Winter has arrived.

No post in awhile. Not much to talk about really. As the titles says, winter has decided to rear its ugly head and man, is it frickin' cold. The regular temperature tomorrow is supposed to be somewhere around -15, which when the windchill is factored in (who in the hell would live somewhere where you had to 'factor in' the windchill? Oh, yeah,....me) that would make it a balmy -30 to -35. Wow. Undescribably cold.

I'm heading out into the turndra shortly to rig up some kind of heater in the chicken coop, because jesus, I think it's cold in here?? Imagine your ass outside all night in a chicken coop! The trick is going to be how to rig up the heater so they don't knock it over by trying to sit on it and avoiding a fire. Which by the way, brings me to my next bit of excitement.

We are all sitting in the living room last night, all doing various things, with a fire roaring in the fireplace. The fire had been going since 8 a.m. because that is what I do when the weather does this shit - wake up, start a fire, plant my ass in front of it and don't move. Anyway, we are all sitting there and all of a sudden the glass on one of the fireplace doors explodes. Explodes. Glass flies everywhere and we all commence freaking out. Only one panel shattered, but WTF? Isn't this shit supposed to be tempered or fire-proof, heat-proof, whatever? So, today, I am scrambling trying to find a replacement because I Need A Fire - did I mention it was -15??

We had an unexpected visitor from Monday - Wednesday and I learned a valuable lesson. My cousin from Illinois was up in our area visiting a friend in Brainerd (Minnesota), so he calls us up to see if we will be around so he can stop by for a couple days and hang out. Immediately, I turned into a sick, tired, whiney 2-year-old to my husband - "Ohhhh maaaan, I don't waaaant companyyyyyy!" "I'm siiiiiick of companyyyyyy". "Besides, he is kinda weird and I don't know him that well and what the hell am I going to do with him for 2 days!!!!" To which my loving husband replied - "deal with it". Since my husband wasn't listening, I turned to my brother, who I called up and tried to get sympathy from. To which my loving brother replied, "I'm with John, deal with it."

Then I started to feel guilty, I mean, how many people take the time to call up relatives they haven't seen for awhile and make the effort to go drop in and visit? Especially in my weird, dysfunctional family? We barely talk to the people we LIKE in our family. So, I stopped whining and tried to act like an adult. So, Brandon showed up and I learned that I was totally wrong. He was great, the kids really liked him, we spent hours just talking, we all went out to eat, we watched movies (The Big Lebowski, ever seen it?? Funny.), then he left and I felt really guilty for ever thinking it was going to be a drag. I invited him back and meant it. It was nice.

So, the rest of the week is going to be spent getting ready for our big conference (we leave Wed.), taking pictures of my oldest daughter as she goes off to her winter formal dance on Saturday night and trying my best to not become a human frickin' icicle in this lovely northern Wisconsin weather we are having. People keep saying, "well, we've had it pretty good so far, I guess we can't complain" Oh yeah?? Watch me.