Snow-tacular 2013

That lump with the antennae - that's one of our cars. It was fun to dig it out after the storm passed.

Like many New Englanders, we endured (and survived) the Blizzard of February 2013. Eric and I found ourselves - separately - at the grocery store stocking up on essentials: beer, wine, 8lbs of tator tots, ice cream sandwiches, toilet paper, donuts and baby formula. (I will let you guess who bought what, but you will probably choose wrong.) If we were going to die of snow, we were going to so Charmin style - comfortable.

When I was in line, the woman in front of me had 2 dozen eggs, 2 loaves of bread and 15 gallons of spring water. She looked at my register offerings and I am pretty sure she was judging me and that I came up wanting in her eyes. I started to feel that maybe I wasn't taking this thing seriously enough. But no way was I stepping out of line and fighting with blue haired old ladies over the last of the bread and water. I set my course. We have municipal water - it was highly unlikely I was going to be out of water. Perhaps, if I lived outside the city and had a well, stocking up on water would make more sense. But if city water goes - it's pretty catastrophic outside and a few bottles of Poland Spring is probably going to be the least of my worries.

Someone shared that while they were at the store, they were next to a woman who had over $500 of groceries already rung up with another cart to go. When it hit $500, she asked if she could put some stuff back. Don't you wish you were behind her in line? What was she expecting? And what if the power went out? Most those groceries would spoil! Argh!!!!

I was, however, held responsible for failing to find the Redbox thingie (official name for it) - so we were SOL on the new movie front. My husband was speechless... I handed him a beer. He seemed appeased.

For the most part, we basically spent 36 hours in jammies, eating junk food and peeking periodically out the windows to make sure the world was still there.

What does one do for 36 snowbound hours?  So glad you asked. Here's the Snowmagedan photo wrap up of a lazy New England Woman and her iphone.

In case you were wondering what 8lbs of tator tots look like, I will provide a "scale photo" for your viewing pleasure:

Of course, one can only eat so many tator tots. Add that to one's boredom and one ends up trying to build a tator tot house for tiny outdoor critters. But the problem with tator tot construction is this; when you thaw them out enough to stick toothpicks in them, they start to fall apart and fail inspections. Also, one runs the risk of being caught by one's husband playing with prized tots and hearing, "Amber! Tator tots are not toys!" Followed by a loud sigh.

Collapsed Tator Tot Construction

I moved on from the tots and over to the laptop. We didn't lose internet. Not good. Online shopping is an acceptable snowed-in activity. I bought another ceramic pig to join Spider Pig (I may have developed a ceramic pig problem. If the husband brings this up, I shall remind him of his tator tot hoarding issue. It's always wise to remember one's leverage): 

Of course, it wasn't all fun and no work. Bean has a science fair project due in a few weeks. We decided it would be fun to experiment with yeast and it's effects in bread making. We made three loaves - one with the correct amount of yeast, one with no yeast and one with twice as much. I think we will have to make a forth loaf and put even more yeast in. I am at odds with myself over the results. I was oddly disappointed the third loaf with double the yeast didn't explode, while also equally glad it didn't so I didn't have to clean the oven. Not only did we not run out of water, we had plenty of bread. Bonus: The house did smell warm and lovely. (Also, we did not run out of tator tots)

So, there it is. Our survival story. Gripping. Moving. Powerful. Hollywood Insider gave it 5 stars.