Monday, December 20, 2010

Snow, What's Up?

I missed my knitting group Saturday morning but was in town in time for my book club luncheon. I think I'd have done it all, but the weather was still nasty. I really wanted to see Alexia's first ballet recital in the evening and that would have been a pretty long day. She is on the left with the arm action, which probably reflects her mother's belly dance teaching more than her ballet teacher.
She is the tall blonde, third from the right, and you can see that she's very serious about dance. I was worried about driving conditions after dark and freezing and almost came home, but I'm glad I stayed.

I talked to Ian just as the recital had ended. I was standing in the parking lot, in the rain because it's where I could get a signal. He said they were all gathering for Eve's memorial and it was raining miserably. I told him I was upset, my iPod had died that day, granted it's five years old. I need it for music and podcasts when I'm on the road. They keep me awake and alert while I'm driving since radio reception is so poor. I was semi frantic, and he passed the phone around the room so I got advice on what iPod to buy from multiple family members. Even though I was just a couple of miles from the Apple store, which is an hour from my house, the difficulty of driving in drenching rain and my confusion on what to buy, magnified by my hunger - well, I went home, got some food on the way and still haven't decided what to buy. The Touch is tempting but so is a 160 gig iPod. Thoughts???
I took a picture for my weather photo-
journal yesterday. At this point the rain had fallen for over 24 hours and collecting because the yard is saturated. This is the desert and were we not on a mountain, this would be terrible.
My poor plants are literally floating, and it's a sopping mess in the llama shed. Ian put on replacement shingles lost in the last storm or it would be even worse. He set up a berm to keep water from flowing into the shed, but anywhere it's flat, it's wet. Zaria was so happy to see me yesterday, Ms Aloof. She raced up and was eating the hay before I could even get to the feeder. She looks like a very tall drowned rat. It amazes me that underneath next to her skin she is warm and dry. Magnificent odd creatures.

I was knitting on Alexia's jackalope, which requires intense concentration, and when I looked up about 45 minutes later, it was snowing. Thus this photo.
The flakes were huge and poor Eddie, who had needed a potty break, came back in looking like this. I toweled him off but he was one miserable boy. He seemed to feel insulted and humiliated, all at the same time. The black is supposed to be black, not speckled.
So this is how today's photo-
journal picture appears. There was lots of shoveling in my morning and the bird feeders were empty. I hadn't planned to fill them, but the desperate birds were rather pathetic and I felt guity so I filled them back up.
You have to admit that when the storm is over, it's awfully pretty. Maybe my opinion is skewed since I haven't seen this view stormless in a week or two. It's a cloudless night, which is gorgeous in the full moon, also frigid. I'm hoping to catch a glimpse of the lunar eclipse.

This is the jackalope, to date. There are an insane number of hours invested in this silly project, and as difficult as it is, it's also oddly satisfying. The instructions are spot on so I just keep knitting and things shape up. It's like knitting a puzzle. I missed something though and got the foot on upside down. I only need to rip back to the ankle and I know what to do to get it done right.

Snow shoveling has taken a chunk of my knitting time, but Ian got in tonight after 6:00 so all chores revert to him. He left SIL Rochelle's in Redlands (SoCal) at 9:00 this morning, and called me from the Ontario airport to say he and cousin Greg had the same flight to Las Vegas. He said he'd call again when he got to Las Vegas. The next time he called it was from Ontario to say that the plane had been returned to the terminal because the Las Vegas airport was closed, due to flooding.That was a long day for him. Rochelle called after he was asleep to be sure he had gotten in okay. She said it has rained so much in SoCal that her pool is flooded. I believe in global warming and climate change. Where is this headed??!!

9 comments:

Theresa said...

Our rain turned to snow too, thankfully. Th ground has firmed up again and life is good in horse paddock land. I can certainly identify with the mud problem. We had 5 months of it last winter. They did say it was going to be wetter than average this year, El Nino year?
Looks like a wonderful ballet event, certainly worth staying in town for! Glad Ian made it home. Flight delays are a bugger.

Jody said...

Your desert like landscape is beautiful with the snow.
Ahhhh...those little dancers are so adorable in their costumes. Lexi is so very cute :-)

Nina said...

The winterscape with the snow and sunshine is incredible. How lucky to have views like that. I love the jackalope colour. Brilliant choice!

Annie said...

We're still having snow here, too... It looks pretty, but especially from behind the windows. Not much fun having to go somewhere on slippery roads!

Carolyn Jean Thompson said...

Cute little hula dancer!

~~Sittin.n.Spinnin said...

You're lucky you had clear skys, last night it was cloudy and you could just barely tell where the moon was :(
Did you get to see it?
And of course, it is clear as a bell out there today, maybe there's a white Christmas in our future? :)

Marion B. said...

Glad for you that things turned 'normal' again hihi.
I think, when I had to buy again, I'd go for the Ipod Touch, with as much GB as I could afford. But I like all the gadgets that comes with it. If it were only for the 'sound' I'd go for the 160 GB because I also like having all my music, audiobooks and podcast with me. Does that make things easier :-) (you can read ebooks as well on a Touch.........)

The girls are lovely and so nice that you were there. I'm sure she'll remember that.

We still have snow, which is a rare thing in THe Netherlands, two winters in a row. It feels like a 'Anton Pieck' winter. http://www.antonpieck.nl/

Have a nice day.

Marion B. said...

With 'normal' I ment the weather.

Leigh said...

Alexia is so cute! I just love those ballet recitals. Brings back memories of DD's class in circus poodle costumes.

I just bought Dan a Sandisk Sansa Clip+ for Christmas. Being over the road so much, I really wanted him to have the music and books to listen too. Mine is 8 gbs with a slot for an expansion card. Originally I was going to get an iPod because I didn't know there was anything else out there. Of course, I have Linux, so that's a consideration. The Sansa Clip+ was very reasonable and I don't have to subscribe to iTunes, which is freeing. My only "problem" with it is that I don't know how to organize things on it. I worked for two days and still had an organization fail. I suppose I'll figure it out eventually, *sigh.

I wish I'd hopped in on Benita's photography challenge. Your photos look great!