Saturday, January 19, 2008
Can We Actually Relax Now?
Yesterday 'Nika and I finally escaped from Test Equipment World Domination Headquarters at about 3:30. I had told KyKy that I would take her to the downtown library so she would be able to pick up some materials for a school project. (Just as an aside, The Minneapolis Public Library exists no more after 122 years. It appears the past few years (decades?) of mismanagement or lack of funding left no alternative but to merge MPL with the Hennepin County system. Nothing against the HC system, in fact their rescue of MPL has increased hours at libraries and opened branches that were previously shuttered. It's just that the Minneapolis Public Library system was a point of civic pride for me. For a relatively small city population wise, it was a great system. But no more.) The whole family ended up going. We piled in the car and drove to the Lake St train platform, took the Hiawatha downtown to the shiny new Cesar Pelli designed library. I've taken the girls down there a number of times, but TOYH had never been there. We split up to find some things to bring home, met up again, took the train back to the car and ended up going to Matt's Bar for Jucy Lucys. TOYH ended up checking out a bunch of videos to celebrate her liberation from studying. After nearly 3 1/2 years of that nagging feeling of, "I can't enjoy anything because there's always some studying I could be doing instead of what I'm doing now," she's free to do what she wants. That means vegging out in front of the teevee. It's a fine weekend for doing just that. The temperature dropped below zero at about 5pm yesterday, and it might stay there until sometime on Monday.
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6 comments:
Nothing against vegging out and watching movies all day, but I have to note it was also a fine day for a nice long walk outside. All this hullaboo about the temperature and windchill has made me wonder if we're living in Texas and not Minnesota. The younger kids and I were up in hillbilly country for the day, and I took a lovely two hour walk with the doggy. We ended up (I think) at that old deserted farm north of our property that we used to hike to. Hard to say if the place I saw was what I think it was, as the only thing that looked remotely like a building was a collapsed pile of weathered lumber. It was absolutely gorgeous outside, and I came back with all my extremities intact.
Were you wearing a snowmobile suit to keep warm?
I'm feeling the need for a snowmobile suit today! It's 16-feels-like-4 in Atlanta this morning. We've had snow twice this week, built some snowmen, and thrown snow/slush balls at each other.
And of course, the local newscast alarmists warn us all to "WATCH OUT FOR BLACK ICE!!!" If they weren't so comical with their sensationalist coverage of, um, the weather, I'd support their message but with some rewording: Dear Atlantans, Stop driving like your usual idiot selves and slow down because you might encounter some ice. BTW, the news channels down here send teams of reporters to busy intersections and stretches of busy highways for "black ice coverage" in the hopes of catching an accident during live coverage. Atlanta drivers never fail to disappoint.
Francis and Jennifer--I was thinking about you this a.m. We started the car about 15 minutes before leaving for church (had to make sure it would actually start). When we were ready to leave, there was a white layer of exhaust condensed/frozen on the garage floor. I told Lizzie that they call that "Black Ice" in the South and thought of you. I had to explain the concept to her.
One of the local weather guys was reviewing various temps across the U.S. on the weather news last nite. When he got to Miami, his report was "Miami was 100 degrees warmer than the Twin Cities today".
Kind of puts things into perspective.
I didn't think of using the snowmobile suit until afterwards. Shoot. But if you're still interested, Francis, I'll see that it gets sent down to you. You'll have to promise that you'll wear it... in public.
Hey y'all: Black ice down here is ice on the blacktop/asphalt that might not be readily apparent to the speeding driver. The Atlantan definition has nothing to do with exhaust.
And Tracy, you can hold on to that snowmobile suit. Spring, that time of year most people call February, is right around the corner! And even if I did wear it in public, people down here would probably think it's a NASCAR driver or pit crew suit--they seem to be the same fashion.
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