Dec. 21: It sucks to be me

We’ve got no less than one foot of snow on the ground here in Clackamas/Happy Valley. A foot! We haven’t had this much snow in, like, forever. Most of today there was freezing rain, which created a hard, thick shell on top of all the snow. Then this evening it snowed at least another inch. This all stopped being fun a long time ago.

Mom made it up from Medford fine yesterday. Traveling up I-5 was clear and easy until she got to Salem, where the roads were suddenly covered with packed snow. She has snow tires but it still took her an extra long time to drive that last hour; she got here in one piece and that’s the important thing. Of course, her car is completely frozen now, and we can’t get into her trunk to get our Christmas gifts (so she says)…

Gilly, Mom’s giant puppy, was not a big hit with Millie. She disappeared for most of yesterday after he got here. We found her at the front door last night, smelling like a campfire. I have NO idea where she spent the day. She’s been shut in our bedroom all day today because we don’t want her to sneak out again before we leave tomorrow. Poor kitty. She’s confused and lonely and nervous whenever she hears Gilly’s huge bark.

We’re not sure what’s going to happen with our plans for tomorrow. We’re supposed to take off for Sunriver but we’re not sure the roads are even drivable right now. I guess we’ll just check forecasts and road conditions in the morning and decide then.

Daryl and Sally’s flight from Boston was cancelled yesterday and they can’t get to Portland until Tuesday. Then they’ll have the drive to Sunriver; we’re not sure we’ll be with them on Christmas Day, but we’re hoping everything will work out as planned.

OK, it doesn’t really suck to be me. I’ve got my mom here and even if we can’t get to central Oregon I know we’ll spend Christmas with family. The snow will probably disappear before we run out of groceries. The kitty will either get used to Gilly or show him who’s boss. And when we’re inside our warm house, sitting around the Christmas tree with our bellies full of yummy holiday food, the view of our snow-covered street is really quite beautiful.

Whether we make it to Sunriver or not, I’ll be posting occasionally. The Sunriver house has wi-fi. Gotta love it.