She's So Cold Like an Ice Cream Cone

Current Temperature: A very balmy -6C
Snow: Um, yeah. Non-stop since about 2:00 this afternoon.

I would be humming "We're havin' a heat wave . . . a tropical heat wave . . ." if it weren't for the snow that suddenly started this afternoon.

It was in the -20C range over the weekend. I, wisely, remained inside most of the weekend, except for an hour on Sunday when The Spouse and I dragged ourselves to the bank, the pet supply store (to buy what a dear friend refers to as "shitty-kitty"), and the grocery store. Everyone has been sick, and it was a good excuse to hibernate indoors. Not that we ever do much more on the weekends anyhow. Just this time there was not even a smidgen of guilt.

It's a fun bug, with a painful, unproductive cough that no drug, NO DRUG can lessen. Made all the more annoying by the fact I wet my pants every other time I cough. Worse than the unfortunate Trampoline Incident of 2002. I tell you, Midge, I am kegeling my brains out here. I ought to be able open a beer bottle by now. Why can't I cough with confidence? Why?

On to prettier thoughts. Below is a picture of the window in the door in our bedroom. This is the interior door (most Moscow doors and windows are double). The room was toasty warm . . . or I was in and out of fever/chill cycles all weekend and didn't attribute temperature changes to the environment. I was not so delirious that I couldn't see that the pattern in the frost was lovely.


Today the water guy arrived with our delivery of drinking water. It was early (between 8:00 and 9:00 . . . they start delivering at 8:00) and the bottles of water were partially frozen. A first for me, actually.

Can you see it in the photos?



Today was one of those odd Mercredi Liberés (Free Wednesdays). Both girls were home, and I had a mission: Clean Their Room.

I announced my plans yesterday. Since the girls had no school and The Spouse's workday does not technically begin until 10:00, we could have a more leisurely morning. He was fed and gone by the time the water guy arrived. I told the girls that we could relax until 10:30, but then we were going to be cleaning demons with lunch at the pizzeria across the street as our reward.

We commenced cleaning on schedule at 10:30. We stopped at 1:30 with 95% of the work done. We changed sheets, picked up clothes, straightened bookshelves, threw away junk, filed magazines, dusted every flat surface (including under the bed), vacuumed, and wiped up paint spills. It was dirty, sweaty work, but their room looks (and smells) right pleasant now.

We went to lunch.

Then we went to the grocery store.

As we left the grocery store with our purchases, I said to the girls, "This is pretty much what I do while you are at school, you know. Minus the nice lunch out."

Baboo says, "I hate your life."

Skittles says, "See . . . this is why I am going to GET A JOB."

Brrrr.