A Visit from Snow Miser (or, alternatively, why my husband is a giant tool)

So, anyone out there hear that we got a little snow in Wisconsin and the surrounding states this week? 20 inches in old Janesville to be exact. I am definitely ready for a visit from the Heat Miser again. His brother the Snow guy is a real dick.

My oldest son turned 18 over the weekend, accompanied by some 18-itis drama that has leveled out as the week has gone on. When the hell did I get so old and why don't I feel like it?

Tuesday evening the snow started. I ended up on the night shift AGAIN covering call ins (WTF! Am I the only nurse who works there??). I took with me a lot of caffeinated items and enough base layer and wool socks to be able to manage the 1.8 mile walk home in the snow if my clown car wasn't up to the job in the morning in the throes of a major snowstorm. Thankfully I made it home in the Matrix after a very very tiring night, and the snow was flying hardcore still. There were several inches on the ground already, with many many more to come. School was cancelled. I got my car stuck in the snow in the driveway trying to pull into the garage and needed a push from behind. I finally crawled into bed about 0730. At about 0815 or so, I awoke to the sound of the neighbor on his 4-wheeler. After briefly thinking I must have been dreaming and putting my head back on the pillow, I heard it again. Yep. Since there was so much snow that the plows were on a "main streets only" mission (I live on a 1 block long cul de sac, not exactly a traffic hub....) he had decided that he would work on plowing our street himself on his ATV with the plow mount. Which he did. ALL. FREAKING. DAY. I laid there listening to him until about 10, when I finally realized sleeping was something that would not happen. I decided I would get up and just go to bed super early that night. I got up and looked outside. Holy Snowdrifts Batman. I opened the french door to let the dogs out, only to be met by a hip-high drift across the back yard ending at the door. Daisy gave me a "yeah right ma" look and turned around to head for the living room. Maddy bounded out of the house like her pants were on fire. The snow was over her head, so pretty much all you saw was a dog hopping up from out of the snow looking like Tigger in figure-8 hot laps around the yard. So yeah, I guess the first order of business was to dig the dogs a potty tunnel.

Nick had ordered a pizza delivery and after 2 hours of waiting for Pizza Hut to arrive, they called back and said that just wasn't gonna happen. You can pick it up though. Nick picked up the keys to the Cavalier and said "watch me laugh at them when I can get through and they couldn't." I watched out the back window for him to go up the road, and never did see him. Curious, I went to the front window to find out where he went and there he was, stuck with snow over the wheel wells, spinning his tires in the ice and snow and getting stucker by the moment. I think he made it about 5 feet out of the driveway.... so I guess he really showed them. While Lucas and I put on our boots and coats, the neighbors helped him push his car back into the driveway. I went the door and see Nick made it into the driveway. Backwards. And was now spinning his wheels at the end of the driveway trying to gun it for the house on a patch of ice. We dug for a while then the Beefy brothers and several neighbors got us pushed back further inthe driveway where we were stuck again. Although mostly sideways and definietly still backwards, at least we were far enough back that the plow wouldn't hit the nose of the car on the slim chance it passed. We gave up and decided to atack it later.

Deciding to wait out the snow a bit longer, we went inside. I picked up, mopped, vacuumed, etc for a couple hours then we headed back out to attack the car. It was still falling fast but we had to do something. We quick blew and shoveled from the back of the car to the garage, salted under the wheels and back to the house. I threw her in reverse and the boys pushed. We finally got her back inside the garage. We blew the driveway out. I went out back and attacked making a poop tunnel for the dogs to use. Before long Lucas comes to the back door and hands me the phone. It was work.

"So you're gonna be here at 6 right?"

"Excuse me?"

"Didn't (boss) call you? She said you were supposed to come in. Nellie NOC Nurse lives in the country and they just closed her road. She can't get in."

(I am not sure when I became the only person capable of working something other than my regular schedule, but apparently I am. And I guess now I don't even get asked, I get told, in this case not even told, this time I was to know by TELEPATHY. Nice. Lord knows I AM known for my telepathic powers. )

So, in my clown car, on terrible roads, with no sleep, and having shoveled all flipping day, I headed off for the NOC shift. AGAIN! (That is I think 6 in 2 weeks if anyone is counting by the way. ) A perfect end to Super Gay Wednesday.

