Blizzard of '08

Well folks, we survived the blizzard of '08. It snowed buckets and broomsticks. The official report for the nearest large town was 13 inches. We actually got someplace between 15" and 18" of snow in about 36 hours. Quite the blizzard for these parts. We will be digging out for a few days to come. The road crews are still on highway and state rt. level for there clean up. They haven't yet started on secondary streets so it might be Monday before they ever plow the subdivisions and back roads. I was able to get out for a few blocks to run to UDF and buy Skoal and diet coke, the important thing. Actually, truth be known, I just wanted to go play in it on the roads for a short trip. The snow on the roads had not been plowed at all but a neighbor with a kick but monster truck left some king size ruts for the rest of us to follow in and get out. It was a lot of fun, if only for a few minutes. The neighbor kids did my driveway for me, twice, and kids and adults have been playing in the front yards and streets so the view out the front window is just kinda messy. The view out the back window is beautiful and pristine with undisturbed blankets of snow covering everything. I mention the front being messy for a reason. I need to relate to you what my daughter Gracie (she is 4 remember) had to say to me a little while ago.

Gracie has just finished cleaning her play room. Cleaning is not one of her favorite activities to participate in. It ranks just above being constipated for her. She whined a bit, cried a bit but after a long while, she was done. She then came down and wanted to help daddy with his project. I was reorganizing the coat closet in the living room. She helps me by dragging everything out of the bottom of the closet and piling it in the middle of the floor. She then looks at the mess and says, "look daddy, you have a big ol' mess, you made it and now you better clean it up." I assured her that my every intention was to clean up my mess. She then waltzes over to the window and says, "daddy, who put all that snow out there?

I answer, " no body put it out there sweety, snow falls from the sky, its just another one of God's beautiful creations"

she then replies," Well, its a mess out there, if Jesus made that mess, is He gonna clean it up"

Okay, it took me a minute to recover before I could answer that one. But once I regained my composure I did answer.

"Yes sweety, he will send the sun and some warm weather to clean it all up for us"

she just said, "oh" and moved on.

Oh to have the understandings and viewpoints of a child. It is priceless. For they are truly the greatest in heaven.

Snow

So today it snows, not a huge thing in Ohio I wouldn't think, but this is the Cincinnati area we are talking about. Now, to give the people their due, we are projected to get 12-15 inches of snow in a 48 hour period. Again, this is not a big deal for most places, but at 15 inches we would surpass the yearly snowfall of most of the last 10 years. This is cause for a little bit of concern, maybe an extra mention of it on the nightly news. Maybe even cause for a ticker to run across the bottom of the network channels to keep us informed of things that might be closing early or meetings that might be cancelled. But, in case I forgot to mention it, this is the Cincinnati area. What that means, for those not familiar with the area, is that no person, reporter, or any living creature has ever seen snow before. Nobody can drive in it, nobody know just what think about it, nobody knows what to do now. The collective conscious of the entire region goes into a panic. The mantra becomes, "the white death is upon us" It doesn't matter if it snowed last week, nobody has ever seen the stuff before. So, please indulge me whilst I make fun of were I live.

"Did you here the latest news report about the weather forecast. NORAD (actually its NOAH) is calling for up to a foot of snow by dawn. We gotta go to the store and buy bread and milk before its all gone, we could be hold up in here for days, weeks even. Did you remember to restock the crackers and canned beets in the basement? The ones we used for thanksgiving. Never mind, I will get some extra at the store if its not all gone yet. The shelves might be gittin' kinda bare by the time I get there, I better hurry. Do we have batteries for the flashlight and the transistor radio down there? You get the kids down stairs and take some extra blankets and water, I will get off to the store. If I don't make it back, remember, I love you, and the little one, but don't re-marry or I will haunt you forever. Oh, yeah, take the dog and some food for him too. If it comes right down to it, we could eat him if we had to. Well, off to the store I go."

One hour later.

