Medium Dawn Felagund of the Fountain

Well, we got the big snow as promised. I don't know how much we got, but it was a lot. There was a lot of blowing and drifting last night, so it'd be hard to tell, even if I was willing to venture outside, which I have not so far. Schools were closed today after an early dismissal yesterday.

This was our back deck this morning. It's still snowing lightly, but we're not supposed to get more than a few more inches today.



Bobby took these pictures of the Wilds last night; he took them out to play in the snow. They are both like little children and get giddy when we have fresh snow falling.

Lancelot.





Guineweird.





On a completely unrelated note, I have enough fannish stuff to report that I'm actually going to use a bulleted list. Whoa.

• I wrote an essay for the B2MeM prompt "Analyze a Chapter or Passage." I chose to compare the death scenes of Fëanor and Fingolfin, looking particularly at the evidence those passages provide for historical bias. The result: The Deaths of Kings: Historical Bias in the Death Scenes of Fëanor and Fingolfin.



• For the personal essay B2MeM prompt, I wrote a personal essay (duh) called Mountains between the Light and the World: On Walls and Greed and the Privilege of Isolation. Warning: It gets into my personal politics, particularly my musings on why I've always been so bothered by the hoarding of light in The Silmarillion and how contrary to my political and personal values that idea is.



• There's a new SWG challenge up. We're explicitly encouraging participants to combine our prompt with one of the other challenges going on. There's lots of challenges going on in the next month.



• Last week, I almost died when I was Googling for a link to Attainable Vistas and, in the process, stumbled on this review of the issue of JTR and my essay in particular. The review called it "one of the best -- if not the best -- article on Tolkien written this year." What?! The writer is a Tolkien scholar, so he liked the first half--about historical bias--more than the second about fandom. Which I'd agree: the historical bias stuff is more generally interesting and relevant to an audience familiar with Tolkien. The fandom stuff is more for the connoisseurs, as it were. :D One of the things I found about traditional publication versus fannish publication is that the relative silence that meets a traditionally published work makes me wonder sometimes if what I wrote is even being read. (There wasn't absolute silence around "Attainable Vistas," but the chatter all came from fandom--go figure!) I was pleased to know that my work was not only read but clearly appreciated. It was a really pleasant surprise.



• Speaking of "Attainable Vistas," I will be presenting the unpublished parts of that paper at the Vermont Tolkien Conference in just a few weeks. I received official registration information a few days ago, so it's really happening. No fandom stuff this time--just historical bias!



• I have most of the rest of my B2MeM path planned out or underway. Let me say again how nice it has been to participate in B2MeM this year. I almost never get to participate outside of volunteering. But I get to listen to people participating complain about participating, feeling like the kid whose family never goes on vacation listening to her friends gripe about having to spend a week in Paris. I've really enjoyed getting to focus on my research and writing; I usually need an excuse to do this, and B2MeM has been a great excuse. It's improved my mood toward B2MeM immensely as well. I will confess that this is the fandom project where I am always the closest to burning out--thank goodness for Indy taking the reins these past few years!



• Not really related to fandom, but while Googling my article the other night, I found that my university has also published my thesis. So you can read it if you want to. Some people said they wanted to! It's been downloaded 21 times, which is pretty amazing in itself.

Well, report card grades are due today, and I still have a little left to do to make that happen, so off I go!

It was bitterly cold outside today, barely passing 0F/-18C with wind chills between -10 and -30F (-23 to -34C) here in the valley. Bobby showed me a picture this morning of a whiteboard at Jay Peak, warning staff that wind chills on the mountain were -58F/-50C!

Of course, he went up anyway and rode for about two hours and came home with some frostnip on his nose. There was a sign at the top of the lift, announcing that temperatures in the waterpark were 100F warmer than on the mountain.