One of the day nurses came in at 4 when her hubby got home from work. When I got done kissing and hugging her for saving my sleepy ass, I gave report and headed home to crawl into the nest to sleep. I pull in at 4AM to find Mikes snowmobile in the spot where his car should be. Apparently he couldn't drive home.

Of course, Mike was snowmobiling during all of this. I guess he thinks it's super fair for every one in the house to pitch in and do their fair share of dealing with the plethora of work that needs to be done when we get that much snow. Everyone except him that is. He owns a snowmobile, which gives him the right to play on it whenever he wants to, especially when there is hard work to be done around the house. Man work. The kind he left his wife to do.

As we - the boys and I - were clearing the car earlier for our last run at righting her from the snowbank one of the said "this would be a perfect example fo teamwork, except one of our teammates is absent." Yeah, couldn't have said that better myself.

Today, I got up about 1100, ate a little something and headed outside again to finish up. The snow had finally stopped. The final damage..... 20-21 inches of fresh powder in 24 hours, nearly breaking the record set in 1984. Since we are surrounded by farm fields, we had a lot of big drifts to knock down too, some of them waist high or better. I blew off the big cement porch out back so my doggies can pee. I dug out the exhaust pipe for the furnace. I dug out the dryer vent so I can dry clothes. I shoveled a path to the front door. I blew out the driveway a total of 3 times today. I cleared the approach to the mailbox so the mailman will stop. I dug a path from the street to the fire hydrant and dug a circle all around it to the grass so we are incompliance with code. All in all, I spent the bulk of my day freezing my big fat ass off either with a shovel in my hand or trying to wrangle a snowblower that is too big for me to manage without throwing my whole body into it and using every ounce of energy I have. Hours later, when it was all done I came in the house and crumbled into a broken down heap on the couch.

The phone rings.

"Uh hi, I'm going snowbiling after work."

I hung up.

Of course he is. Why would anyone think maybe he might come home and give his family a hand with the hard work, or at least have offerred? What a giant tool.

So here is the short list of the things I have learned this winter, especially today:

- to operate the snowblower: It's physically hard. It's too big for me. But I can get it started and I can do it. Like a single woman.

- to get a stuck car out of the snow. Not just once, but three -count em- three times. Without a husband in sight. Just like a single woman.

- to manage to work an ungodly amount of sucky hours while simultaneously making sure the kids and dogs are adequately accomodated. All by myself. Like a single mom.

- to fix things that go wrong around the house. All.by.myself. Like a single woman.

- to keep myself entertained, during endless hours that I am left alone while the other people that live here find better things to do. I can entertain myself rather well, just like a single woman.

I'm thinking the take home message here is I get better and better at being single every snowy day. Maybe before long I will be. I sure hope riding that bitch Polly Polaris is just that wonderful. And worth it.

Lost and Found

Today I did the Sugar River Bike Tour with my sister, which wound back and forth over the Sugar River in the Brodhead (WI) area. I think we had a good time, although my sista may not think so after I twisted her arm to at least do the 30 mile route instead of the 15 she originally signed up to do. She was into it until about mile 20 or so, when she started hoping the SAG cycles had a tow rope. (Sorry Shel!)
It was the best supported rides I have done. Lots of goodies and rest stops (which were manned by Girl Scouts armed with cookies!) and tons of SAG vehicles on the course on motorcycles who pulled by frequently and ASKED if we were OK. Often.
Much of the course took place on some pretty busy roads without little or no shoulder though. Haven't these people ever seen a back road? Sheesh!

Now, about the title....
About September 8th or so, I purchased a lovely little helmet at the IMWI expo, which came equipped with a really cool zip up case with room for storage of all little bits and pieces of bike stuff (gloves, snacks, etc). It was S-WEET. I was leaving this case in the back of my SUV so that I had a place where I could keep my helmet and other miscellaneous bike stuff together when we transport to ride places.
This case is now missing. I. CAN'T. FIND. IT. ANYPLACE. I have turned the garage and the house upside down looking for it with no luck. It's disappearance coincides with a certain person deciding that my car needed to be cleaned because there was too much JUNK in it. Incidentally, this person also saved the cardboard box the helmet came in - THAT we safeguard....... I think that person had better figure out where they put it before I become homicidal....... I hate it when my stuff gets moved around!

