Monday, Feb. 13

Woke up to the 6:30 alarm this morning, and turned on the TV to check weather predictions, and reports of school closings. Absolutely nothing was happening outside, but the local school district and the community college both posted closings. So I turned the TV off, and we snoozed until around 8 a.m.

It was nearly noon before it started spitting snow, which increased as the day went along. I meant to do a treadmill session, but Hubbie said Mother asked me to go to her house. I figured she wanted to take a shower, but she actually wanted to give me a Valentine and a bowl of strawberries for Hubbie's and my Valentine dinner tomorrow night.

By now, it was snowing big fat flakes that were accumulating on the trees and ground. I grabbed my camera and took pictures through the windows...wasn't in the mood to go tramping around outside today.

Other than uploading a few of the pics to my social network page, I didn't accomplish much the rest of the day. There's something about a day like this that seems to just bring me to a complete halt. If I can't keep to my regular schedule, then I don't seem able to devise an alternate plan.

At one point this afternoon, though, I did decide to make a batch of decaf chai tea. So Hubbie and I dragged out the blender, bowls, measuring equipment, and ingredients, but then discovered we didn't have enough instant tea to do it. Thoroughly thwarted, we put everything away and went back to doing nothing but watching TV.

Later, for supper, we had leftover lasagna, with salad, cottage cheese, and green beans. Afterward, I turned the TV off for an hour, and we took everything out of the freezer side of the refrigerator/freezer, discarded outdated or freezer burned food, and inventoried the rest, making special note of items that need to be used soon. I see a veggie supper in our future, and maybe a fajita dinner.

Then, we read our novels for a half an hour, before returning to TV, including a 2010 movie called, "Small Town Murder Songs." An aging police officer in Toronto finds religion, but has trouble leaving his past behind. A young woman is murdered in his small town, and his past is called into question. This was originally a film festival movie that questions whether we can truly change and hold our demons in check.

We followed that with an episode of "Downton Abbey." The mansion no longer houses recovering WWI military. Now, it's back to the lives of the family and staff, who are having problems adjusting after the war. As one character said, "Everyone is relieved that the war is over...and disappointed."

The master of the house, for reasons unknown to him or the kitchen maid, suddenly locks lips with her. The young man of the house, whose war injuries supposedly paralyzed him, suddenly gets up and walks. He had given up hope of marrying, but now he has proposed to his love.

The maid who got pregnant by the son of a wealthy family, who subsequently died in the war, has the baby and pleads with the family to recognize it as his. They don't, since there is no proof.

The elderly matron of the household resists the coming changes in clothing and hairstyles...short dresses and bobbed hair. This manipulative woman seeks to interfere with the marriage plans of the young man and his intended, since she thinks there is someone else of a higher social status who is more suited to him.

The daughter of the family elopes with the chauffeur, but a couple of the women of the family find her and convince her to return home.

A man, with the encouragement of a woman who manages the kitchen staff and maids, loses all his money when he buys kitchen staples on the black market, hoping to make a fortune selling it to kitchens that have been long without them due to the war. But it is discovered that the flour, meal, sugar, etc. has been laced with sawdust.