News From The Rut

Snow day #12 dawns tomorrow. Surely we'll get back to school on Monday. I swear, if a kid says, "How was your Christmas?" I'm going to think, 'Christmas! That was ages ago!'

The trash company called and said they'd pick up next week on their regular schedule, and allow double trash. Seriously? Every time they miss a week, you can bet I put out double trash. What the not-heaven are we supposed to do, ya mo-ron? Oops! That was Stork, in Animal House. But still. How dare they think they can skip a pick-up, and NOT let us put out that week's trash, even though we paid for it. I don't exactly notice them giving me a refund on my quarterly bill for every time they miss a pick-up. In fact, every bill is more money due to "increased fuel costs" and never adjusted when fuel costs go down for a couple of weeks. There's big money in trash.

My mom the cockeyed optimist thinks that rain overnight is going to melt all the snow out of her driveway and off her roads. True, she only has about 7 inches to our 12, but I don't think that's happenin'. Especially since the temp only got up to 30 degrees by 3:30. I told her I'd run by and take her out for a while tomorrow. Because I'm off school, you know. Surely the rain will make the covered roads slushy. Not slicker than snot. Right? I'm sounding more like Mom every day.

The Pony does not even get excited now when we get that magic phone-tree text. It's supposed to be a call. But the branch above me, the one right off the main trunk, does not call Mrs. Hillbilly Mom. I suppose Mrs. HM is not worthy of fifteen seconds of his time. Instead, he has given his wife standing orders to text me. Yeah. That might work for normal people, but around Hillmomba, land of no cell reception, that means that my phone must lay upstairs to get a signal, while I am down in my dark basement lair. Even The Pony, with his horse-donkey-like ears, cannot always hear that little "blip" when a text comes through. I've taken to sending him up every half hour after 2:00 to check on it. One night we didn't get the info until 5:00. Yesterday it came in at 2:02, so I was right on top of it. I don't know why I feel guilty about not notifying the branch below me soon enough. After all, her elementary daughter answers most of the time. I think we need a chain of offspring to pass along the info.

Mabel, as you lay back and revel in your retirement, I can't help but think you might feel just a tiny bit envious of me, getting that exciting call for an unplanned day off. Because really, how fun can it be looking forward to having EVERY tomorrow off?