I’ll take mine without a jackhammer, thank you very much.

My week thus far has consisted of the following:
Monday: I swam laps for an hour while Mike took his swim lesson with Martin. That is always relaxing, swimming laps. For quite a while it was just me in the lane, back and forth, back and forth. Before long I was joined in the lane, first by Dr Kolste, who swam nice slow laps at a pretty comparable pace to mine, then in came Kitty the Ironwoman to do some laps. That was all good. Then we were joined by an old guy lapping the sidestroke. I think it was probably rude and it pissed him off a little that I kept passing around him in the lane but GEESH it seemed important to me at the time to do better than a 5:00 100m. Oh Well.
When the swim lesson was done, Mike and I went into “transition” and did a 5 mile out and back loop from the pool to the poop plant and back, fairly uneventful. Kinda slow, but that’s just me. I tried to test Jeff’s theory that the half mile before and after the plant would be fast, but I don’t think it made a difference in my plodding pace, sorry to say.

Tuesday: This was the next-to-the-last SWAT practice at Rockport, which makes me sad. I have so enjoyed the camaraderie of the group and the benefits of training with others at varying levels, most of which are faster than mine. It really pushes you to not only try to keep up with the stronger athletes, but also boosts morale to be able to offer support and encouragement to those less advanced (for me this is on the bike).
We swam (I got in a couple 1000m), then we took a bike ride. We chose a route that went on the back roads, which was great for me. I t was a really hilly route and when we got to the turnaround, I shared that there was a bitch of a hill just a couple miles ahead that we had not enjoyed riding (TWICE!) this weekend. So of course we took off to ride that hill. I still hate it by the way, but it is getting easier. We just backtracked our route on the way back, which was fine. It did start to get pretty dark on the way back, which makes me nervous because I hadn’t planned on it and the only light we had for the group was my taillight. When we got back to the parking lot we took the usual 2.25-mile loop around the trail and it felt pretty good. All in all a good training night – pretty easy pace with a good mix of activities, paces, and people to talk to. Sounds like there is a Masters Swim group in the works for the winter at the Milton HS Pool, which we will for sure take advantage of.

