We Made it Through Three Storms in One Week...

Monday, February 15, 2021 we sat in out home listening to the sleet click on the side of the house. At times you could look out the window and it looked like we were having a really good rain storm. Alas, all those drops were little pellets of ice. I decided to spend my day curled up on the sofa crocheting. We watched some more of our Psych television series as well as clearing out some things we had DVR'd. We interspersed this with watching the news for just the weather. 

A friend posted on Facebook that her son and his new bride were moving into their apartment that day. She was wondering if anyone had an air mattress they could borrow until they got their real bed. We had one of those. She gave me her son's phone number and I called him. He came to Sadieville in the morning before the ice made the roads bad and picked up the air mattress and I loaned him a set of sheets and pillow cases. We asked him how the roads were and he said at that point I-75 and the main streets in Georgetown were okay. However, our Hwy 32 was like it had never been cleared or treated. Our street, Eagle Bend, was in good shape and had been treated. It was nice to help someone a little. Can't imagine moving in this weather. 

After Brendan left, Claude and I put on warm clothing and headed out to move the ice that came during the night on the driveway. We finished up and Claude laid down some rock salt to help with the second round of storms. 

The sleet started again in the afternoon and continued into the night. I read on Facebook where my relatives in southern Louisiana had ice and snow. Family in Texas were posting pictures of snow in their yards. Our son in Michigan was getting snow. This was a massive storm that went from the Gulf of Mexico all the way up to Michigan. That is a lot of territory. Absolutely crazy.

Tuesday, February 16, 2021, the Scott County kids would have their 6th day of NTI. I, on the other hand, awoke after my dear hubby. When I got to the kitchen, he had made biscuits. Knowing he purchased buttermilk to learn to make biscuits from scratch, I asked if he did them from scratch or if they were canned. They were perfectly round and the size of canned biscuits. He confessed that they were sort of homemade. He said they were Jiffy Lube biscuits. Then we both did our old people laughs. Our son, Jake, lives in Chelsea, Michigan. There is a Jiffy Mix factory there. These were Jiffy Mix biscuits. But Jiffy Lube biscuits is really funny.

About 11am we got into warm clothing and shoes to go shovel snow. We opened the garage door and started from there. Claude stepped out first with a broom to go over and clear the front porch. He stepped on the mound of snow and turned to me and said, "That is not good! I stepped on this and I didn't even sink into it." This simply meant that most of what we would be shoveling was a 4-inch+ layer of ice with a sprinkling of snow on top. I started clearing out behind the Jeep. Claude finished the porch and shovel a shovel-width path down to the street in the middle of the driveway. It didn't take me long to realize this was a big deal to shovel. 

My mind reflected back to a few years ago when we went to Key West for our anniversary. The day we were leaving Key West, Lexington got on foot of snow. This closed down the Lexington Airport, which is what we were flying back to. We got a flight to Atlanta from Key West so that we would have a better chance of getting a flight to Lexington from Atlanta when one became available. By the time our flight made it to Atlanta, I realized I was very sick. We got dinner and then back to the hotel in pouring rain. I curled up in our bed and shivered like crazy. Claude went out in the rain to the Marriott hotel next door and purchased any meds he could find. We knew we had one full day at this hotel. By the next morning, Claude had whatever it was I had. We spent the day in bed feeling miserable. We had a flight out the second morning to Lexington. We made it to Lexington and then to the Kroger in Georgetown where I bought Papa whatever groceries he usually got. Then to Papa's apartment for me to put away groceries, refill Papa's meds and Claude to work on Papa's driveway with a foot of snow in it. After that, we got to our home about dead. But we had a driveway that needed attention. I needed to be able to get out in case something happened with Papa. At that point, completely drained of energy, we determined that we really only needed to shovel out a path for one car. We shoveled half the driveway and went to bed. 

This day as we shoveled, I remembered this and told Claude we were only going to concentrate on the half of the driveway behind his Jeep to the street. If we got that done, we would be good to get out if we needed to. That is exactly what we did. Lesson learned from several years ago. 