We were almost completely without snow thanks to the springlike weather at the start of February break but got a surprise few inches the other morning--enough to make things pretty again. However, the lack of snow also means a lack of insulation around the house, so we came home from a Vermont Family Theater performance of Into the Woods tonight to find we didn't have water because the pipe running from the well into the house had frozen. This happened once before, and Bobby crawled under the house (not as weird as it sounds if you remember we live in a mobile!) and warmed the pipe with a space heater, and we were fine again within minutes. This was New Years Eve, and our friends that night teased us that we'd earned another stripe as Vermont residents by having to thaw our pipes with a space heater. Tonight, it was much colder and windier and without that helpful layer of insulating snow, and our little heater just ain't cuttin it.

Bobby just got off the phone with the plumber, who told him that we're the eighth call tonight from a mobile with frozen pipes, and he's gotten two calls from people whose oil tanks have frozen. He says we'll be fine till he gets a heater free to come thaw us out; we just won't have running water (we have filtered water in the fridge, so we have water to drink and for the Goldens); such is life sometimes when you live on a well.

However, of course, as soon as I heard that, my hands felt dirty and wanted washing.

We're under a winter storm watch for the middle of next week. If we're going to have the bitter cold, I'd rather have the snow as well. Bobby's hoping for it, of course. But we've learned since living here that the weather prediction is far less reliable than in Maryland, so we'll have to wait and see. The snowfall the other night was not predicted; everyone was surprised to wake up and find the world blanketed in white again. Since they're saying we could get a lot out of this thing next week, we'll probably get almost nothing.

I can hear the wind outside right now, howling like a ghost.

Baltimore officially broke the record for the most snowfall out of a single storm, so this was officially The Most Epic Snowstorm Ever^TM Or At Least Since Records of Such Have Been Kept Because I'm Pretty Sure More Epic Snowstorms Happened Before But Just Weren't Written Down. Here in Manchester, the National Weather Service tells us that we received 32 in/81 cm of white powdery goodness. However, I can speak from experience that snowfall numbers from this storm are going to be unreliable because of the wind. When I checked NWS snowfall totals yesterday, Lineboro--a town five minutes away that shares our zip code--supposedly had 4 in/10 cm more than we did, which is unlikely. The wind was just blowing it around, so an accurate measure was difficult to impossible.

Let's just settle for saying we got a lot of snow.

( Read more... )

We left Liberty at around 12:30 today. Bobby had been talking with our friend Dawn, who lives in town and was watching the Goldens, for the two days while we were gone. Last night, she informed him that the town had run out of salt and so wasn't able to salt the streets. We live within town limits (barely), so the town does our street. We also live at the top of a huge hill; continue up our street past our house, and you look out at the mountains from the highest point in Carroll County. So getting home with the Yaris if the roads were not salted could prove treacherous. Given that, we decided to wait till later in the day, to let the town hopefully get their hands on some salt and, at the very least, let the sun do its work.

Once we were off Route 140, the roads weren't great: still snow-covered in places and a slushy mess in others. This seems to be the MO lately. I don't know what's going on and why it is lately taking so long to clear big roads after a snowfall. Bobby saw something online where a lot of plow drivers were commenting that they hadn't even been called out for this storm; apparently, the state is trying to save money. Wonderful ... because Marylanders aren't perilous enough on the roads when it snows. Ironically, for all of our worry about Manchester, once we crossed into town, the roads were beautiful. I guess they got a hold of some salt. They always do a good job on the roads, and this is definitely one of the perks of living in town. (They also vacuum up the leaves in the fall and pick up Christmas trees, brush, and bulk trash for free.)

Our driveway was, of course, completely inaccessible, since it had a foot of snow as well as a nice pile from the plow at the bottom of it. We parked in Neighbor Bob's driveway while Bobby went to get the snowblower going. And guess what wouldn't start? It is not our luck, it seems, to have motorized things start as they should when we need them in inclement weather. Bah. So we both grabbed shovels and went to work. Luckily, it was a light, powdery snow, and we quickly cleared enough space to park the car and a path to the front door.

