Thundersnow &c.

Wednesday night we were hit by a truly impressive Thundersnowstorm.  The snow animals were absolutely delighted.  Here you can see Murchison, Flurry, Vim, and Plouie watching the storm with great enthusiasm.  Plouie actually calmed down a little for once.

At precisely 4.58 the following morning, I was awakened by an eerie, remarkably high-pitched alarm noise, which disappeared almost as soon as it had happened, along with our power.  For awhile the power company claimed the culprit was a tree, but the tree turned out to be mythical.  What had actually happened was a gas leak under the street, so that the power company couldn't fix the outage until the gas company had fixed the leak, which was a complicated endeavour what with all the cars and snow on the street.  The power was out for almost thirty-six hours, along with our heat.  Our heating is actually gas, so technically it was working (we did, for instance, have plenty of hot water), but the thermostat  is electric, so the gas didn't know it was supposed to turn on.  This meant our apartment became very cold, and we eventually elected to crash at the house of a friend of ours out in Upper Darby.

When we first established that the power was gone, AJD said, 'Uh oh, I'd better go make sure no one is telling Angel Joe ghost stories.'  Fortunately, everyone had better sense than that.  When we made the choice to evacuate, though, AJD realised we'd better check to make sure Angel Joe was in good company.  It turned out he was with Nicodemus.  'That's a terrible idea,' AJD exclaimed, so Angel Joe was relocated to Butterfinger's company.  Teddy bears are good for traumatised ermines.

Just as we were leaving, Vim decided he wanted to come too.  Barry and Gilly got to have adventures, he pointed out, and he thought possibly he might be useful for us.  So we smuggled him into my bag, and he got to ride the subway train (which he thought was great fun), spend the night in Upper Darby (likewise), ride the bus all the way to Center City (he was disappointed I made him stay concealed until I pointed out that the other passengers might be frightened if they knew he was aboard), and then go to work with me.  We proclaimed it Take Your Polar Bear to Work Day; I wonder if it will catch on.

So Vim had a great time, and has been regaling the others with the story ever since he returned; and no one told Angel Joe ghost stories; and we have both power and heat again; so all is well.