Storm Cancells 2009!

One more day of 2008: We are in the midst of a classic coastal blizzard. Its now 20 degrees out, blowing 30mph and snowing like a bastid'. Its supposed to go down to the single digits overnight and the wind is supposed to pick up to 50 to 60 mph. Cool storm, BUT, I just heard on the radio that the town of Chatham has cancelled it's New Year's Eve celebration. Us too. For our small group of friends, those of us who were going to gather at Keith and Evangelina's, we put 2009 on hold. We'll all wait a day to ring it in. Single Digits! That reminds me... I better bring in the beer and the Cristalino. I stuck it in a snowbank when I got home from work (the drive took me almost two hours). At that point it still we were still planning on going out.

Will Cuts a Tooth: It's been a big couple days for Will. He got home from his 4-month doctor's appointment with the blessing to go ahead and eat real food. Yesterday, he ate his first rice cereal, sitting in his highchair and a day later, that's today, on New Year's Eve, he cut his first tooth! He also is trying to learn to put himself to bed. It's a horror show. He's not happy now and I'm going to go help him out...

Running Again

On Friday, we hit 45 degrees and I've been feeling pretty much like an old shut-in vampire for the last two weeks. So, I got out and ran. I think I went about 5 miles: From the house, I went down Main St. to Paynes Creek Beach (~1.5mi), then over sand to Saint's Landing (1 mi), up Robbins Hill Rd, down Lower, then up Swamp, back to Main to Alden (1.25 mi), then up Alden (with it's nasty hill) to Tubman, and back to our house. (1.25 mi). I had planned on only going out for 3 miles, but it was so nice I just kept going. Now... I'm feeling the pain.

It's been a relaxing 4 days . I'm glad I took Friday off. Now Monday looms. Tomorrow, while Chase is skiing... I'll be back at the desk.... ugh. (Will you be getting some footage chase? I saw a helmet cam mount on E-bay)

A Snow Day - Lucky Kids

The kids had a snow day today (Friday). I'm not sure what kid is whispering in the right ear but there was NO snow. Not a bit. It was barely even a cloudy sky. It was, however a beautiful sunrise with lots of RED in it, so maybe the decision maker was a sailor... "Red sky in the morning sailors take warning..." At any rate, as we waited for the bus that never showed (on dry pavement), our neighbor pulled up in his car on his way to work. "You know there's no school today." he said. The kids went bananas and it was even exciting for me. I love a good storm.

Well, it took all day before the first flake fell, and the kids certainly could have gotten in a school day in. Huh... in Rockport, we used to have to have a good 8 inches AT LEAST on the ground at daybreak before they even thought about calling off school...

(This is where the power went out last night, and killed my computer. - I finally got the pc running again. I'm not sure if I dare turn it off again though)

So, to finish my thoughts from last night...

Good for the decision makers! It was always so exciting to get a snow day. Thanks to the guy who said... ah what the heck, it's Friday... give the kids the day off. And they did! What a thrill.

We finally did get our snow. A lot of it, starting around 2:30 in the afternoon. The heavy stuff, and it pulled a wire down somewhere. Our power was only out for an hour I hear. I don't know. I took the opportunity to go to bed after lamplight card writing became too much of a pain in the ass. Power to Abe Lincoln!

Christmas Decorating - "Oh Joy!"

Every year I hang a very simple line of fake evergreen swag adorned with tiny white lights. At each hook, there is a red bow. It usually looks pretty good and has just enough holiday tackiness to save me from looking like I was really trying to make it look good. This year, just after I got home from the dump, I couldn't find my bag of "ready to go" decoration. I looked all over and even found a bag marked "Outside Lights." This bag, I'm now realizing must have been marked from a previous year and stuffed with something else. At any rate, the swag is gone. I'm all but certain that it went into the bottom of the transfer truck's bin. 40 feet of lights, swag and bows, not to mention all the sanity that slipped away with it while I was searching for it...

So, this year there will be no swag. Oh well. I put up the remaining lights around the edge of the new porch and put two more strands on the bushes outside the front door. I even hung the REAL clippings from the bottom of our Christmas tree under the garage lights, but Amy told me I should take them down. "Don't overdo it" she said. And one look around at my make-shift second-"string" plan with it's sparse glow and wires all over the place and I knew she was right.

Remembering (Great) Grandma Merrill

This is a photo of Great Grandma and Great Grandpa (Kay and Arthur Merrill) at Cape Hedge Beach in Rockport. It was taken in July of 1938. They are the two that are sitting up toward the right side of the photo. Grandma died last week at 94 and we will all miss her very much. She always had a big smile on her face and loved to see her kids, grandkids, and 11 great grandchildren. I'll always remember that smile, and sitting with her looking through one of her many photo books(all way out of any chronological order.) Sometimes my kids would be wedged in between us, sometimes it would be just Amy and me; sometimes just me. She'd pick out a photos from somewhere in the middle of the book and captivatingly tell us the story of it. Sometimes she'd get to laughing so hard she would have to stop talking.

Hey Rockporters... Where's the Madras Shop?

In case you didn't know, the old Madras Shop is GONE! Yup, they finally tore it down to make way for the new Symphony Hall. Kind of cool to see the empty lot. Imagine what the whole street looked like at one point. (click the image for a bigger view)