Snow Day...week!

Well, the kids were only scheduled to go to school for two days this week, but they got an early Thanksgiving surprise by being snowed in both days. Layne and I are a little jealous of the snow days and wish they would apply to our jobs as well. I had kind of a reverse snow day this week were I stayed at work instead of staying at home. On Monday I went to dinner and the Harry Potter movie with my girlfriends. By the time it got out it was after 10 p.m. and had been snowing all day. Tanner was worried sick about me driving home, which was sweet of him. And since there was a blizzard warning beginning at 5 a.m. the next day I decided to stay at my parents house to avoid the hassle.

Boy were the forecasters right. We had 50 mph gusts and 30mph sustained winds with zero visibility at times. Luckily we didn't have any doctor appointments so we just hunkered down and stayed out of the storm. A lot of cities and counties closed their roads and so I decided not to tempt fate and stayed another night.

It was probably a good thing I did because at 1:45 a.m. I got a call from my dad telling me that he was starting to have an electrical storm in his leg. I ran upstairs and helped him get some food so he could take some pain pills. He was shaking all over and practically choking it down he was in so much pain. Then we put an ice pack on his hip and held it tight to try and help alleviate the pain. It was the worst thing I have ever seen. It made me ill to see him going through it. And it was so frustrating not being able to do anything more to help him. Luckily the pills kicked in within about thirty minutes. I went back to bed after and hour and I was sure his pain had subsided. I got another phone call at 4:15 a.m. The pain was starting again. We got ahead of it better this time and I stayed on the couch until morning. Later he said that if an animal had been in that kind of pain we would put it out of his misery. I had to admit that thought came to my mind. A human being shouldn't have to take that kind of pain. Then it made me think of the pain that Christ suffered for us and how this was surely just a fraction of what he went through.

The next morning came the real fun. Now that the wind had subsided it was time to dig out, literally. When I opened the garage door there was a beautiful wave of snow about four feet high. I don't know why I didn't get a picture of it. Unfortunately I am sure that I will have many more opportunities to see the same thing as this El Nina winter we are experiencing plays itself out. I started out with the snow blower but it just wouldn't cut through the drift. So I finally resorted to the shovel. This picture is when I was about half way done.

And finally the finished product. It does feel good to accomplish such a great task. Then I moved on to the entrance to the driveway that had been packed in by the snow plow. This was even harder to do because it was hard and ice over. But again, a good feeling to have it done.