snow days

Sure enough, the day after our ski trip a winter front moved down and covered the entire state. It snowed Tuesday and it looked like we were in for more than 24 hours of the fluff. But the wind kicked up in the afternoon and the temperatures dropped, and they dropped to historic lows. Wednesday morning it was 0 degrees at 9 am. The nights were in the negatives. Wind chills were something like negative 20 or worse. Days didn't get above the single digits.

The boys didn't go to school on Tuesday because of the snow. Then Wednesday the diesel in the school buses turned to gel, and there was no school that day. Then Thursday, it was negative degrees, the fuel was still gel, and we got our first reports that there would be a natural gas shortage state-wide and that we'd either need to conserve heating fuel or we'd be in one of the pockets with none. No school that day. Then Friday, oh, sure it had started to warm to the 30s, but the natural gas shortage was serious and water pipes were starting to burst anyway, so no school again.

I heard a national report that this time of year is good for auto mechanics, with their shops filled with cars that slid off the roads or just wouldn't start, and for wine merchants, with all those parents stocking up in anticipation of snow days. Sometime this week, the boys went to Borders and used some Christmas gift cards to purchase a Lego Star Wars Wii game. Tuesday night we went to a Chinese restaurant, the night before Chinese New Year, for the boy's favorite Egg Drop soup. The boys add a little soy and chow mein noodles.

It's hours before Super Bowl. Jackson is working on his state report on Hawaii. He has been reading books on Hawaii, drawing maps and flags and pictures. And now he is putting together a little book. I so enjoy talking with Jackson. He's becoming so mature, and he's always been so thoughtful. Ry is playing with his Legos. He's always asking me arithmetic questions. What's 56 and 56 he'll ask. I'll turn the question around, and he says 112, because 6 and 6 is 12 and 50 and 50 is 100. What's 1 minus 100 he'll ask. Negative 99 he answers. I ask him, are they teaching you this in kindergarten? Is Jackson teaching you this? I just figure it out, he says. Last night he was singing Butter Flies. Then this morning, I asked, hypothetically, what if we had more in our family, and he said, well, just make sure it comes from your side of the family. I asked, do you think you come from your mother's side?

Smart little guys.

I got a chance to talk with Ariel a couple of times this week. Once on the cell; once on Skype.