Tuesday, December 11, 2007

48 hours of pure hell and an ice storm.

Hey there. Perhaps you have read of my plight. I think it's been a leading story on cnn.com, so that means it's a big deal. Yesterday, I awoke to the strange combination of snapping trees, thunder and sizzling power lines. A veritable winter symphony that Dickens himself couldn't have better written. Or something. A few hours later, the power finally went out. You were right Mike Mitchell England (only funny to native Oklahomans, apologies, also, it might not be funny to them either). Shain (for his version, click HERE) forged a path across town amidst tree debris and stoplightless traffic (what's so tough to understand about a four-way stop people?) to pick me up so we could do important things like seek out coffee, pastry and toilet paper. Shain chose to dress for the occasion by wearing a freshly pressed white button down oxford, pin-striped mid-weight pants and shined dress shoes. With no real coat - some puffy thing he claims he got in Prague or some bullshit. Business homeless chic, I say. (I had on fleece upon fleece, mittens, scarf, heavy coat, etc - like a normal person.) Anyway, we make our way to SuperTarget where in addition to toilet paper, I remember my mom has requested hot dogs in the event she was able to start a fire in our fireplace. I left her as she was frantically tearing pages out of our second copy of The Riverside Shakespeare to use as kindling, so I was skeptical. Turns out it didn't matter as all that was left on the shelves turned out to be pepperoni. Mmm. After my superhappyfuntime with Shain, I spent some superhappyfuntime with my fam in the dark. We only had scented candles. Our living room rivaled my brief stint trapped in a ventless office at Yankee Candle Co. headquarters. Ugh. However, power was returned and I finally succumbed to the migraine graciously supplied by my mother and went to bed retardedly early beneath a pile of quilts and a dog. I awoke this morning to a bevy of texts from my workstudies happily alerting me that XXX had no power. No school! Yay! I went back to sleep and continued to drool while dreaming about appearing on The Barefoot Contessa. I wish I were kidding. Work's back on for tomorrow, but after almost 48 solid hours of family time, I couldn't be happier.


That's the sadness that is my backyard and a tree that used to be more complete. It continued cracking and breaking all day till there's not a lot left.

Close up of crunchy, frozen grass. But I finally got to break out my Montrails and clomp around just like the old days of New England!




More tree sadness. And my neighborhood was pretty fortunate in that it's a cheap, newish subdivision with no real trees, just crap Bradford pears that snap like my mom when she misses her 4pm snack.

Hey, yeah, I'll just run out and grab something from the store. NOT! That's probably 1.5 inches of ice encasing my car, folks.

Hmm. Pepperoni or pepperoni? I just don't know!

Ice encapsulated holly. Pretty. Sort of.

Music for winter misery:
All That I Want - The Weepies
Cold December - Matt Costa
Sister Winter - Sufjan Stevens

24 comments:

Mr. Shain said...

i'm glad things worked out for the bee-spot family. i'm also a little sad for you that no one comments on your blog anymore. but i'm also a little happy about that i'll admit.

blythe said...

i know. either everyone hates me or i need to learn to not quantify my reading public's love in the form of comments. or this post just sucked.

Colleen said...

Cool! So this is how readers feel when I detail crappy things I go through here! I had no idea that was going on. I should like watch the news and stuff.
It looks pretty from afar if you dont' have to deal with it.

Anonymous said...

My fam went through the ice storm troubles in SE KS and southern MO, too. Ice on the trees = pretty. Driving on ice because I work where it can never close = not pretty

John said...

Wow, great pictures. I'm amazed at how cleaned out the Target is; and why did they only leave pepperonis? You'd think they'd have left other equally unsuitable winter supplies (e.g., tartar sauce, bacon bits).

blythe said...

colleen - you guys are having record warmth, right? this is the beginning of the end... i think it's all related to the BCS personally. LSU...

SRU - you had to go out in this? wha? be careful!

john - yeah, it was totally bizarro target world. also, a salad of bacon bits, pepperoni and tartar sauce would've sounded so god late monday. mmm.

Christopher said...

A certain area university which shall remain nameless is expecting me to use my accrued leave time for missing yesterday. And by "missing" I mean "showing up to work 15 minutes early, finding the building without power, braving the cold and climbing the creepy dark stairs with a maglite, and leaving a note that I came by and to call my cell phone if the power came back on." Not to mention removing the fallen tree that was blocking my car in the driveway, and risking life and property on the aforementioned traffic-lightless streets.

blythe said...

chris - turdfaces! i went to campus corner stupidly yesterday to do some shopping. no such luck. i can't believe they made you guys go, then take vacation! oh, the ways of higher ed. you know, nps is out for day 3 now. our fellow yearbooker (if this is the christopher i think it is) has been without for over 48 hours now. not funny anymore. poor kid. i almost feel sorry for him.

JHC said...

Hey, sorry about the ice storm. I guess I shouldn't have been complaining when I didn't even lose power. It's just that your problems didn't affect me, so I really didn't care about them. Anyway, enough about you.
I see that your poll is closed and I never voted. Since it ended in a tie, I was wondering if I could cast the deciding vote?

blythe said...

jhc - ah. a little vintage jebus. i missed you. sort of. in the meantime, of course you may cast the deciding vote.

blythe said...

and also, no one likes my new header? i thought it was nice for winter. fine.

JHC said...

I quite enjoyed the new header.

Potato Gratin. That is of course if you like your co-workers. Otherwise, go with the flask and give them the gift of drunken holiday honesty my family so adores.

d said...

ok. i was JUST going to say that i love the new photo in the header, but now i'm not going to, 'cause it'll just look like i'm sucking up or something. and lord knows you don't need any more people kissing your ass.

i've been wondering why my parents aren't responding to my e-mails. now i know it's because they're most likely without power. NOT that they don't love me anymore.

The Jersey Tongue said...

I am so glad to find that this site isn't another plug for the Bee Movie. It's strange how something so deadly and dangerous can also look so beautiful--that holly pic was especially pretty. Not so much the car, though. Sorry about that one.

Mr. Shain said...

that's awesome how everyone likes your new banner (the picture i took of you). and it's so nice that you told everyone how i took it and what a great photographer you think i am. you're swell.

JHC said...

I don't think everyone likes it, Shain, and I got called an ass kisser for my compliment. Since it's not a self-portrait, I just assumed you were the photographer, so techincally, I was complimenting you. If only you were given grace commensurate with your eye.
Sad.

Dan Nolan said...

I really need to start watching the news. I had no idea my okie peops were in such peril.

blythe said...

hey turdsandwich/shain - i posted the link to your page with the photo i stole, i figured kids would follow along. i love the picture! and you're right, your camera is waaaaay better than mine. now, send me the rest! it's not like you don't have electricity or something... do you smell yet?

Michael5000 said...

I will formally go on record as liking the new header. It's very jaunty and seasonal.

Geez, so needy...

blythe said...

you guys finally get it! need-spot.

i was just needing a change, but i thought i'd made a bad choice. like when i decided to get side sweeping bangs. fine. i need reassurance sometimes. and you kids don't? right... fine. maybe you are normal.

ellekinzy said...

coming from someone who used to live in norman, that pic of an almost-empty super target gave me the major creeps. that shit ain't right...

ellekinzy said...

coming from someone who used to live in norman, that pic of an almost-empty super target gave me the major creeps. that shit ain't right...

G said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
JHC said...

zing?