I don’t remember if I have mentioned this before but our road is under some major construction this summer. It is a main road to the high school and had outgrown its simple country road status and needed some improvements. The process to widen it, add a bike lane, curb & gutter, and sidewalks began mid-June and we have endured some minor inconveniences up to this point. Our mailbox was relocated ¼ mile up the road onto Austin Rd, the dry weather creates a dust bowl effect whenever the people who ignore the “Street Closed” sign cut through, the bajillion stakes/flags/markers/spray painting all over the lawn, and cutting down all our mature trees from the terrace were annoying but we worked around them.
This week we reached a whole new level of inconvenience. They began the work of digging out the road in preparation for leveling the road and cutting in the curb. There is heavy equipment parked everywhere. There is soft mushy dirt everywhere. Every time I drive away from the house, I feel like on of those dad-burned Duke boys flying up the bumpy dirt road, mud flying everywhere. Monday I rode the scooter to work and couldn’t get down the road to get home due to all the construction, ended up baja-ing through the grass from the school and through my backyard. It was quite a sight I’m sure, but it worked.
Have I mentioned it has become monsoon season here? We have been DOUSED with rain the past week or so. It rained Monday overnight, so I was hard pressed to get up the hill from my house to reach solid road and get to work. I ended up getting up to the wheel well in mud in 4WD halfway up the hill, then having to chuck it into 4Low, turn sideways and gun it up the wrong side of the street. The only thing that got me out of the hole was thinking about having to call Mike at 0530 while he was still in bed to come get me unstuck. Man Rule #4440 – DON’T POKE THE BEAR. If you wake him he is very, very grouchy….
The way home was equally dicey. I came up Mineral Point Rd, a direct shot from work to find equipment busily blocking me off. I could see the house but couldn’t get there. So I turned around and drove around the block (which is actually almost a 2 mile re-route since there is a big chunk of school property that must be bypassed an a highway to enter and get off of – much more than going around a regular block…) to enter the other side of Mineral point from Austin Road. I stopped to get the mail then headed down the road, eventually getting there through the muddy soft road. I checked for the newspaper, then called to find out where it was since I hadn’t gotten one the night before either. The Gazette guy told me the carrier had dropped the off at the mailboxes on Austin Road (Wasn’t I just there!!!!). I walked back up to check and sure enough there was a pile rubberbanded together and shoved between a couple of mailboxes in the bank of 12 or so. Like I would have actually found that on my own, but whatever…..
O the way back from tri practice, it was dark and we saw 3 or 4 guys standing in a hole with shovels, which was surrounded by a huge flood light and some digging type equipment. They looked sweaty and grouchy and I couldn’t tell what they were doing. When we prepared to go to bed, I said to Mike it sounded like they were out there still working on the road… like a jackhammer sound. It went on for while. We listened to it. I got madder and madder.
Finally, I had enough. I got up out of bed and found some flip flops and a flashlight to go see what was up with all the racket. I marched across the wet grass, through the school lot and approached the small group of workers standing in the hole. They did not look happy to see me. Perhaps it was because I looked like a crazy woman- the hair looked like I was sleeping on my head, wearing jammie pants hiked up to my knees, mismatched flip-flops, marching up hill out of the dark. The noise was so loud it was deafening. I waved my flashlight and pointed angrily to my watch. I shouted “It’s 11:30 for gods sake!” but they couldn’t hear me. One guy finally crawled out of the hole and came over. I shouted “Is there a plan to be done sometime soon??????? It’s late , I’m tired, and we have to work tomorrow!!” After several repetitions, he said “Hopefully” and gave me a look like I was insane. I refrained from killing him. “Wahts the plan here?” I shouted. He gave me some cock and bull story about a power line that had been pulled by some machine, blah blah blah, had to be fixed so no one loses power….” I could see I was getting nowhere. I ranted for a minute more, telling them they better be done soon or I was gonna…. (They looked really scared at this point, or maybe it was just hurting them to try so hard not to laugh at me…) . I turned around, waving my arms, bitching over my shoulder at them, and stomped away home like a spoiled child.
Returning to bed, Mike rolled over and said, (with the jackhammering noise echoing through the bedroom) “I see you really were able to quiet them down.” Miraculously, he was not smothered in his sleep last night…….
The noise finally stopped at about 0300. Yadda, yadda, yadda, I’m really tired today. I see myself being called the crazy lady who lives on the corner in the very near future.......
This morning- another Baja adventure thru the mud pit. It is predicted to rain all day and into tomorrow. Not sure if we will even be able to get home, we may need to park at the school and walk home. What do I get in return for all these marvelous improvements and minor joys inconveniences you ask? I get a bill from the city for $6000 or so. Yeah me.

Thank God Its not Tuesday today!

Wisconsin has been hit hard by rain the week. It’s hot and humid, stifling really. Aside from the fact that it makes exercise more tiring, it does some funny things to a girl’s hair. Tuesday was no exception on the hair front. The humidity was so high, my hair was a frizzy, poufy mess. When I got home from work and looked at it, I thought I was looking at Roseanne Roseannadanna in the mirror. Big hair – huge.

So I pull the Brillo pad back into a ponytail and start thinking about SWAT workout Tuesday evening. Man it was going to feel good to jump into that pool and swim some laps! As I stand at the kitchen counter working on a pre-practice snack, my son ambles up to the counter and says, “Yeah, there was a little problem with the laundry….. I spilled a little of the soap.”

Understatement of the year. Sunday, I cracked open my new super-economy size jug of Tide HE super-concentrated detergent, 110 loads worth in all. I used a capful, the rest was left sitting atop my washer. I hesitantly headed down to the laundry room to survey the damage. There was Tide on the ceiling, running down the walls, standing an inch deep on the floor, spilling out of the room over the approach soaking into the BEIGE (now blue) carpet in a large semi-circle. It had run under the machines and was soaking into the baseboard woodwork and the wall behind it. It was running down the front of both the washer and the dryer. There was a small laundry basket filled with blue soapy towels. There was one towel on the floor in front of the machines, I think for the purpose of holding the soap in one location, which incidentally was under the washer and dryer and up against the plaster walls and baseboard wood. I stood and looked in disbelief, pretty sure there was steam blowing out of both ears at that point. Bad words were said. Thankfully, there was plenty of soap available to wash my mouth out……..

