Oh, about the time LZP broke his arm, he sent this picture of his daughter, his oldest child and our niece – well, she and Der Bingle share the DNA, but I’m proud to be her aunt. It came through on my email when we were grappling with getting Der Bingle re-established in Fairborn and then getting the school schedule going again. So, I’m late in sharing it.

This is Miss Jody Vance and the apple of her dad’s eye:

LZP says, “I really think it captures her spirit and sense of rascalism.”

I could not rehash this yesterday; my nerves, they were shot. Shot, I tell you, like zee leetle people who are near Clouseau when he takes his gun out. In fact, I think I am still feeling some of the aftereffects. It started Thursday night when some schools starting announcing delays; the name ran along the bottom og the tv screen and East Noble was not one of them.

Oh, the moaning and wailing and flailing. Could not this school announce so little heads could fall asleep on pillows that need not be disturbed until two hours later than normal? the morning came and sill East Noble was not on the list . . . and then it was for a delay. Immediately the intense watching began for a closing announcement. At 8:10 when all hope was abandoned DeKalb County closed, DeKalb Eastern Closed, East Allen Closed and then there it was East Noble Closed. The screaming screech from upstairs was deafening. Suddenly those who had been giving the TV evil looks of death were cheerful.

The rest of us were limp. And then I did the unthinkable: I suggested we re-enact the response to the broadcasted list. I meant the happiness that followed the East Noble Closed segment. Summer decided to re-do the pain-filled minutes that began when Adams appeared on the screen.

Oh, they’re not going to close  . . .  oh no oh no oh no . ..  oh, Central Noble isn’t closed . . . they never close . . . Grandma you jinxed us . . . why aren’t they closing? Oh, God, this is the worse day of my life. Oh, DeKalb . . . they closed . . . panting, whining sounds of despair . . . they won’t clo . . . SCREAM.

It can be scary here.

Especially when someone walks to where the celebration is and says, “Oh, Summer, the newscaster just said the typist made a mistake; East Noble is still on a delay.” Of course, only a fool would say that.

Snow was predicted for today and some people assumed there would be a two-hour delay; no snow came until about 9 and it came from the south. Now schools to the south are starting to close early. I do not want to know what my grandchildren are thinking at this time. Noble County Council on Aging closed but I suppose the school corporation thinks, hey the kids are young, they can take it. Anyway, I hope Cameron and Summer have learned not to count their flakes until they fall.

Right now we are at a Two Hour Big D and the weather site says this:

PATCHY FREEZING DRIZZLE IS POSSIBLE THIS MORNING. THE FREEZING DRIZZLE WILL LEAD TO A THIN COATING OF ICE IN SOME SPOTS… SUPPORTING SLICK TRAVEL CONDITIONS… ESPECIALLY ON UNTREATED ROADS. PLEASE USE EXTRA CAUTION WHEN VENTURING OUT THIS MORNING. ANY FREEZING DRIZZLE IS EXPECTED COME TO AND END BY LATE THIS MORNING.

So, I don’t know what East Noble will do. There are windy roads around lakes here and teen-age drivers, but tomorrow is supposed to be pretty cold and snowy with a winter storm alert and that might mean a closing. East Noble may figure they need to try and go today. Daylight will make a difference, but if the freezing drizzle is ongoing, it may tip the scales. Frankly, my windshield kept icing up while taking Alison to work.

My intuition says that school will not close.

Oh, got to tell you this. East Noble has initiated a call system that notifies students of delays via a recorded phone message; it’s okay, but it kind of takes the fun out of watching the scrolling schools at the bottom of the screen.

And then there’s this other thing I forgot to  mention: LZP – aka Banana Man – fell on ice and broke his funny bone and had to have surgery and his arm HURTS and on the phone he sounded like Der Bingle looked in The Golden Lamb picture.

My gosh, a man on the weather channel has the name Joe Bastardi, and actually, he looks as if he was traumatized in Middle School and High School and College and, well, by little soon to be old ladies watching TV on January 6.

We had a road trip today. We had been telling him there was nothing to see . . . and then it dawned on us he’d been in rural Indiana for a long time.

At the Golden Lamb.

Pointing out info on the USS Maine.

He selected steak and mashed potatoes; I had salmon and carrots; Der Bingle had swiss steak.

Father Christmas at The Golden Lamb.

Beleaguered Der Bingle.

Cameron’s view crossing the Ohio.

In Kentucky.

Cameron in front of Cincy skyline, Roebling Bridge and, of course, the Ohio River.

Cameron’s view of some of old Cincinnati houses.

The Solid Rock Church of of Interstate 75.

Oh, and another Cameron view.

And another.

Okay, I’m tired.

Cameron and I are here at the Ohio Redoubt. And Der Bingle is here too, of course. I got it in my head this morning that we could go to The Golden Lamb for lunch since Cameron is a history buff. I don’t know that he is so hot on it after all, but for Heaven’s Sake – 12 presidents and Charles Dickens. We’re going. Too bad we missed the Cratchit Christmas Meal. HA! I can just see Cameron’s face as he actually meets a Christmas goose.

