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.

snow snow snow

More snow.  I peeked into the (still absent) AJD's room.  The snow animals are absolutely delighted.  The non-snow animals look suspiciously hungover, with the exception of Reggie, who is alert and upright.  It wouldn't surprise me if river otters are immune from the less pleasant effects of alcoholic overindulgence.

In further news, Sleepyhead has fallen out of bed again, and the ermine is staring down at him with great concern.  I continue to be concerned for him, as he's been here long enough for it to be absolutely clear that his issues were not the result of jet lag.  Also, Hrithik still hisses at me when I try to get near him, which hurts my feelings.

That's My Plouball

The mystery of why Plouie chose the Jingo over the window has been resolved.

I took him downstairs with me to get the mail, just for the heck of it, and when we were on our way back upstairs, he started telling AJD about how it had snowed.

Yes, somehow he hadn't noticed the snow.  At all.  Despite... like, everything.

On the plus side, he was very excited.

The Wild Republic Reacts to the Season's First Snowpocalypse

This is a very special post for me: it's the first one to include pictures.  (AJD is the one to thank, because it's his camera.  But I'm the one who took them, so he's not responsible for their obvious lack of photographic expertise.  Photography is not one of my talents.)

Over the weekend, we were treated to our very first major snowstorm of the winter, about a foot in all.  The snow appears to have stopped, but the wind continues to be very impressive; we're scheduled for gusts of up to 40 mph all day, maybe into Wednesday.  Apparently this is the first time in a century that we've had so much snow in a strong La Nina.  Last year we had like four or five big storms like this (though less windy), which led AJD to coin the term "snowpocalypse".  We have decided to stay inside and not go anywhere for a few days.

Naturally, with animals from so many diverse climates, opinions in the Wild Republic are sharply divided over whether the snowpocalypse is good or not: the animals from warm climates are horrified, but the animals from cold climates are delighted.

Last year, we ended up putting all of the cold-climate animals in the windows downstairs so that they could look out at the shovelled walks (which make the piles of snow seem higher) and feel at home.  We haven't moved them downstairs yet, although we still might, but they made a beeline for the windows in AJD's room as soon as the snow started to get serious.

Here you can see Murchison, Flurry, and Vim staring happily down at the snow-swept sidewalk.

The Ice Age animals had a similar idea, but they picked a different window, the one that is partially covered with ice on the bottom.  That's Mimsy, the mammoth, on the left; Gus, the glyptodon, is on the right, but you can't see him so well.  (Mammoths tend to unintentionally take up a lot of space.)

The rest of the animals decided that the thing to do, when faced with a blizzard, was to have a Jingo.  What, you ask, is a Jingo?  Basically, it's a sort of party that warm-climate Wild Republicans throw to distract themselves from the snow.  The idea is very simple: you run around and around in circles, get massively overheated so that you don't notice how cold it is, and then pass out from exhaustion and sleep for a while.  I suspect alcohol may also be involved.

Between the winds and the Jingo, poor AJD didn't get any sleep last night at all.  He's been awake for almost twenty-four hours now.

The aftermath of a Jingo resembles a massacre.  To give you an idea, I have pictures from two different angles.

It looks kind of like a massacre, right?  Or maybe an orgy?  But no, it's a Jingo.

If you suspect you may have spotted a walrus in these pictures (and hey, isn't that an upside-down penguin?), and you're wondering why Humphrey isn't in the window, well, yeah, some of the cold-climate animals did opt for the Jingo over the window.  In Tibby's case, it was probably the excitement; he's an inquisitive little chap and he probably wanted to see what these warm-weather sorts were getting up to.  Humphrey... well, remember I said I suspected alcohol was involved?  Humphrey's involvement is one of the reasons behind this suspicion.  As to Plouie, well, who knows about Plouie.

Two warm-weather creatures did not participate in the Jingo.  Reggie is in my room for south room duty this week, so he spent the night bonding with Seal (as you might imagine, sea lions and river otters have stuff in common) and being perplexed with Sleepyhead (frisky otters do not know what to make of narcoleptics).  Meanwhile, Cami decided that the thing to do was simply sit on the floor by AJD's radiator, thus simultaneously a) placing himself in the warmest place in the room and b) placing himself where he can't see the horrible white stuff outside.

Doesn't he look cute (and cold)?