I could tell immediately by looking at the scene what happened. We (and by we I mean my almost adult, think we are all grown children) stuffed the HE washer with as many awkward heavy imbalanced items as possible. We pulled the jug of detergent forward to fill the cup. We did not push it back so it was more centered on the washer, we just left it hanging from the edge because that was easier. As soon as it hit “SPIN” the first time, the jug plummeted from the top of the washer, hit the floor, backsplashed upwards to the ceiling and wall, cracked open and leaked out the bottom. We of course were playing video games or otherwise not paying attention and went back several hours later to transfer the wash to the dryer. Surveying the mess, we used a couple towels to wipe up a little bit then placed a towel in front of the washer so it quit leaking forward where we could reach it. Then we went back to our video games.

The carpet cleaner was out of the closet and standing all farfled up just outside the room on the carpet. It was full of water, which was seeping slowly into the carpet. I picked up the attached hose to move the machine onto the tile and realized too late the hose was filled with soapy water that were the remnants of a failed attempt to use it to extract the soap from the carpet, so soap and water went running everywhere out of the hose. More bad words were said. Looking closer at the carpet on the threshold of the room, I noticed that the carpet cleaner beater brushes had frayed the carpet badly along the edge where it had been used.

Lucas had to go to orientation at Papa Murphy’s, so I sent Nick to give him a ride and wait around. Truth be told I may have poked someone’s eyes out had they stuck around for the clean up, already knowing how well the first attempt had been done. Before long, Mike was home and together we spent roughly 2.5 hours sliding around mopping up soap. We scooped soap into a dustpan and poured it into the utility sink. We pulled out the machines and scooped, and scrubbed, and washed and rinsed and mopped behind them. We wiped down the walls, the ceiling, the woodwork, the cabinets, the door, the machines and everything else in the room. Ever tried to wash up soap? It’s harder and slipperier than it sounds.

Cost of that load of laundry:
- $30 in detergent
- $?? repairing/replacing the carpet
- $?? replacing the woodwork
- $?? refinishing the mushy soapy plaster, repairing the wall, painting
- $30 for replacing the two now ruined mops
- our time in missed training hours – PRICELESS!

Needless to say, by the time we were done, we had pretty much missed most of SWAT practice. The sky was darkening, so a run or bike on our own was ruled out too. I was frustrated. We missed our workouts Monday too due to rainy weather.

We headed out instead to do some errands so hopefully we could be back on track Wednesday. In the car, I noticed that the skin on my hands and feet and forearms were starting to feel a burning sensation. I quickly realized that it was a chemical irritation from the ultra concentrated detergent we had been swimming in for hours. Looking at my feet I could see where the detergent had actually started eating away layers of my toenail polish. I looked at the palm of my hand, which was also sore and noticed it was bruised along the area where I was holding the mop handle and the scrub brush. I remembered earlier that I had noticed my wedding ring needed to be looked at because it needed to be sized again. Looking at it closer now, I saw it was bent and actually broken after the soap cleanup. So while we were out, we stopped at the jewelry store to drop it off for repair.

We stopped the car and going around the backside of the Envoy, I cut the corner too tight and ran into Thelma (the bike rack) who bit me pretty hard in the ribcage. OUCH.
After dropping off the ring, we went to see my good friend Vicky since we were at the Mall and collect on my coupon for free PINK flip flops. Vicky’s Secret by the way is that her underwear is uncomfortable and is not that much better than Wal-Mart…...

I have never looked so forward to a day being over in my whole life. Once we were home, Mike and I worked on our Bigun tribute song, which was so much fun, it almost made the farfled up mess that was my evening worth it.

Thank God It’s Wednesday, that’s all I have to say today! I still have Roseanne Roseannadanna’s hair though. Hope that isn’t a sign of things to come today……..

Ran a 10Kwith Mike after work tonight so we are back on track again. Yeah.

I used the training assistant on RWOL today to tweak my training plan for the Half Marathon in September and tonight I will be working on that some more. We’ll see how it goes. It just doesn’t seem like there is enough running to get ready for a race of that size, but we’ll see. After all, they are the experts, I am a mere mortal so what do I know?

MTB Mayhem and the SWAT team

It's been a busy couple days.

