The Ice Cometh Not Yet

If there are too few spaces, you are too old.  And miles to go before I sleep ...  I still have the nightmare where I didn't leave enough room at the bottom of the page for the footnotes and I'm typing two carbon copies and I've got at least ten pages left to type tonight and it's New Year's Eve and I work tomorrow morning at six a.m. and the paper is due the second of January and there's an ice storm and I'm missing the party.

Dang. That's when I wake up with heart palpitations and visions of a citrus slice ice life preserver floating in rum punch.

Blogger wants a measly one space after a period. No pause, no breathing room, no grace, no chance to hear the river ice cracking. It's back to the STOP days STOP of STOP telegrams STOP. My little horse must think it queer to STOP without a farmhouse near.

True, no carbon paper for the topic:  Cuba After Castro.
How many spaces after the colon? We are all hunkered down waiting for an ice storm with the potential for a school "snow day" tomorrow.

Real true sheet of carbon paper, not mint condition

Weather Dot Com and the tv stations have got us in a flirl of freezing drizzle anticipation. The waiting is rough, the wishing is a road not taken. Do I want to stay home tomorrow? Sure. Do I want to start calling the families on my phone tree list at 6:30 a.m. trying to explain the "snow day" and "late start" concepts to non-native speakers from tropical climates? The telephone doesn't work very well for pantomime notifications.

This is the first time I've gotten it straight that the January 1888 blizzard in Nebraska known as the "The Children's Blizzard" was a different weather event from the March blizzard of '88. The January blizzard is depicted in a mosaic in the Nebraska State Capitol, perhaps as a warning to teachers, parents, and children. to check the forecast and dress appropriately. I couldn't send that reminder loud enough in English with carbon copies or by tableau vivant no matter how many spaces between sentences.

Drama queen of Verdigre in red velvet photo album

Neither of these are the blizzard described by my great-great grandfather in his handwritten life story. That was the Easter Sunday blizzard of April, 1873. reported by Prairie Bluestem. I'm feeling like a winter weather wienie!


© 2013 Nancy L. Ruder