Iced

Spring semester: day fifty-seven

The severe weather threat from yesterday and the overnight tonight amounted to little here; it rained and rumbled a bit early this evening, and the temperature dropped by thirty degrees very quickly, but I assumed that nothing was going to happen and that the weather forecasters were, I dunno, high on something.

I told my students in both classes this morning that I would be in the Writing Center for my office hours this afternoon to make up the hour I skipped last week while pathologically and nervously studying for comps, and that after that I would be getting out of town before the storms hit. At 2:45 PM, I left campus -- it was really dark north towards Newton, and I'd already heard reports that Hutchinson (the big, state-fair-holding city thirty miles to the west of my house) was getting some pretty strong storms. Halfway up I-135, I noticed the temperature drop like a stone, as I had my windows down. It went from being about 70 outside to around 50-55. I realized that I had driven through the cold front that had brought these storms, and that it was so strong that I could distinctly feel it. This is never a good sign.

By the time I got home, it was really dark here and already starting to rain a bit. I immediately put the car in the garage where it would be safe, as basically -- depending on how this storm system tracked -- we could get anything from tornadoes to a horrific ice storm...or both. I came upstairs and cooked some dinner, and watched some of the extras on the Red Dwarf X set I had before coming back into my room to talk to Daisy for a bit. Daisy had just gotten up; she still has to keep her normal sleep schedule even on her days off, lest she not be able to stay awake on the nights she does have to work. Around 6:30 or so, I decided to go to bed, as I was really tired and just wanted to get some rest. So, I did. I passed out rather quickly, with my kitties laying with/on me.

When I awoke, it was night, but I didn't know what time it was. I heard it raining against the windows in the bedroom, and heard a few rumbles of thunder off in the distance. I rolled over and looked at the clock -- it was a little past 10PM. Oh, I thought, NOW we get the storms they said were supposed to start at like, 5PM. I'd not been asleep for a long time, but it felt like it. I got comfortable again, Pete came up and laid across my shoulder/chest, and I fell back asleep.

The next thing I knew, I was awakened violently by thunder so loud the cats freaked out and jumped up, thunder so loud that it rattled my windows and bed -- followed by lots of really bright lightning and rain so loud it sounded like a TV displaying static turned up to full volume. Basically all at once, too. Sadie was so freaked out that she tried to climb on top of my face/head/neck area so that I could protect her. I looked at the clock again -- 10:30. It wasn't getting any lighter, either; as the minutes ticked on, the storm got stronger. I was wide awake.

I began thinking as I laid there in bed. Hm, this could just be a thunderstorm, or this could be one of those storms in a line of them that precedes a tornado, microburst, downburst, or something else. I can either lay here and see if it blows over, and see if I can get back to sleep, or I can get up and go check the weather upstairs to see if it's going to get any worse.

I mulled it over for a few minutes; I was still incredibly tired, but I was also wide awake, and even if the storm ended at that moment, I knew I wouldn't be able to fall back asleep for some time. Like it or not, I was basically awake for a while, after only having really gotten a short nap (I'd planned to sleep most of the night, if not all of it). As it was only getting stronger and louder, I got up and decided to come upstairs to see what was hitting us, and if it was going to get worse. If there was the possibility for tornadoes, like hell I wanted to go back to sleep; I wanted to be able to get up, ready the cat carriers, and be able to hunker down in the basement bathroom -- the most secure place in the house, underground and against the back foundation.

The radar showed the storms hitting here; they weren't severe, but damn did they sound like it. It was raining really hard, the wind was whipping, the lightning was frequent and beautiful, etc. But behind that was what was troubling -- a massive pink swath of ice. Ice.

It was almost seventy degrees this morning when I got up to go to campus. I wore shorts and sandals to teach in today. By 11PM it was 34 degrees and there was ice coming our way.

Again, welcome to Kansas.

Once the storm moved off, we were treated to a delightful downpour of sleet and ice for a little while before it cleared out. It's 1:03 AM, and there's another large wave of it on its way to hit here soon. I'm glad the car is in the garage. The electricity has already been flickering, and my internet has slowed down considerably and is being a bit spotty at times.

I do plan to go back to bed within the next hour or two at the latest; I have to get up in the morning (or early afternoon) to do my taxes. I just downloaded all the forms from the IRS website, and can fill them in/print them here at home now. I don't think it will take an incredibly long time to do and calculate, but I absolutely need to get it done and mailed off -- I haven't waited this long to do my taxes since I've been in graduate school, but everything has snowballed over the course of the spring semester, and therefore I've been swamped with not only all of the comps stuff, but my own lack-of-sleep/time issues as well. Upon looking at the forms, it looks like I'll be able to do them over the span of an hour or two tomorrow -- at least the federal ones, anyhow. Should be pretty painless. I basically fill out the same stuff every year; I always have to fill out a Schedule C-EZ for my online businesses, but that's the only extra thing I ever have to worry about, and it's never enough to push me over the edge into owing taxes on anything (I make +/-$200 or so per year from them, roughly). I always get so stressed about doing my taxes when, in reality, it tends to go pretty quickly and I usually get a decent refund from both the state and the feds.

I brought home the acid-free paper ream I needed to print out the final copy of my thesis for delivering to the library for binding, as if that's going to get over there by Monday, I'll either have to deliver it on Thursday or get extra permission from the library person to deliver it on Tuesday morning when I take my students over there. A few of us have already gotten approval/the go-ahead from our readers, and while I know my second reader (read: super-famous poet professor) has approved it, I have heard nothing from my director or the chair, my other two readers, nor have I heard anything from the MFA director about its approval. I meant to stop by and ask her about that today, but she was not in her office when I was on campus this afternoon. This means that I'll have to bug her via email (even though I don't want to) in order to get a bit more clarification, and/or to ask what the deal is with the comps scores and the dates given for that, as that must be some sort of typo (as I mentioned before).

On that note, I'm going back to bed and plan to deal with all of this stuff in the morning. I'm tired and because of that damned storm, my sleep schedule is now totally thrown off again.