Of course, once we were inside, Bobby went to start the truck, and naturally, now that we don't need it, it started right away. And today is much colder than it was on Wednesday; my only hypothesis is that it wouldn't start because of the rain. I don't know enough about cars to know what might be affected by rain that would cause a car not to start, but it's the only thing different between Wednesday and today that makes any inkling of sense.

The official snowfall for Manchester was 11.8 inches/30 cm. Bobby showed me a chart from the National Weather Service last night that ranked the reported snowfall in various locations. Check out who's sitting pretty at #6.




Boo-yah, Manchester, in the top ten! I did see an unofficial report from the NWS with a report of 12.5" from Lineboro, which is the next town east of us, although they share our zip code. I'm not sure if they weren't included because of that or because the report came via CoCoRaHS and not from an NWS-trained spotter. (I am an NWS-trained spotter, yo. Although I haven't actually done anything with that for a couple of years now. After my MA, yaddayadda.) But then there's our friends in Westminster in eighth place! (I don't know where Funkstown is except that it is west of us--in Frederick or Washington County, I think; I used to know when I still assigned parole retake warrants and could tell you where every one-horse town in Maryland was located but that knowledge faded pretty fast--but I always imagine everyone there walks around in bellbottoms and platform shoes.)

My dad swears that Manchester is the coldest place in central Maryland. He insists that when Manchester [rarely] gets a spot on the evening news' weather map, it is always the coldest. I don't watch the evening news, but Manchester does have something of a microclimate. It is colder here, and we do get (and keep) more snow as a result. Not only are we pretty much as far north as one can go in Maryland--I like to joke that I can stand on my front porch and spit into PA--but we have a high elevation relative to the surrounding area. Our house stands at 1040 feet/317 meters above sea level. As noted above, the highest point in Carroll County is just up the road from us; to offer a point of comparison, my parents also live adjacent to the highest point in Baltimore County (the next county east of us), which is 505 feet/154 meters above sea level. Driving west on I-70, you have to go quite a ways into the mountains before the elevation signs show that you're above where our house sits. So it is not unusual, when driving from the bottom of the hill to our house near the top, to watch the thermometer in the car click down 2-3 degrees F as we drive.

With the driveway clear, we enjoyed the nicely cleared town roads as we drove into town to pick up the Goldens. We had a pristine backyard to let them out into; I took a video because they're funny in the snow. Apologies for the jiggly camera work; I was very often looking at something other than the camera.




In summary, these past two days have been awesome, despite first the truck and then the snowblower not starting. I was a good girl the other day and did download the syllabus for my next class, and I got one book read (Frankenstein) and two pages of notes typed up on it. I also got to play around a lot online, so it has not been all work and no play (for which I would get in trouble with a few people around these parts). And Bobby snowboarded for literally 15 hours, which seems ridiculous to me but makes him so very happy.

It is presently icing/sleeting outside and has been for now going on 12 hours. Schools are already delayed two hours tomorrow morning with "morning reevaluation," which means that they're at least considering closing altogether. I can always use a snow day; I always have stuff to do. I finished the short article based on my Mythmoot presentation and turned it in yesterday; today was the SWG newsletter; tomorrow could be revising and turning in my article on the SWG for the Signum University Eagle. That would put me in a really good place. So ... *crosses fingers*

It's March One, so ... B2MeM! I think probably everyone here who is Tolkienish has heard about it, but if you have not, check it out. It's a great event this year, which I can say without feeling like I'm tooting my own horn since I am not running it this year and had almost nothing to do with planning it: a marketplace format, where participants "sell" and "buy" prompts using imaginary coin. There are many, many excellent prompts. As a mod, I get an email for every comment left on mod posts, and I was reading all of the prompts as they came in but stopped because I was wanting to buy everything that came in.