Claude went to clear out around the mailbox and then worked from the street up the driveway. I continued working from the garage down the driveway. When we got to this point in the picture, we paused. Claude looked at me and said, "Does this make you think we are like the Transcontinental Railroad trying to meet up?" We paused for an old people laugh. Claude is definitely a Utah boy and grew up a few miles from the Golden Spike Monument.

We finished that half and then went inside to warm up. How good to have a nice home in which to be during this weather. 

The third round of snow and possibly more ice was to start Wednesday and go into Thursday. Yippee!!

We spent Tuesday late afternoon and evening listening to the sleet hitting the house. I stuck my head out of the back door to the deck and took a bit of video of this sleet bouncing off the little table on the deck and sent it to the local news station, WKYT. 

We received a lovely card in the mail. It was from Agatha Fertitta. She owns Fertitta's Delicatessen where we ate our Muffy sandwiches in Shreveport, Louisiana. Then we proceeded to leave without paying. Our first ever UNintentional dine and dash. I sent her a note of apology with more than enough to cover our meals right after we got home. She received that note and sent me this one in return.

It felt very good to know we were forgiven for this error in judgement. I made a quick trip to the basement to pull out my old high school yearbooks. Agatha Fertitta was one year ahead of me in high school. We will definitely go back if and when we ever make back to Shreveport. 

Katelyn sent this picture of our sweet Raelyn working on her ABC's. She looks so diligent in getting it right. And, she looks very left-handed.

Wednesday, February 17, 2021, we had some sunshine in the morning. However, the weather told us to we were under a winter weather advisory from 7pm Wednesday through 7am Friday. Up to three inches of snow was anticipated. The kids were now on Day 7 of NTI. We had neighbors who posted on our neighborhood Facebook page that I-75 and the main streets in Georgetown were passable. Again, he confirmed that Hwy 32 didn't look like anything had be done to it. We have to drive Hwy 32 for about a mile and a half to get to I-75. We decided to take a leap of faith and go to Georgetown. I made up a treat bag for Papa. We drove in for that and also drove through Panera to get a salad for our meal of the day. Then back home. It felt good to get a treat bag to Papa. Bless his heart. 

We were happy to get back to our warm home. We were going to snuggle in and wait for Round 3 of this storm to hit Sadieville. This weather map was posted and pretty well shows the remarkable weather we have had during this week of storms. There are so many people without electricity. Texas has their own power grid and simply can't keep up with the need. We have family in Houston that had frozen pipes that burst in their garage. Family in Louisiana without power. People in southeastern Kentucky that have been pummeled with more ice that we got twice and now would have inches of snow on top of that ice. To get to the power lines in rural Kentucky, they often have to trek through the snowy slopes to get to the line. It is a grueling experience for the residents and the workers in the power company. I kept watching out the window to see our snow start in Sadieville. I went to be without more snow falling.

Thursday, February 18th, we woke up to more snow on the ground. Not sure how many inches but we probably got our 3-4 inches of just snow. 

Katelyn posted pictures of Miss Emelia watching a television show. She appears to be doing a peek-a-boo thing. 

In the afternoon we shoveled the driveway. Well, we completely cleared the half of that was had already been cleared a couple of days before. Then we cleared the snow off the ice on the other half of the driveway. We were hoping that the ice would eventually melt of its own accord. The first picture is near the garage door showing the depth of the ice. Claude put his size 12 foot by it to give some perspective. The second picture is shows the driveway with half with only ice that has to melt.

Hayden was anxious to watch the other two Lord of the Rings movies on the big screen. We told him we had to watch the weather as we would not be driving over on ice or snow. It appeared Friday would be a clear day allowing for some snow removal and maybe melting. Saturday would also be clear with rain coming on Saturday. I checked for options at two theaters near the Marx family. I gave those options to Claude. He picked his top three. I sent the top three of Claude's picks in order. Hayden chose the third. We would be off on Saturday to watch Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers and Lord of the Rings: Return of the King back to back. Hayden is one happy grandson. 