"Honey, I made it. The shelves were bare but I got most of what we needed. Have you seen the can opener? I couldn't believe how many people were there, I was in line 10 deep. It was a made house. I had to whack some old lady with my cart to get to the beef jerky. I told her I would share but she wanted to buy it all. I wish people wouldn't wait to the last minute to prepare for these disasters, it makes it hard on the rest of us."

Weather warning buzzer goes off on television.

"This is a severe winter storm advisory. Expect high winds, drifting snow, low temperatures, and accumulation up to 18" by morning. You are asked to not leave your home unless absolutely necessary. If you must leave, remember to dress warmly, and in layers, like and onion, or a parfait, everybody loves parfait. Put women, children, and animals in a warm and safe place, preferably the basement just in case your roof falls in from the weight of the snow."

3 minutes later

"Now its time for the traffic report, how is it out there Balinda? (Balinda is a weather bunny standing outside in a arctic parka, a scarf, and a toboggan, sweating alot because its really only 27 degrees and she is dress for -10. But hey, she is on the scene) Its terrible out here, people are mad I tell you, absolutely mad. Look at the highway, traffic is snarled all over. People cant see what lane they are in, they are not signalling their intentions, and worse yet, they are sliding into things all over the place. Its madness I tell. By the time this is over we may have thousands of stranded motorists and hundreds of abandoned vehicles. Its only going to get worse, stay home people, its utter carnage out here"

3 minutes later

"Now its time for a weather update. More snow, this could be worse than the blizzard of 78. The Governor has been asked to declare a state of emergency. When asked the governor replied, "what?" (He's not from around here) The white death is upon us people, take shelter. The white fluffy spawn of Satan is coming to destroy us all. Film at 11, and 11:03 and 11:06 and 11:09 until the power goes off and we all freeze to death and are forced to eat each other for our own survival"

5 minutes later

"Did you hear that honey, its worse than I thought. I might need to venture back out and buy more beer and pringles. We might be stuck in here till spring. I wonder if its too late to rent some movies while I am out. Most of the good stuff is gone I am sure but I bet I can get some copies of Gilligan's Island. Might as well get some educational stuff, we might need the ol' professors wisdom if we are gonna be stuck for a while. Might look for some old McGuyver stuff too. If we get thru this I promise I am going to build us that bomb shelter come spring"

Okay enough of this silliness, who wants to sing with me?

"OH, the weather outside is frightful, yada yada yada, so delightful. the thing the thing the thing,

Let it snow, let it snow, LET IT SNOW"

okay, and for those of you who cant get the other tune out of your heads, I will sing with you too.

"Just sit right back and you'll hear a tale, a tale of a fateful trip, that started from this tropic port aboard this tiny ship"

Ride home

The ride home today was an interesting adventure. It was raining pretty hard and the sun was out and shining brightly. This, as one would expect, causes brilliant rainbows. What one might not expect is that the sun was reflecting off the wet highway and as cars drove past they would through up a mist of water behind them. The effect of this was interesting to say the least. This dual effect produced a rainbow that came straight up out of the highway in the lanes on the opposite side. To simplify it, you had a large and brilliant rainbow in the sky that came all the way to the ground so you could see the actual end of the rainbow right next to you as you drove. This was a neat thing to see in passing, but it did bring some difficulties. Every driver on the road seemed to make the same observation that I did, how neat is that. What some large percentage of drivers did, however, was to not notice that the rainbow stayed right in front of them all the time, so they would slow down (dramatically) to look at this beauty. The person behind them was usually caught unawares of their braking and then would have to hit their brakes rather briskly, which then transfers on back the line until you have a continuous pattern of speed up, brake frantically for no good reason, repeat all the way home. I don't know what they were expecting to see at the end of the rainbow, some chick in a dress with a dog in a basket maybe, or some short guy dressed all in green dancing around a pot singing about yellow moons, pink stars and green clovers, who knows. All I know is I almost ground into fairy dust a couple of times by semi behind me.

