Old Man Winter Continues to Be a Pest!

Notice the depth of snow in my backyard. If you look closely, you can see Nels' footprints.

Today I stayed home from church and watched the service online. The weather stinks! We're having a ground blizzard – new snow last night and strong winds today. Right now it is 3 degrees above zero, with a wind chill of minus 14 and dropping. Predictions for later tonight and tomorrow are anywhere between 20 - 25 below zero, with a possible wind chill of minus 50. Some schools have already been closed for tomorrow, including Rochester and Austin. The Minneapolis announcement will come no later than 6 pm today.

Tomorrow my sister leaves for Arizona for a three week stay. Lucky her!

Happy 13th Anniversary to Me!

 

Today marks my 13th anniversary with BHP—the publishing house where I work.

 

The 22^nd of January was a Monday when I started. I had just come back from a one week vacation from seeing Heidi down in Baton Rouge, Louisiana (that’s where she lived for three years prior to moving to Seattle). I had two cats then: a black one named Shadow and a pure white one with a big tail like Nels has, named Sebastian. I just loved Sebastian (Shadow was Heidi’s cat, and she was nice, too). The night I got back, I looked at Sebastian and thought his mouth looked funny – like he had a pink button he was chewing on with part of it sticking out. Well, that wasn’t it at all – it was his swollen gum! So I started my new job the next morning. At noon I ran Sebastian to the vet and they said he had gingivitis. They put him under and cleaned his teeth real good. He also had a little ear infection. I picked him up later that evening and was given oil to put in his ears a couple of times a day and a pill to shove down his throat.

Well, both cats slept on my bed that night – per usual. They were so glad to have me home again. While I was getting ready for work on Tuesday morning, I put the oil in Sebastian’s ear and shoved the pill into his throat. Within seconds he started to wheeze. I tried to get him to drink water, but he wouldn’t. So I called the vet’s emergency number. The person who answered told me to bring him in right away. I hurried dressing and got him into the car and drove to the clinic – not far away. They told me to leave him and I said I would come to check on him at noon. Well, around 10:30 they called and said I should come back as soon as possible, which I did. I was told to go into the room where the veterinarian was working on him — patting him on the back and giving him mouth to nose resuscitation. She told me the pill had gotten ingested into his lungs and he had chemical pneumonia. She tried and tried to help him breathe, but to no avail. She finally handed him to me and told me to cuddle him because he wasn’t going to make it. That was really hard on me! I hated losing him, and felt so bad on my second day of my new job.

I didn’t return to work that day, but went the next – Wednesday. On my desk was a beautiful china tea cup with flowers in it and a nice card. Another co-worker later that day gave me a beautiful book about a cat. I’ll never forget how nice they were to me. My, that seems like a life time ago. Where were you 13 years ago?

Felix Play Date

Over a week ago I made a date to have Felix play at my house today. Wouldn't you know it? We got about 5 new inches of snow overnight. Knowing it would probably be awhile before our snow removal service would show up, I got dressed for the outdoors and began shoveling because I didn't want Peder or Sarah to get stuck in our parking lot. It took me about 45 minutes to shovel all of the sidewalk out to my garage and my entire driveway.

After this labor, I was tired—and hungry. While eating some toast with a cup of hot chocolate, I noticed snow coming off the top of the next door building. What in the world? Has the wind come up, or what? Checking closer, I discovered there were men on top of the building, shoveling off the snow. I have never seen this at my home before.

Aurelia and Peder coming up the walk

Aurelia and Leo

Felix taking his turn on the Amish stool

These days Aurelia is into posing.

After the family left, Felix had fun playing with some of my toys.

I believe he had a good time here!

Record Cold

This photo about sums it up. Yes, it is wickedly cold here in Minnesota, and has been for the past several days. On Friday the Governor officially closed all of the schools in our state for today, and I have just read that the Minneapolis schools will be closed again tomorrow. This below zero stuff is to last until Wednesday when our high is predicted to reach 4 degrees.

It's not just the below zero temperatures that are the problem. It's the added windchill. At the time I walked to my garage this morning, the wind chill was reported to be –55 degrees! That means bare skin can freeze in a matter of 5 minutes. Since I live so close to the office, I drove an extra 3 miles out of my way just to get my car warmed up a bit.

We're not alone in this. My dear cousins and Aunt Ginny and Uncle Allan in the Chicago and NW Indiana area are dealing with this, too, plus they have many, many inches of fresh snow. Thankfully it sounds like they are all hunkered down and safe inside their respective homes.

I'm really having a hard time with being envious of my cousins Pat and Pudge who are enjoying the lovely temperatures in Arizona right now. According to the Internet, the temperature high for today will be 69 degrees—that's ABOVE zero!