Thursday, Dec. 27

Two days later...the snow persists, and the roads remain hazardous. And now sleet and freezing rain are predicted for tonight and early tomorrow. So daughter has decided to stay here until Saturday. Fortunately, she is on Christmas break from her work, and is not due to return until January 2.

So we are making the most of our forced confinement, with lots of good food, marathon movies, sessions in the hot tub, game playing, and working a jigsaw puzzle.

Today, Daughter painted a Santa face on an oval glass ornament I'd given her last year. I guess she didn't have time to paint it last year, so she brought it with her to work on this year.

Hubbie spent his time shoveling snow...making a path between our house and Mother's, and creating a space in front of the mailbox for the delivery vehicle. There was no mail delivery yesterday, but we felt sure there would be today, and there was. Yesterday's and today's editions of the local newspaper were also delivered.

We were up this morning at our regular hour of 7:30. Of course Mother was up earlier, but stayed in bed until we got up. Daughter was up pretty early too, around 8:30. After breakfast, I did stair stepping, resistance bands, and weights exercises, and then got ready for the day.

Before lunch, I helped Hubbie make another batch of fruited popcorn. For lunch, we had more chicken noodle soup, with sandwiches, chips, Italian Cream Cheese ball and crackers. For dessert, there was a choice of cherry or apple pie, with ice cream.

After lunch, Daughter helped Mother work on a jigsaw puzzle that has been up since the weekend that Hubbie's family visited. Once I'd finished gathering laundry and doing some other household things, I joined them.

Hubbie, in the meantime, spent his time taking care of Mother's and our cats, among other things.

Mother seemed stalled on the puzzle, but since I put a fresh eye on it, I was able to help her finish it this afternoon. Daughter had abandoned it earlier in favor of enjoying her social network page. I don't think she is a real fan of jigsaw puzzles.

Now that the puzzle is done, Mother can start one of the two I gave her for Christmas. The two new ones have 300 or 350 pieces, instead of 500+. She has more difficulty completing the bigger puzzles now.

Later, we had a supper of leftovers...goulash, baked sweet potatoes, asparagus, cottage cheese, and sourdough bread and butter. Then we watched a movie..."The Hunt for the I-5 Killer," a true story about a year-long search for the man who murdered forty-four people along the I-5 highway in California, Washington, and Oregon. Randall Woodfield had once been drafted by the Green Bay Packers, but was cut during training camp, and failed to make the roster.

A second movie we watched was "Borderline," a 2002 feature from the Lifetime Movie Network. A prison psychiatrist is getting a divorce from her husband, and he gains custody of the children. A delusional inmate under her care is released from prison to a half-way house, and he decides to kill her husband and his girlfriend.