Yesterday, while we were out scouting for Cousin Vinny’s Pizza, we happened upon something we haven’t seen much in Kendallville in the last couple of years. Summer and Cameron and I often went inflatable hunting, but the pickings have been slim. However, here we saw this:

Tomorrow Cameron and I are driving down to Fairborn in one car and Der Bingle is going in another . . . and we hope to get the latter settled back in the Ohio Redoubt following the interpretative representation of “Planes, Trains & Automobiles”.  We will need to stock him up with food and straighten up his kitchen and help him with the laundry.

We’ll probably have a couple of Cousin Vinny’s pizzas tomorrow night and maybe go to a restaurant on Saturday; and then it will be time for Cameron and I to head back up here and start another year. Sydney is staying at the vet’s for observation and diet control while we are gone.

Uh, I caved and we got a big TV this year . . . and then Der Bingle added  Internet capability and movie downloadability  to it and it is becoming intimidating. I think I like cuddling up with a 13 inch set about two feet from my face better.

I would have liked a bobcat and a dumpster for Christmas, but I will do the best I can to get rid of all this clutter without accidentally throwing out things I really want to keep. It may be a challenge since when gathering up stuff to keep, I have stashed it in whatever is at hand – like a plastic grocery bag. Ah, yes, the idiocy of it all.

Yesterday at Mother’s I picked up some pictures from way back when and my dad’s teaching license from further way back when . . . and I looked for something to put them in . . . and I grabbed an empty box that had held window plastic. That was just so smart.

This organizational thing is going to be hard; it is not my natural state. It’s not that I can’t keep things straight in my mind – it’s just this business of having things at my fingertips. This idea of a place for everything and everything in its place. It worked okay – well, sort of okay – for a long time and then over the last ten years with folks living with me, I lost my grip.

I’ll probably be in bed before midnight  with the covers pulled up over my head – this has been quite a year. I’m a little afraid of 2010, but it’s coming anyway.

You can tell I’m scared by the random topic recital.

Well . . . over and out for now.

This morning, oh about and hour and a half ago, I stepped out in the vestibule and grabbed a Diet Coke and a Coke and thought they felt pretty damn cold. Well, I just looked at the weather and it is 17 degrees, but feels like five. I suppose somewhere the sodas are not herded together and a couple have frozen. Ha! Teach them to be stragglers. I’m being cruel; they have no legs and can’t voluntarily hover together. They can’t yell for me to do something. They just . . . feel their insides chilling and then swelling and then POP – it is an out of can experience.

Ack, I almost forgot. LZP called yesterday and passed on the word that he had broken his right arm – the tip of a bone by the elbow and I’ll be more accurate when I know more. He has a stick shift so Sam will have to be driving him. I forgot to ask Der Bingle is his arm is stabilized in a bent position or is sticking straight out.

Morning is coming in the faintest, grayest way it can. Yesterday we saw the sun for a few moments and I remarked how the sunlight just lifts your spirits physically and then it went away and I went and watched railroad journeys of Switzerland and the US. Cameron started looking up AMTRAK schedules. He’s thinking cross-country and I’m thinking we need to take practice trips first – like two hours into Chicago on the LakeShore. Oh, the train going east follows the Great Lakes . . . but it only runs at night. RATS.

We have a blizzard of clutter here and bags of scooped up Mother papers to go through and lawyers to see and “zee probate” – yes, I will feel like a drunken Frenchie by the time we get through it all.

I need a deviled egg.

Alison, Robert and Summer went to Indianapolis to visit Colin; they are staying overnight. Cameron and Der Bingle and I are here holding down the fort. It is quieter, although my little dance at their departure was almost jolly.  The cat is pissed – she is with her not favorite people and I must keep reminding myself she was Mother’s cat.

We were going to have Jim’s Pizza as a special treat, but they are CLOSED for the holiday week. CLOSED!!!!! A local outfit, they are only open Thursday, Friday. Saturday and Sunday evenings for take-out during the year. CLOSED. So I went to Scott’s and grabbed up an eclectic mound of food – cole slaw, potato salad, cheddar and horseradish cheese, a shrimp ring, barbecue pork and barbecue beef, a cranberry salad, fancy little bread sticks and pomegranate juice. Later I had a turkey sandwich and two deviled eggs. I suppose this is boring, but I’m managing it because I am also watching a show on Atilla, Huns and Constantinople’s wall.

Cameron and Der Bingle are watching a Leslie Nielson movie and Cameron is laughing the patented Cameron giggle/chortle/guffaw. Loudly laughing it. Now earlier, he and I watched the 1931 movie “M”, made in Germany with Peter Lorre. I read the subtitles; he partly understood the German and read the subtitles also. And now he’s watching snicker humor . . . Oh, well.