While this was going on I got a call from blink...blink.. my wife, who informed me of two items of interest. First off, each time I reference her in my blog she says I owe her 5 bucks. This is the rule that firstlady hottietype from the nation of Indiana has for her husband the pastor. Each time Pastor Mark references her or the kids, she claims ownership of 5 bucks. I will agree to this rule, in its entirety and pay up just as often as Mark does, never. I asked her what made her think I was referencing her to begin with, she then listed her 3 favorite things, Vera Bradley (ugly quilt like purse), Ipod (she complains about not having a nano), and Iphone, (her latest on the list of I wants). The trick here is, only she knew I was talking about her, for sure, anyway. The second point she wanted to bring up was that she had spoken to my beloved sister in law Kristie. Kristie called to point out that my new idea of "today's deep thought" was boring and I needed to go back to having funny posts. Now, let me just think about this for a moment. I can either write a post with a deep meaning that allows the reader to exercise their mind, ponder the greater meanings of life, reach out into the great expanse of knowledge and look introspectively upon themselves. I can provide insight into the purpose of existence, the karma of daily life, the spiritual relevance of mankind. I can suggest to people the greater comprehensions of events in time and space. I can help all mankind form some understanding of the universe.

OR.

I can talk about poop.

Hmm. I guess I will just have to give up my daily deep thinking because it is just too much to ask people to endure. When the philosophy of life comes pitted directly against "I don't wont raisins in my butt" and the all mighty and powerful Fernando, I guess poop is just more interesting too read about. So, Kristie, I will endeavour to have more funny stories about constipated toddlers, call center employees named Squishy, and other such nonsense, and less stories about philosophy and human nature. Maybe my next entry will be about my inlaws. I might need to post a story about a line I remember that went something like this." I gave my heart and souuuuuuuuuuuuuuulllllllllllllll.............................." Or maybe not, who knows.

Greed

Today's deep thought:





"You can't have everything. Where would you put it?"





HT to comedian Stephen Wright.


http://www.stevenwright.com/index.shtml

We are a greedy people. So greedy in fact that we have even invented phrases to describe our greediness. Phrases like, "keeping up with the Jones's". We even have entire industries that constantly improve things just because we want to buy new stuff, not that the thing didn't work, were worn out or needed improved. We must have the biggest SUV that hauls 23 kids, which is now being replaced buy the need to have the greenest car that gets 150 MPG. (http://evolution.loremo.com/) We must have the biggest smallest Ipod, or Iphone. Why cant I live without a nano, or a nino for that matter. Must I have Vista, I really don't want it. Don't get me started on Xbox and PS whatever the heck it is this week. Why cant we stop the need for more more more. And just so the tech nerds don't feel left out of the "I want new toys" parade, no, I don't tweeter or twitter and I don't RSS feed read or burn either because I like to see people hit my site meter and I return the favor by hitting theirs. Speed is another thing, why do we need cars that go 150MPH? I cant drive that fast anyway because of all the other cars on the road, all with only one person in them I might add. Anyway, deep thought for the day, the next time we head off to the store we should ask ourselves, do I need one more Vera Bradley purse just because I don't have that pattern yet and Judith has more than me, or can I really live without it just fine. Just a thought, a deep thought.

I am now going to listen to my non-satellite AM radio as I drive my leased SUV home to my palacial estate in Maineville. (HT to Bill Cunningham for the palacial estate line)

Reflections

Today's deep thought:

"If you want to know what you look like, look at your reflection. If you want to know who you are, close your eyes."

Chris

We have a tendency to see what we think about ourselves when we look in a mirror. We do not usually see what is really there. We almost never see what others see when they look at us. For the best perception of "self" we should simply close our eyes and take a hard look.

Fences

Today's deep thought:



"It is impossible to see things from both sides, unless you have been standing in both places"



Chris

Value

Today's deep thought:

"It is the prudent and responsible thing to do, one must go to great lengths to protect ones jewels."

Chris