Bet you thought I lost power yesterday when I stopped updating that blog post.

Wrong. I died of BOREDOM.

Snow is beautiful (it’s what we’re getting today) and it’s so much better than ice. But I am ready to throw in the towel on this winter business. I love cold weather. I love rain and thunderstorms. We’ve never reached a point where we had so much rain in Oklahoma that I have tired of it. I think I’d enjoy Seattle or London a lot.

This winter weather though? I’m tired of it. The whole thing might be different if I lived in a state that was equipped to take care of this kind of thing without any major hiccups. But the snow and ice are so rare that it doesn’t get handled very well. I know that the various groups in charge of taking care of things are working their hardest, but man oh man. I’m done. No chains to put on my tires. No back up source of heat if the power goes out. No place to get water if there’s a problem with a line (like there was this morning). First world problems, I know.

Unfortunately, this afternoon I made a deal with my husband that if he would watch William Shakespeare’s Romeo + Juliet, I would watch Dune. I should have realized whenever he laughed maniacally and said, “Yeah, I’ll definitely watch Romeo + Juliet if you’re going to watch Dune.”

We’re only 20 minutes in and the faint of heart need to be warned. (If any of my uber-squeamish cousins are reading this, stop NOW.) There is an alien in this movie whose mouth was clearly modeled after a cow’s girlie bits.

I’m going to collect quotable lines from this movie for your entertainment (and in italics, things that they should have said):

• “The itching becomes burning.”
• “There is a place terrifying to us…to women.”
• “Stains become a warning.”
• What up. I’m Sting. Look at me rockin’ this red hair and leather.
  
• “You are so beautiful, my baron. Your skin, love to me. Your diseases lovingly cared for, for all eternity.”
• Allow me to unplug your heart, bleed yourself all over me, and sexually assault you.
• Baby blue, was the color of her eyes…
  
  Baby Blue – George Strait
  
• “Spice. Pure, unrefined spice.”
• “I want to spit once on your head. Just some spittle in your face.”
• Let me now use a type of sign language that looks like a poor attempt at vogue-ing.
• “It’s yours to squeeze, as I promised! Squeeze! Squeeze! Squeeeeeze!”
• They’ve just told a man he must milk a cat every day for the rest of his life if he wants to live. I’m so confused.
• Let us fight them with our pelvic thrusts!

And that, friends, is pretty much how today has been.

People are calling it “Snowpocalypse” but we need to fix this. FREEZING RAIN, folks. That’s ice. Ice is so much worse than snow. So much more apocalyptic. Here I am, blogging the biggest ice storm to hit Oklahoma in 2010, so what if we’re only 28 days in. They’re comparing it to 2007 and I’m going to have to check my archives to see how I fared in that one. I think I stayed under the covers for days.

So far this morning I have:

• Taken what may be my last shower for days.
• Had what may be my last cup of coffee.
• Shaved my legs (muy importante)
• Finished up a good deal of laundry.

And I’m about to finish all these dishes and fill the tub, just in case. In a situation like this the last thing you want to be without is water to flush the toilet with. Memories of gathering buckets full of snow in 2001 to empty in the bathtub, melt, and pour in the back of the tank just for a flush are NOT something I ever want to relive.

What I’ve learned in my few years on this earth is very simple: if you would like rain, ask me to paint over a weekend; snow – allow my husband and I to plan a trip back to the east coast to visit his family. You’ll get that in no small amount. Yes, go ahead and thank us. This ice storm thing is new, but not surprising. It probably has something to do with the fact that we had a trip planned this weekend and my having my annual with Dr. G (for gyno).

You see, I’ve never had an appointment with Dr. G when there wasn’t a glassy sheet of ice covering the entire parking lot. I’m a’tellin’ ya. Not to mention the fact I’m always waiting a while in the exam room because there’s something about a good ice storm that makes babies’ heads turn south and prepare for landing. A little bit like cows.

I’ll be updating as I can. When I feel like it. Until everything goes click and I suddenly have so much time to read.

Stay safe!

5:45AM - Thank the Lord, Norman has canceled school. No, I don’t want to make this up later, but I can’t imagine what kind of day it would have been if we’d had school.
6:39AM – Rain in Norman.
6:56AM - Placing lighters and candles where I will remember, in case this thing gets started before the sun is good and up. Who am I kidding. We won’t see the sun for days…
7:30AM – Mom and Dad called to invite us down to stay while our window for travel is still open. I declined, even though they do have a generator. You get in the country and you’re way more likely to go without water. I told Dad what I’d been doing to prepare. He said it sounds like we’ve got things under control. That’s a big deal.
7:34AM – Nosebleed. Weird. I never have nosebleeds. This would be a bad time for a brain aneurysm.
8:44AM – I joke about aneurysms too much.
9:25AM – I have a sick fascination with non-stop coverage of bad weather. Think I was born with it.
9:26AM - Also, husband still in bed.
9:50AM – Whew. Gary England has made it to the studio. We’ll all be okay
12:02PM - Chili on the stove. Still have power. The freezing rain is coming down really hard now.
2:32PM – It actually is treacherous here in Norman. Tree branches are trying so hard not to touch the ground. I’m watching the Jason Bourne movies and reading The Redneck Diva’s post (thanks for the shoutout, lady!) about the Icepocalypse. Told you it was a better name.
3:20PM – Mom called. Exciting stuff down there. A branch fell on a line and caught on fire so my dad shot it out of the tree. The day was saved.
3:24PM - Also, they are now without power. This has nothing to do with the last update.