Friday, February 19, 2021, we determined a good day to stay inside and off the roads so road crews could clear. We had breakfast together and then I typed Papa a letter and worked on my Blog. Claude cleaned the kitchen and set up to watch Robert Duvall movies.

In cleaning the kitchen, Claude took out the drawer in which he keeps the potatoes. This drawer used to also have the onions stored in it. However, Alton Brown explained potatoes and onions should not be stored together and Claude made sure they were separated. Honestly, I can't remember the reason why. For all the years of me running out kitchen, I stored them together and we are all healthy. Anyway, I digress...Claude took the potato drawer out so he could pour out the onion skins still in there. As he looked to the back of where that drawer was in the cabinet, he found a lot of stuff. It appears a lot of napkins fell from the drawer above and were resting behind the drawer for the potatoes. 

The afternoon was spent with Robert Duvall (Lonesome Dove, Open Range and Broken Trail) and crocheting and reading.

Saturday, February 20, 2021, we had sunshine! Well, we had some clouds. But there was a bit of sunshine and it was most welcome. We had a date with Hayden to go to Tinseltown Theater in the evening. 

We first drove to Lexington to go to Hobby Lobby for me to get one more skein of yarn. Then back to Georgetown to drop off a treat bag for Papa. 

I was prepared to fill his birdfeeder but also well aware that, if the ice was still there after a week, I was not going to risk a fall to go to the back of the nursing home. How grateful I was to get there and find the walk to the back shoved and clear with ice melt pellets on it. Yippee!! I filled Papa's birdfeeder and then peeked in his window to find him sitting on the side of his be eating lunch. He smiled. I told him I filled the birdfeeder. This is mostly hand gestures with me yelling. He doesn't hear the yelling but he got the hand gestures. He told me he noticed the birdfeeder wasn't there and was wondering where it went. Now he understood I had it sitting on the ground to fill it. We blew kisses and waved. It does my heart good to see him smile.

Lunch was at Cook Out Burgers in Frankfort on our way to get Hayden. We got to LaGrange and checked into our hotel room. Then we went to the Marx home.

Bailey wanted to show us something in her bedroom. She had tacked the big red scarf with a picture of a turtle in the middle to her wall. We brought my guitar and the package of guitar strings downstairs with us. Claude would restring my guitar that Bailey is using to learn to play guitar. Hayden shows us a video of his Tuba/Euphonium concert. His High School has had an award winning band for years. This school year and the end of last school year they have really struggled to find a way to keep the kids playing with all the rules and restrictions for Covid-19. The tuba and euphonium section of the band were able to use a local church to record a 28 minute concert. It was so good to hear them play. Grateful for all these educators working so hard to make this happen. 

Then Hayden, Claude and I were off to Tinseltown. We had tickets for the 4:20 showing of Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. There was a good bit of time between that and the next movie. We went to the lobby and purchased food that was as close as we could get to a meal. All seating has been removed from the lobby of the theater, so we found a counter and made ourselves a little buffet. 

I'm not sure this was acceptable but we had to leave the theater so they could clean it before the next movie. This worked out well for us. As soon as the sign was on that seating was okay in the theater for Lord of the Rings: Return of the King, we went back to the theater sitting only a few seats down from where we sat the first time. We had a great time watching these two movies on the big screen. As we drove back to the Marx home to drop Hayden back, I asked him if he was a happy young man. With great gusto he declared himself very happy. It is so fun to share these little bits with the Mini's. Claude restringing Bailey's guitar and watching movies with Hayden. Good times as a family. Oh, and Claude made Rice Krispy Treats and took them to the Marx home, so Andie was also very happy!

We made our way to our hotel for the night and slept in this morning, Sunday, February 21,  before returning to Sadieville. We have enjoyed a quiet afternoon. I curled up on the loveseat in my sweat pants and winter sweater and finished reading a good book a friend recommended. It was by Debbie Macomber titled "A Walk Along the Beach". Not a heavy read at all but enjoyable. I believe I shall read the book Claude found about the Knights Templar next. Those guys fascinate me.

Time for a nice evening with the hubster.