Snow

I admit it, when I looked out the window on Monday morning I thought -- it's Colorado! Ridgecrest actually got 3 inches of snow from Sunday morning to Monday morning. Last year when it snowed we were told it hadn't snowed in 6 years -- and last year's snow wasn't as deep as this one.

This is what it looked like the previous afternoon, when it had been lightly snowing for an hour or two:

I took the photo because I thought this was all we'd get, silly me. It just kept snowing and snowing and snowing.

At 6 am Monday morning our phone rang. Of course immediately I thought someone had died and the survivors had kindly waited until 6 am to call and tell us. But then I thought -- who? All our parents are gone. If one of my sisters died, would the surviving brother-in-law in question call me at 6 am to tell me? If one of Rocket Boy's remaining relations died, would anyone even remember to tell us about it, much less call politely at 6 am? While I was puzzling about that, the phone (which is on Rocket Boy's side of the bed) stopped ringing and went to voicemail.

I lay there worrying. The phone rang again. This time Rocket Boy woke up enough to answer it. It was his boss, telling him the base was going to open 2 hours late. I sat up in bed and looked out the window, observing the Colorado scene.

Only thing is, in Colorado nobody's going to close a base for 3 inches of snow!

We still don't know our way around this place, that's for sure. Apparently you're supposed to listen to 102.7 FM to find out whether anything else is closed for weather, but we didn't do that. Imagine my surprise when I drove up to the twins' daycare at 11:30 to find the parking lot COMPLETELY empty. Turned out, all the schools in town closed, and of course the daycares. For 3 inches of snow, which began to melt as soon as the sun came out, mid-morning.

So the twins and I went to the park instead, at their insistence. Sorry, no photos, because I didn't have my camera with me -- I wasn't on my way to the park, I was on my way to drop them off at daycare. But you improvise. Boo bears don't have proper snow attire -- no warm coats, no warm boots. They do have mittens, from last year. Baby A insisted on wearing his in the car; Baby B insisted on not wearing his at all, ever. When we got out of the car to go to the park, Baby A decided to leave the mittens behind. I figured we wouldn't be staying long, what with our inappropriate clothing, so didn't press the issue. I didn't have gloves either -- what can I say, I thought I was on my way to daycare!

We walked around in the snowy grass. Boo bears complained, and went to walk on the path instead, until they encountered a big puddle of melting snow. Several snowpeople had been constructed in the park, so we went to look at some of them. Then I wanted to show the boos how it's done, so I started rolling a ball. Just as on that memorable day back in January 1962 when it snowed in Palo Alto, the snow rolled up like a carpet, though in Leroy Jackson Park it also brought with it a lot of dry dead grass and some bird poop. And I had no gloves, so my hands immediately started to freeze. I rolled one ball, for the snowman's bottom third, and then gave up. I made a quick little ball with my hands, put it on top of the big ball, and said "OK, there's our snowman, now let's go bye-bye car!" The twins were happy to follow me, as they too were cold and wet.

That night I got online and ordered them some warm, waterproof, winter coats.

Today we had fog and the roads were icy, but daycare was open. There's a tiny bit of snow left in our yard. It should all be gone by tomorrow or the next day.

An old friend from Colorado called me today -- she'd gotten our Christmas card and hadn't sent out any of her own, but wanted to keep in touch. She mentioned that a few days ago they'd finally had their first good snow.