Reports of my demise have been greatly exaggerated.

Sorry, Gang.

I just wanted to let y'all know that I am not, in fact, dead.

I know I've been shitty about updating this thing but life has been slightly insane lately.

A brief rundown of reasons for not writing-

1. I've been promoted to Director of my division at work. This may not seem like a hardship, but it's been rough. I was hired as a part-time tech trainer about 6 months ago. I was then promoted to office manager, but they didn't hire a new tech trainer so I was doing 2 jobs. Now I've been promoted to Director but we still haven't hired anyone new so I'm now doing 3 jobs and I'm going rapidly insane.

2. We're pregnant and we just found out it's a boy. Again, this is in no way a hardship, but it's taking a great deal of my mental faculties to deal with all the associated stuff on a day-to-day basis.

3. I'm a lazy bastard.

Anyway, I PROMISE I'll try to do better from now on. And on that note...

I HATE WINTER!!!!!!!

I cannot state this strongly enough. I know, you're saying, "Why the **** do you live in Michigan, then, dumbass???"

But I agreed to move back to MI (where I grew up) from Miami (where I went to college) when I got engaged. S.A. is also from Michigan and she stated, quite emphatically, that she was NOT going to live and have children in Miami. So we moved. However, days like the past couple
give me serious doubts about the wisdom of that decision.

I assume that, if you're a regular reader of S.A.'s blog, you've read a nice romantic view of the beauty of Northern Michigan under a layer of new-fallen snow. (I assume, because I haven't had time to read her blog lately.) I, on the other hand, will give you a more realistic view of things.

S.A. and I went to leave for work yesterday morning and found that, due to the 15" of snow we'd received overnight, there was absolutely no way we were going to be able to get our cars out of the driveway. I called my uncle, who lives a couple blocks away, and asked him if he could drive S.A. to work so she wouldn't be too late. He happily did so. And I went about trying to shove my driveway so I could leave.

All my life, I assumed that a paved driveway would be easier to keep clean during the winter. This is, of course, because I grew up with a long gravel driveway. The grass is always greener and all that jazz. I may have been correct. However, I did not take into account, when we moved into our house, that a paved driveway that goes dramatically uphill as it leads to the road is swiftly converted to an ice rink, from which no 2-wheel-drive car can escape, unless you are extremely diligent about plowing and salting. I'm not diligent.

More to the point, I didn't own a snow blower and the driveway is rather long, so shoveling over a foot of snow from it before work in the morning is a difficult proposition. However, as there did not seem to be any other option, I went to it.

I shoveled for about 20 minutes before I heard the sound of a tractor starting in my neighbor’s barn. I turned around and out he came, riding his John Deere. He buzzed up and down the driveway (Okay, maybe rumbled is a better term.) and signaled to me that the driveway was clear and I could now leave.

In reality, the only CLEAR part of the driveway was the layer of ice covering the pavement. I barely touch the gas and my wheels began to spin. Needless to say, I was still going nowhere. Obviously feeling pity for me, he backed his tractor up to my rear bumper, pushing the rear blade right up against my car are proceeded to push me up my driveway. Had I any pride at all, it might have been somewhat embarrassing.

By the afternoon, I had arranged to purchase a new snow blower. Unfortunately, snow blowers do not fit in the trunk of a '98 Nissan Sentra, so I also had to find someone with a vehicle to help me bring my new beast home. Since I was having significant difficulty finding anyone available before 5pm, when the store closed, I decided to attempt to use my uncle's 2-wheel-drive pickup. All of you who have tried to drive a 2-wheel-drive up a steep, extremely icy hill say it with me now.

Bloody moron.

I succeeded in fishtailing the truck ridiculously close to the front door of my house and only stopped when I realized that 6 more inches and I going to be parked in our entryway. I then called my dad and begged him to stop what he was doing and help me pick up my snow blower and move the truck back where it belonged. Thankfully, he complied.

I finished blowing the driveway at about 8pm. But not until I'd gotten another of our cars stuck and un-stuck.

I HATE winter.

Laterz