Good God, The SNOW

What a weekend folks. I mean seriously, a banner few days for me. Try to keep up, will you? And also, don't be jealous.

As I type this, we aren't even really midway through January, but we've had multiple snow storms, 2 of which have been isolated to the last 48 hours or so and have accumulated well over a foot of snow on the streets of our frozen neighborhood.

Wow, I'm going to have to get creative to urge myself through this winter (by my count, at least 3 more full months to go) without resorting to drinking. Heavily. Or drugs - only kidding. Sort of.

A summary for your reading pleasure:

Friday - all day:

The final day to the longest, most stress ridden week of work I can recall in quite some time. The plans, the conference calls, the meetings, the sheer LENGTH of my to-do list. And the emails...oh my GOD, the emails. I finally make it through the day and stumble out the door to realize that phase 2 of this snow storm (I didn't even TELL you about Thursday, the snow, the sub-zero temps, the commute via public transportation on Friday) had set in with a vengeance. I could not face the el. No way in frozen over hell. So I grabbed a cab and tried to keep up with the stream of emails still steadily hitting my blackberry. I got a little nauseous from reading/typing in the cab. My cab driver was wrapped in a blanket - almost swaddled. I found this exceptionally odd, but whatever. Just get. me. home. PLEASE.

Friday - evening/night:

Emails and work stuff continued until nearly 11, mixed in with movies on tv, playing with the pups and getting creative with dinner (as in a baked potato and black beans). The snow was still falling. HARD. ALOT. Took the boys out one final time and all 3 of us were snow covered when we returned indoors. Climbed into bed and fell asleep watching Sex and the City.

Saturday - a.m.:

awoke to a complete white out. Had to dig my shovel out so that I could dig a path out of our house. As a special twist, I awoke to cold sores so needed to make a trip to CVS STAT. Finally got the boys to potty (after digging a space for them to do so) and after feeding them breakfast, I set out to attempt to uncover our vehicle. This was comical. I am 5'4" if I'm an inch, and the snow in the driveway was just below my knees in some places. I scraped and shoveled and climbed and slipped until I could at least see out the windows. One really positive note: that Jeep is awesome. Drove over more than a foot of snow like it was a sprinkling of sugar.

Saturday - later a.m.:

Returned from CVS, did a little light cleaning, more work stuff, caught up with fiercely neglected feeds, played with the pups, watched the snow continue to fall.

Saturday - afternoonish:

Headed downtown for a haircut I scheduled several weeks ago. Contemplated cancelling, but man, I needed a haircut. Braved the train, nearly froze to death on the platform, was covered in snow and soaking, but only on my outer layer (God, I love you North Face). Enjoyed a not too crowded train ride downtown to my latest ipod soundtrack. Got off train downtown, walked out of the station, and promptly entered hell. Of the frozen variety. Walked the only way I could - head down, one arm out to warn me of incoming obstacles. Wondered multiple times who would live here of their own free will. Emailed my husband (in Vermont) asking him just that. 

Saturday - later afternoon:

Left salon after a nice catch up with my stylist and trying not to smack 2 girls in a heated debate with THEIR stylist over their certainty that "deployed" and "deported" mean the same thing. Seriously? Knew in an instant I was not fighting the train. Stumbled to the corner, kept head down and just stuck up my right arm without even looking to see if cabs were coming. The heavens took mercy on me and a cab appeared at the curb within minutes. Got home and googled condos in California and looked through old photos from California.

The rest: ordered pizza, watched movies, did some work, ate almost the whole pizza, went to bed.

Sunday: pretty much a repeat of Saturday except the snow. finally. stopped. And I was able to dig out the car and do a couple of errands in between more work. But Internet, as I type this, it is snowing again. I kid you not. Oh, and I ate the rest of the pizza.

Lest you think I am being overly dramatic, some photographic documentation to support my story follows. As this is only a brief sampling (and I'm incapable of taking less than 100 photos since getting my fancy new camera), you can find more photographic evidence here. Enjoy.

Send sunshine and wine. Lots of wine.

this is on our top deck. put on the hunter boots and stepped out - this is how far up the snow came:

both boots in the path i shoveled on the deck
a snow covered Jack says "oh HELL NO" and bolts back inside
the boys ventured out (tentatively) when I shoveled the path. you can see that the snow is literally taller than they are (not that they are extraordinarily tall...)
the deck pre-shoveling