Monday night, Mike and I went to the Velo Club Mt Bike ride in Rockport Park. I had an off night. The decision was made to work on some of the technical aspects of the trails, in particular hill climbing and some of the single track stuff. I fell down a lot. Several of them really hurt. I became convinced the Schlegels were trying to kill me. We ran through spots in the park named FUBAR, the figure 8, the roller coaster, and broken pinky. Broken pinky was especially heinous. It is a gimongous steep hill covered in loose gravel. I pretty much spun out midway up and fell off my bike onto to my elbow.

I struggled with:
- my clipless pedals. The shoes for my road bike and my MTB have different style clips. I could not get clipped in a lot of the night, kept using the wrong motion to clip, pushing forward instead of stepping down.

- my emotions. The more frustrated I got with the ride, the stupider I rode. I had trouble with shifting sensibly and just did some stupid crap for no reason except sheer frustration.

- my fears. The more I had clipping problems, the more I timid I rode. Because I rode scared, I kept riding into trees. Or flipping myself off my bike.

- my directional orientation. We rode the trails backwards from what we have done the last two times. Totally threw me off and just felt wrong. I think this led to my first (of many) falls off my bike where I slid backwards down a hill and took out a tree. The poor thing never saw it coming, but the scrapes down my back where I slid down the bark as I laid that sucker out will last me for a while - they are pretty raw.

- My balance. I fell off my bike a lot. Sometimes for no real reason at all. I felt like a big giant ass.

- my stupid bike. Did I mention I really hate her this week? I do. Just as I reached the peak of my pissiness, I was pedaling uphill and the chain broke. I let out a little whoop. "YES! I CAN'T RIDE ANYMORE TONIGHT! WOO HOO!!!" Unfortunately, Bob whipped out his fixy thing and fixed up the chain. I rode some more, then as we were fixing to leave the park it broke again. He fixed it again and we went home. I hate my stupid frigging bike this week. I'm sure it will pass, but I blame her for this ride. Lord knows, it's not MY fault..... :-)

Tuesday was our first Tri-out (like a work out tripled). We started in Rockport Park at the pool. We swam some laps. I swam/walked beside Mike trying to help until he got pissy and got out of the pool to pout. Then I swam some laps of my own and got out myself. I no longer want to help coach him since I just get the brunt of his frustration with it. I plan to call around for a coach for him, letting someone else get bitched at would be well worth it for me.

The bike was an easy 20 down Afton Road and back. I cannot fathom why they ride that busy road with glass all over the shoulder when there are tons of virtually empty country roads branching off it everywhere, but whatever -it was not my party so we went with it. Not knowing what to expect from this group, we hung towards the back at first, then took off and hammered it a little harder on the way back in, getting ahead of a big chunk of the group. We skipped the run, mostly because we didn't bring our shoes. Maybe next time. It seems like a nice group, very helpful and offered some good advice so far. We'll keep going for a while and see where this goes. The seem to keep a good pace for us, which is what I was most concerned about.

Pet Peeves

Why is it that everyone who congratulates you on your weight loss has to tell you how great you must feel? I didn't feel "bad" before I lost weight, I was just fat! I was healthy feeling and had no chronic health effects from my weight other than inactivity. So I guess that comment means fat=bad (the opposite of great) which frankly feels a little insulting.
While I'm at it- what is with people who ask loudly in a crowd how many pounds you've lost? I work in a hospital on the top floor so I am often caught in the elevator with someone who does that. There is no easy way to sidestep the bluntness of the question that I have found sucessful. I have tried answering "a lot," but the questioner invariably presses on even more loudly for the exact amount of pounds lost. In the last week, I have been asked that in an elevator full of Family Practice residents and then again in the elevator in front of at least 6 20-something construction workers (at the hospital working on a renovation). I have lost more than 175 pounds, or almost the equivalent of a high school linebacker......... it's really kind of embarrassing to admit in front of a pile of people you don't know that you were once at that level of gluttony. Everyone can relate to needing to lose 10 or 20 pounds, but I imagine there are a lot of folks out there who hear my answer and think "Wow - you must have been huge!". Yes, I was, thank you very much for shining a spotlight on it! There is another co-worker here in the hospital who asks ocasionally at the end of meetings for the update, still embarrassing but I can tell she is trying to be supportive.
I know these people mean well and are trying in their own way to be suppportive, and I try to remember that they probably dont mean to be rude or embarrass me to death as I try to answer the question before I crawl under a rock and try to hide...................