3 Week Review

I go back to work this afternoon. It will be very strange after being away for the last three weeks. I've missed the kids a bit, but had a good time with my own family.

December 12th was the last day I worked. All that week there was a little snow and ice on the road, and as usual, it paralyzed the entire metro area. We did not get the big, record-breaking snowstorm until the 20th. Before that, it would not have been difficult for me to get to work, but since the schools were closed, it would have been sort of pointless to show up.

Every time we get a snow storm, (and it happens almost every single winter... go figure, we're on the 35th parallel in the Northern Hemisphere and it's winter) all the politicians and government types wring their hands and say, "Oh this is sooo unusual! We just don't have the resources to deal with it!" Then they flap their wings and run in a circle, squawking loudly, "The sky is falling! The sky is falling!"

This is usually followed by some moron (this time it was Sam Adams, the new mayor of manic, pass-the-granola-and-let's-all-sing-Kum-ba-ya Portland) saying something like, "Gosh golly! For us to cope with this kind of trouble, I think we may need to raise taxes!" He then added the obligatory comments about 'climate change' and speculated that 'this may happen every year'.

No shit, Sherlock. It really has nothing to do with the imaginary specter of climate change (which, if you did not know, are the words that have replaced global warming... an equally meaningless phrase.) See above, Sam. We're on the 35th parallel and it's WINTER. My gawd, what a dumbass.

Now people who can actually think (meaning those who do not hold public office) come up with ideas like this one... we have fleets of vehicles already bought and paid for with our money. How about ordering a set of tire chains, a snowplow attachment and a friggin' bag of salt for some of them? This latest storm once again showed how totally unprepared Gresham and Portland and surrounding areas really are.

In an utterly amazing show, ODOT decided to plow the I-5 freeway DURING EVENING RUSH HOUR... TWO DAYS IN A ROW!! Now you'd think that all the screaming from the public after the first day would have clued them in, but again, we're talking about elected officials, most of whom are dumber than a box of hair.

Traffic was backed up for 20 miles. Dave Thompson, a former reporter turned ODOT spokesman actually said that it would "help people get home faster in the long run." Had he stood next to the I-5 freeway to say it, I bet he would have found out in a big hurry that the general populace isn't all that far removed from savagery and have not forgotten how to tar and feather someone.

During this "unusual storm" emergency vehicles could not get to people who needed help. The major roads were plowed, but side streets were not. To compound the stupidity, each time the main road was scraped, the three foot berm blocking each side street got taller. The mayor of Gresham declared a state of emergency and called in the National Guard. They brought their Humvees to Gresham to act as ambulances since ours could not get in or out of neighborhoods.

EVERY time this happens, people are stuck wherever they were when it hit. The majority of vehicles that were stuck were those trying to get out of their neighborhoods for groceries. And of course since it was the week before Christmas, many of them hadn't finished their shopping.

They all expected the government to help them. Moral of the story? If you think the people in charge are there to help you in this or any situation, you're deluded.

Quick... name a time that the government actually helped you or anyone else! I'll wait.

:::crickets:::

Couldn't think of anything? Well DUH! They're completely clueless. When (not if) this happens again, none of them will have learned anything from the experience, and once again, all of us will be on our own. That's why you should stock up on food. That's why you need an alternative source of heat. Candles. Batteries. Flashlights. Your cell phone should be charged up. You should be prepared to spend as much as two weeks cut off from grocery stores and work.

Am I complaining? No, not really. I don't expect elected officials to be anything other than what they are. Useless.
They can't help it. It's their nature.

I just plan to be self-sufficient and get a big kick out of watching the news reports. Our local reporters are something else. What, I am not sure.

It was nice to have those days off.

Not helpful on the paycheck, but you know, things always work out. I just refuse to spend much time worrying about it.

Eric was not working either. Now he had to use a large portion of his vacation time so that we can keep eating and keep the roof over our heads, but I'm just really glad he *had* the time to use.

We had our Christmas shopping done. I didn't buy a whole lot this year. I had ordered some stuff for Matt's stocking that did not arrive in time due to the storm, (there was no mail delivery, no UPS, no FedEx for several days) but I cut the pictures of the items out of the Think Geek catalog and put those in his stocking instead.

I had some vague plans about getting some things done, but since Eric was home, I did not follow up.

Instead, we played Scrabble and Cribbage. We hung out together. We re-watched the entire Firefly series and watched Serenity and once again marveled over the fact that such a good series was canceled.

I went Goodwill hunting a few times. Took Tami with me one day and had so much fun. It's always an experience to hang out with her, she's very irreverent ( I know... can you imagine me hanging out with someone like that?) and I can tell her anything. We laugh a lot.

I sat by the fire in the living room a lot. I cooked. Eric cooked. I did some scrapbooking. I sat here at the computer and sorted some photographs. Uploaded them to Snapfish. I got my first digital camera in December 2005. There are thousands of photos in the external hard drive that's hooked up to this computer. Many of them are of my Girl Scout troop. I'm trying to save the ones I want and dump the rest. No reason to keep them all, or at least no reason I can think of.

When I was chatting online with my friend Raisy, and mentioned that I really didn't get anything done over the last three weeks, she pointed out that housework will always be here. That in 20 years I won't care whether or not I got the house clean, but that I'll be really glad that I spent that time hanging out with my family.

She's partially right. I'm really glad I had that time with my family. But I won't have to wait 20 years not to care whether or not I got everything done.

I already don't care. :)