Yesterday was one of those snowy days when you wake up and nothing about the day goes as you had planned. On the local news I found it had begun around 3 o’clock in the morning, well after we’d returned home close to midnight after getting Ben & Vim to the airport for their redeye back to New York. I began to anxiously watch the street to see if there was any sign of a snowplowing truck. If there wasn’t one by noon, I couldn’t see how we’d be able to make it down the steep roads without the car sliding into someone’s picture window. And we had places to go and things to do! 

At first it looked like one of those innocuous snowfalls that doesn’t seem so bad while it’s  trickling down so quietly in lacy white flakes, but then you go out to the driveway to start clearing some of it away, only to find out you’ve got a foot of snow to move aside. It hadn’t quite finished when Hubby got the camera and took this picture of the accumulation atop the support post along the front balcony.

I’m about ready for spring! The mountains behind our house are so covered with deep snow now that the deer are already coming down to ours and the neighbors’ yards looking for anything green to nibble on! In fact we spotted a herd of about 20 elk trekking across the mountainside Sunday morning before Mother Nature decided to add insult to injury with an additional dumping. This is around the time each year I start thinking about going out and purchasing a salt lick to set out beyond our fenceline. If I could I would go outside and handfeed them carrots and lettuce or something.

The outdoor tables and chairs on the back deck were beginning to look like big white coffins lined up at different angles to each other with mourning chairs set up beside them.  Pretty soon the telephone began to ring, and notices and cancellations began

coming in. Suddenly a busy day in the planner turned into a day with little to do other than move snow from here to there.

I started hand-washing the  pie tins and wine glasses that had managed to get by everyone’s notice during last night’s cleanup after our pie party. In spite of lots of help from Vim and Ben and Hubby, I was on my feet almost the whole day and knew–from the way the bone in my knee felt like it was trying to punch through the skin on one side and by how tired I was feeling–that this was one of the days my rheumatologists had warned me about a long time ago: I had to learn to recognize when I needed to take it easy.

So, while poor Hubby was busy outside, I was inside, busy too–in a manner of speaking:

ABOUT MRS. HUGHES: While I was exploring my Wintersong “stats” page, I discovered that my December 4th posting of the video of Mrs. Hughes Observations on Life was getting the most clicks, and has been the most viewed of almost any posts on Wintersong. I decided to see if I could find out more about her, whether she had done anything in addition to that video.

I found a lot of things, but nothing to back up what I found. According to this website, there’s a line of greeting cards now available at 100,000 stores and gift shops called “According to Carol.” A google search failed to turn up any, however. By clicking on this link you can find out how to book Mrs. Hughes for your own special event, and see her schedule for, presumably 2008, although it’s not absolutely clear since the year isn’t listed. She entertains on some of the Carnival Cruise Lines, Legend of the Spirit apparently being the usual one. Again, I wasn’t able to verify that. 

If you happen to be in Auburn, California in March, you might try getting tickets to the Auburn Soroptimist Society’s Women Who Kick Comedy Butt gig, being held in Auburn on March 15. That led to more surfing to find out who and what the Society was about. Appropriately enough, they’re a worldwide organization for women in management and professions working through service projects to advance human rights and the status of women. Very little else pertaining to the event for which Mrs. Hughes is booked to appear alongside comedian Grace White. So much for the elusive Mrs. Hughes. If anyone finds out more about the greeting card line mentioned above, or anything of general interest, maybe you’ll let the rest of us know.