I went to register for my last class before the thesis (Romantic and Industrial Revolutions) on Friday, and it doesn't start till April, so I have another month off from for-credit coursework. This means that I should be able to get a big jump on my reading. It will probably mean that I dick around with B2MeM, thesis research, and other fannish things instead. I should at least download the syllabus so that I can at least pretend I'm going to do something with it.

Because there's nothing better to do on an "ice day" than play with green, living things, I showed some love to my houseplants today, and Bobby and I started the year's tomato and pepper seeds. My succulents are all throwing off baby plants since I've been doing better with fertilizing them properly; I need to re-pot these and then find new homes for them. Otherwise I'll be like the Duggars of succulents; I already have several baby aloe plants that I was supposed to give away years ago. I just get attached and don't want to give them away.

All in all, this was a pretty dull weekend, but productive. I'd love to extend it to a third day!

Bobby and I went to Ocean City for a long weekend, having taken off work on Friday. (So tomorrow I get to see what the person who covered for me actually did with the work I left for my students, since Ms. Karen was also off yesterday.) The reason for going was multi-faceted. It was the Maryland International Kite Expo, which we were interested in checking out. Bobby wanted to take the surfboard he got for his birthday out for a spin. And we just felt like going.

No Goldens this time; this was the last weekend they would have been allowed on the beach and boardwalk, but we were unable to find pet-friendly accommodations at the somewhat last-minute. It turned out to be just as well since Alex--who is doing very well and hasn't limped in almost two weeks--isn't supposed to do more than 5 or 10 minutes of mild activity at a time until the vet clears his ACL injury on Thursday, so he would've been basically stuck in the room all weekend. As it was, he and Lance stayed with our friend Dawn, who certainly lavished them with attention.

We were supposed to have gorgeous weather, and we did ... sort of. We left Friday morning with Bobby's surfboard securely strapped to the car. Me being me, I was a little nervous about that, but it didn't budge either way, even going over the Bay Bridge with its wicked crosswinds. Friday was the worst weather day of the weekend; in the 50s F (~10C) with rain at night as the warm front rolled in. After arriving in town, we stopped for pizza at Piezano's--our first of the year! Bobby called the day before to see if they were open, and we rejoiced that they were. It is tradition that we stop at Piezano's on our way in. We were staying at a new hotel, the Coconut Malorie, which was a bit fancier than where we usually stay. We were a bit early but were allowed to check in and, after that, headed for the beach.

The breeze was brisk and coming off of the sea, i.e. cold. But the sun was shining, so I wrapped up in the beach blanket and was comfortable. Bobby donned his wetsuit and off he went. ( Read more... )

It has been pouring rain all weekend, miserable and nasty. Throughout it all, my refrain has been, "At least it's not snow!" Lol. *cry*

About 45 minutes ago, Bobby and I left to go to the gym. It was pouring rain with a little sleet mixed in. The temperature was 38F/3C. Forty-five minutes later, this is our front yard.

( Photos beneath the Cut )

Well, the predicted snowstorm has hit with a vengeance. We are currently in a lull (Bobby told me the technical meteorological term for it but I forgot what it was), but it is expected to pick back up tonight. (ETA ... it is actually freezing rain again out, which SUCKS.) Bobby estimates that we have gotten about 16 inches (41 cm) so far. We could get 6 additional inches (15 cm) tonight. It is hard to estimate the depth because it has also been very windy, so the snow is drifted quite high in places. We also had quite a bit on the ground from the storm last week. I'll be interested to see what the NWS reports as our official snowfall totals.

Thank goodness the ice was finally out of the trees before this hit. That could have been a disaster. Or maybe I spoke too soon! The power just flickered. It is really windy outside right now.

Bobby took some pictures out in the yard when he went out to clear the front steps.

( Pictures Featuring Goldens and Freyja and Snow beneath the Cut )

Well, now on top of our winter woes, I have a cold. Bobby has been fighting one off for days, and it was inevitable that I'd catch it, and I did.

