BlizzardReal weather. Sigh. A blizzard before Halloween and a summer that saw very little rain and almost every day over 80. I guess if Denver had the sea, too, there'd be no keeping people out.
Snow began to fall yesterday morning and hasn't stopped yet (it's 5:53). I didn't go to the gym after work because I figured it would be better to walk here and get less exercise than deliberately make my evening commute longer and later and exercise my stress level. At 3:45, the roads were wet but not frozen; if I'd gone to the gym and headed home after sunset, the ride would've been much worse.
We were slugs at home, watched "Cold Comfort Farm" on this pay station we have for free (for the month, presumably), then we went for a walk. I cautiously put my contact lenses in for the first time in six or seven weeks (since the nuptials) and we layered up. It was so lovely to walk in the snow without glasses! Of course, I've only been back in the stupid things since August, so I'm only remembering the six years of pre-contact lens hell.
As soon as we reached the road, we were joined by a delightful golden retriever who was so friendly he wanted to greet every car that came by. So we thought he was looking for his family. As fun as it was to walk with a dog, especially something as close to a Labrador retriever as a golden, we worried that he would, with us, wander farther from his house. He had rabies and registration tags but no name or home phone number on his collar, and it was 15 degrees Fahrenheit out. RDC went to ask at the houses across the road if anyone knew the dog while I kept him by our door and called Animal Control. Animal Control didn't answer, the police officers surely more concerned with humans last night, but RDC found a family who said their neighbors had such a dog. So we three headed thataway, and the dog trotted up the driveway as if it were his own--much, however, as he had expected to come into our house, though I brought the cordless phone and phone books into the entryway. There was a man outside whom the dog greeted ecstatically but who seemed not very concerned over his dog's (his name was Max) hour-long absence in a blizzard in a city in the freezing cold.
But all's well that ends well.
JPS has been dead for almost seven years, and despite being able to borrow LEB's or Charenton's dogs sporadically since, I have been essentially dogless for that long. I'm surprised I haven't tried to teach Blake to fetch.
Blizzard, second dayThe city's shut down, the highways are closed, the airport's dormant, but the Safeway was open, so we stocked up on some essentials. I forgot dishwasher soap, though, which means that I might have to wash dishes by hand. Horrors. We walked part of our walk, getting farther than last night since we didn't fear we were leading a dog astray but also thus without canine company. I do miss a dog, and sang that song from "South Pacific," "Nothing walks like a dog, nothing talks like a dog....there ain't nothing like a dog." Poor Blake.
At home I made another batch of oatmeal chocolate chip cookies, this time with Ghirardelli's double chocolate chips instead of last week's semi sweet. The consensus is that the double is overpowering.
The city is still shut down but HAO sounds like she's enjoying her birthday more now than she did this morning. If DIA is nonfunctional, then the nonavailability of a ride back to the airport for her visiting friend is moot. I can still get her the 25¢ present I planned for her 25th birthday.
MortalityI got a call from SEM this evening, about two paragraphs ago, a call whose reason stalled this writing for the past three hours. He said he wanted to make sure I knew that he cherishes me as a friend. My dearest SEM, I love you too. But talking to NBM was the hardest. I lived with her for a whole school year and never heard her so upset. Of course, she never had such cause. Not everyone knows yet; SEM hasn't got in touch with PLT or DEDBG yet. I probably won't post this for a few days because of that. He wasn't even supposed to be home; he was supposed to be off teaching a course somewhere. But he was there for NBM and I am so glad.
Then I called my mother, because considering NBM and my relationship, I thought she would like to know. She told me some worrisome news about DEW. So here I sit in the middle of a paralyzed city two thousand miles from home where my friends and family need me, typing desultorily and watching Blake preen his painful new feathers (I tell him that next time he ought to try scales; they're lower maintenance) and eating chocolate chip cookies and not writing my paper and feeling powerless in more ways than one.
Good night.
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Last modified 25 October 1997
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