarket and post office... with no problems.  so, really we haven't been totally house-bound.  it warmed up enough today to begin the melting process, and then the temp started the downward dive again heading for 18F tonight.  sure do hope the UPS guy makes it up the hills in the next couple of days.  i'm still expecting 4 more shipments of holiday online shopping goodies.  hoping that the warm comes back in the next week so the tribe can come for the big turkey dinner on friday.

haven't even got any photos to put here... quite pathetic really.  but i did finish a hat and a pair of mitts in the past few days.  maybe i'll take photos tomorrow.

partying in Vamos

to celebrate our 30th wedding anniversary on november 23, we had a PARTY and invited a bunch of our friends.  we must have had good karma going, as the weather was mild and dry and most of the partying happened on the porch, leaving the whole kitchen free for dancing (Greek and Albanian dances).  there was lots of food and wine and raki and fun til quite late!  and again, there was an international group of people there... Dutch, French, Syrian, Albanian, Cretan... and all of them, by the way, were most happy for us and the whole planet that Barack Obama will be our new president!!!  bravo!

into december

and a lot has happened since that last post of november 21... beginning with the work stoppage of my beloved macbook.  yes, i know, macs don't crash. at least that's what i thought, but sadly it was true and now it has a new harddrive... a few days before the 1 year warranty expired.  it was one of my first adventures after returning home, following the trip to costco on a saturday (eeeekk) to replace the tv set which made popping noises when turned on and then started smoking.  oh, yeah, then there was the trip to the ER at St.Vincent Hospital where the ambulance took my dad straight from tgiving dinner at Bud's.  Pop stayed overnight for observation (he'd passed out at the dinner table and was unresponsive for 8 minutes) (thankfully, there were 2 nurses in attendance!!) and he was discharged the next day and seems to be back to his "normal".  we got the dogs back from boarding kennel and they were uncharacteristically quiet for a couple of days... maybe fearing they'd have to go back to doggie camp if they made any noise.  i'm happy to say they are back to normal now, and as usual,

Meika is projectile shedding everwhere she goes.... normal.

it was 70s F. when we left Crete and it's freezing here.  nothing more to say about that.