Happy Hour Chatter

.... I hope! I look outside and I see the 16 inches of snow on the ground, and cringe! It's white, it's wet, it's moisture we don't need right now. I pray for my brother's home. I pray that what we did on Sunday is enough to protect the homes in Adrian. There are all kinds of thoughts thrown out on an hourly basis: 1) There isn't that much water content in the snow 2) Snow is better than rain 3) I hope we don't get a fast warm-up 4) We haven't seen the last of it yet 5) Let's hope we have a traditional ND spring... 6) Shit!!!! (That's my personal favorite by the way!) No matter which way you look at it, we've been in the grip of winter for 5 months now, and we're all tired of it. You can see the look of despair on any given pair of eyes. We're hearty souls and can take most anything thrown at us, but really...this is too much! I'm here, once more, staying at my sister's house. She has been truly wonderful, yet again. I...

Thank goodness for cold weather - sort of. The river is slowing down (frozen) and the water has receded from my brother's home. A HUGE sigh of relief. For those of you sending your concern via email - we are doing alright and I thank you for your prayers and thoughts. It is truely appreciated and brings a smile to my face to read your email. My brother is cautiously optimistic that things will level out, however - as we all know, that which is frozen must unthaw at some point. The Corps was touring my brother's area on Friday, after he expressed strong concern about their intent to release water from the two dams which will directly affect the homes downstream (including my brother's). At least they are willing to listen and take in to consideration the flood-weary folk who just do not want to lose their homes. I'm going to head back to my brother's on Sunday to do some more prepatory sandbagging, just in case he needs to lay another layer. If he needs them,...

This was sent to me by one of my "yoga buddies" on Thursday morning. I was so frazzled and stressed, but when I opened her email and read it, I laughed so hard! I felt a little better and emailed her to tell her that her particular sense of humor was exactly what I needed. I'm going to share it with you, in hopes that it will lift your spirits also. **~*~***~****~***~****~****~*****~*~*~*~*~*~*~**~*~*~*~**~*~*~*~**~*~*~*~*~**~ There will be a party at my house on Saturday at 6pm in celebration of Spring. Please RSVP your intent to attend. Activities to include croquet tournament in the backyard. BYO hairdryer and extention cord. When we have located Spring the festivities will commence. Hope to see you all there! Georgia

We managed to hold off the water on Tuesday night/Wednesday morning. It was pretty scary though. We laid another row of sandbags at approximately 11:00 pm (in the dark, in the rain/snow). The water was rising rapidly at about ¾ of an inch every ½ hr. Insane! At that point, we had done everything that we could do. After several phone calls to my brother in Germany, we made the conscious decision to leave the house and climb to higher, safer ground. During daylight hours it was scary, but by darkness it was downright frightening. We couldn' see what was coming at us. We waded out of there in 2 ft of icy water and a snow storm – saying prayers that when we returned the next morning, the main floor would be dry. Sleep didn’t come easily to any of us. We bunked down in the office of the local elevator – which was the communities flood control center. Marna and I made the decision to go back to the house early the next morning to check on how it fared the night. We again wa...

Well, it has been a day and a half. We were in a holding pattern until around 11:00am - trying to decide if we should, or shouldn't sandbag. I was pushing for sandbagging as I'm all about being proactive rather than reactive. We finally made the decision to go for it and started filling sandbags. We had about 200 filled when reinforcements arrived from Terry's worksite. Awesome people! My brother was calling every so often to see how we were doing and to check and make sure things were going alright. I felt so sorry for him when I spoke to him. He's in Germany on business and will not be home until Friday. We filled 2000 bags and we have another 2000 (hopefully) on reserve. They are sitting at the local elevator - which is flood central for other residents of Adrian who are in the same boat. I made a trip to Jamestown to pick up plugs for the toilets and drains. I'm making a mental note to make sure that I thank our good friend Neil for coming in to his pl...

Place 1 large beef roast in roasting pan. Place 2 small beef roast in roasting pan. Stick in oven, crank up the heat. When small roast is burnt, the large roast is ready to eat! MY kind of cooking instructions!

I made it through Monday! (Does happy dance here!). I am typically alright with going to work on Mondays, but it seems that the longer the winter drags on, the less enthused I am about getting back in to the grind of another work week. I love my job, don't get me wrong...it's just that sometimes the people wear a little bit on my nerves. The COS said, "remember, thick skin." To which I promptly replied, "Give me a break! It's Monday....I'll develop thick skin tomorrow!" He wasn't amused. For that matter, neither was I. (shrugs) At least the sun is shining and it was a toasty 45 today! Rock on! I have spring fever sooooo bad right now. It is in sight! IF we can manage to escape any snowstorms or rainstorms in the next three weeks, I think we'll be home free! I am choosing to ignore the peeps that say that there is another major storm headed our direction. I want to know how the bleepin heck they can predict where it's going to land when it...

What a day, eh?? I tell you what, if you weren't holding on to your hat today, most likely it was in MN by now! I'm sitting here typing this while at my sister's house. She is a gracious host and has pretty much been letting me stay rent free all winter long. Of course, I DO give her a ride to work so that she doesn't have to get her car out of the garage and fight the ugly streets. Everything navigates better in a 4-wheel drive - except my wonderful country roads, of course. Tonight I picked up my nephew Blaine and brought him over to Peggy's as well. He is a joy to be around and - in fact - is watching me type this! (Say "HI" Blaine!) We had a wonderful supper of roast pork, smashed potatoes, creamed cabbage, corn, and these scrumptious rice krispie bars covered in chocolate. We all pretty much decided that any food consumed during a blizzard doesn't have any calories! Yeah! Hey! We got to find SOMETHING good about this damn blizzard. I...

Everywhere I look...stuff, stuff, STUFF!!!!! Argggggggghhhhhhhh! How did I manage to accumulate so much stuff?! Those who know me, know that my house isn't huge. So, what stuff I DO have looks like clutter! I'm going on record here and saying I hate clutter - which translates to "I have TOO MUCH STUFF!" ~L~ I have found this lovely channel called HGTV. LOVE IT /(HATE IT!!!) "Why" you ask? Cuz, it makes me woefully aware of how NOT perfect my house is! I watch them transform these ordinary looking rooms/houses (you know the ones, the ones that look like MINE!) and I get to thinking, I can do that to make "this look better" or "that would look great in my house". THEN I stress because, "when am I going to do THAT to make THIS look better?" or "yeah right, suzy-craftsman I am not!" ~L~ THEN, to top it all off....when I DO try and get rid of my "stuff", hubster brings it back in to the house cuz "...

Too long, in fact. I have been quite busy with my yoga classes - which is a good thing. I've picked up a 3rd class teaching yoga to the local college soccer teams (mens & womens). The coach stated that he wanted an athletic type of class which focused on flexibility and balance and was I "up for it?" Well.....duh! Yoga is a passion of mine, and how could I not want to share it with a bunch of 20 somethings. Unfortunately, the class would be on Thursdays after my regular basics and happy hour classes. I was up for it, but was my body? That was the question. I must say, I handled the 1st class well and earned a thumbs-up from the coach. I believe the students were a bit taken aback also - perhaps not expecting the type of class format that I teach. That is all good though - I like to keep them guessing. Winter weather is a sore subject with me. I was stormed in to town yet again this last Thursday. I called my sister Peg to see if room 402 at the Inn was av...