It was back to work today; Baltimore County schools opened regular time. (Carroll County schools remained closed since we got hit with the worst of the storm.) The drive to work this morning was quite startling. Branches and trees are down everywhere. The damage is substantial. It looks worse than the tropical storms of the past few years.

Everything here is still coated in ice. Drive even just five minutes south, and most of the trees have thawed, but it doesn't appear to have gotten above freezing here today. We lost another branch in the yard from one of the maples that took down part of the chicken run. Luckily, the damage was not bad, and Bobby was able to repair it this afternoon.

Freyja was due to be spayed today, so we loaded her into her carrier to drive her to the vet's office this morning. Ten minutes on the road and they called to cancel her appointment because the office is still without power. So we turned around and drove her home. She is spared again! She was originally scheduled for Tuesday, but we had to reschedule for today because the after-school program started up Tuesday, and we would have had to pick her up right in the middle of it, which was impossible. Hopefully three is a charm and her next appointment will actually happen.

I am almost ready to start writing my final paper for my current class. I really drag these things out ridiculously. I have one more article to read; I have written a draft thesis statement and a quick outline, so it will just be a matter, this weekend, of writing each section. If I can do two or three sections a day, then most of the paper will be done this weekend. Those who think I work too hard will be proud that I downloaded another book by Rousseau yesterday (my Kindle has 3G--dangerous because I can continue to download books even without Internet or power) that I do not actually intend to read for my paper. I decided against it. I have already read three books by Rousseau in excess of what I was required to read for the class, plus the usual collection of articles and book chapters, so I decided to give this one a pass.

This means that I am actually reading something at the moment that is not school-related! (It is still academic-related, for my "Tree of Tales" paper ... baby steps, people!) The book is called The Song of Middle-earth by David Harvey. I'm actually rather disappointed in it so far. It was written about 30 years ago, so the Silm and UT were available, but the book seems to mostly summarize the texts. How annoying! I would assume that if someone is buying a book about Tolkien, then one has actually read Tolkien. He frequently reaches the point where I think he is going to get into something deep and thought-provoking, and then just kind of peters out. He makes some good points about Tolkien's legendarium not being derivative; he starts to delve into world cosmogony but flakes out with a statement that Ainulindalë shares several themes with other world myths. Aaaaand? (He also falls into the trap that I've found to be rather frequent of stating that a particular archetype is "common" in world creation stories when reading a boatload of world creation stories has convinced me that this is not the case.) He also doesn't seem to be much of a writer, and it is hard sometimes to see how his ideas are connected. (This reminds me of an objective that I frequently include when writing Written Content goals for student IEPs: The student will use transitions to show the connections among ideas within and between paragraphs in a multi-paragraph composition. He could use that objective in his hypothetical IEP.) Since he deals with mythological themes and cosmogony in particular, then it was a book that I pretty much had to read before undertaking the next revision of my paper, and I do hope my opinion of it improves. But so far, I'm not enjoying it much more than if I'd read the other work by Rousseau, and that is saying something.

This post has a soundtrack to go with it!

( Ice Soundtrack )

We were predicted to get an ice storm last night into tomorrow morning, and we did. Oh we did. We were confident enough that schools would at least be delayed this morning, so we stayed up later than usual last night and watched the last of our snow day movies. (We have a tradition of watching 80's dance movies on nights when we know schools will be closed or delayed the next day for winter weather. We've already worked through Dirty Dancing and Footloose, so that left Flashdance as the only one remaining in our collection. If we get any additional snow days--and if we get the monstrous storm predicted for this weekend, there is a good chance we will--then we will have to settle for something else.) We went to bed just after midnight and, around 12:15, heard the start of the distinctive and disturbing tick tick tick of ice hitting the windows.

( The Rest below the Cut! )

ETA ... pictures are up here.