Snowbound
ah...my lovelies! How are you? No, seriously, how are you? You think that's a question I just toss off carelessly? I really want to know. I'm interested.
I am beginning to develop a severe case of cabin fever and possibly a cold as well. It's just been snowing and snowing and snowing and there is a drift currently propped up against the arched gate to my backyard which towers well over my head and may soon pose an avalanche threat to all who venture near. Which would be more of a concern if people were actually venturing about, but they're not. It hard to venture 'bout with five foot drifts stacked haphazardly every where.
The snow in the park is tremendously deep and heavy. It's past my knees and past the wolf's belly. She moves through it like a furry black porpoise, bouncing and bobbing while snow sprays around her like water. My goal on our walks these days is to seek out the nearest dead branch, break it apart into pieces and then wade out into the middle of an open field. There I stand in the center, tossing sticks this way and that, the wolf in gleeful pursuit, bouncing and tunneling and wagging furiously. Then we trudge back to the car and spend the next half an hour creating sludgy puddles about the house as snow melts off our shoes and paws and mitts and tails. (That's right... have I forgotten to mention it before? I have a tail! Yes indeed. It's lush and plume-y, but sometimes presents a bit of a hazard such as when I get excited and it knocks glasses off the coffee table.)
I feel hemmed in, imprisoned by snow and cold and the struggle to get anywhere. It's tiresome. I'm so ready for spring.
My obsession with rootbeer continues unabated. I continue to pine for tulips and daffodils and spritely flowering things. Also continuing my love affair with children's literature. I've advanced from Beatrix Potter to Noel Streatfeild's Ballet Shoes. And I'm thinking about creating a whole portfolio around those children's books I loved (love) the most and classic nursery rhymes.
Speaking of Ballet Shoes, on wednesday night, I was propped up in bed, the wolf snuggled at my heat ( I meant feet, but heat works too), the husband downstairs doing all the puttering before bed things he does, reading the last few pages when up on the roof there arose such a clatter I sprang from my bed to see what was the matter.
There was a crash and an ungodly thump and then a series of fearsome bump bump bumps that seemed to be coming from the roof directly over my head and continued down the side of the house. I jumped. The wolf jumped. Jack yelled from downstairs "Are you okay?", thinking I'd fallen from bed or something.
I rushed to the window, half expecting to see santa and at least three reindeer planted ruefully in the snow bank below. But no. There was nothing in the snow bank but snow, smooth wind sculpted snow easing around the big cedar tree in the front garden.
A bit shaken, I made Jack do a walk round the house inspecting for burglars and airplane engines whilst i sat upright and wide-eyed in the centre of the bed, trying to comfort the wolf who was literally shaking under the covers.
He found nothing, not even a fallen icicle.
It's all very mysterious. I can't imagine what was clamouring on my roof. Leprachauns rehearsing for St.Patrick's Day, possibly... really large and over weight leprachauns. A cloven hooved beastie that was terrorizing the neighborhood, leaping from rooftop to rooftop, wrecking havoc on the shingles...perhaps?
Or as Soonerhas suggested, perhaps it was one of those great flapping flying turtles, winging slowly southward, who lost momentum suddenly and crashed gracelessly on my rooftop. And though we have yet to find a turtlle-shaped hole in the snow, Sooner is convinced that the wayward flying turtle is tunneling beneath my house even as I type this, bent on laying its eggs below. He's advising that I take all cautious measures, including turtle netting to prevent them from attacking us while we sleep. I'm complying and have purchased not only turtle netting, but six rolls of duct tape as well.
But that got me to thinking.... what is the collective noun for a bunch of attacking turtles? Sooner provided the answers there too: It's a bale. A bale of turtles. And he directed me to this site where I found these delightful phrases:
� a skulk of foxes
� a charm of goldfinches
� a parliment of owls
� a labour of moles
� a knot of toads
and every so many more.
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