don't eat the thundersnow

So, another workweek has come and gone. It's Friday night, and everything is quiet in Dallas County, Iowa. Really, really quiet. I have Monday off, so it's a 3-day weekend. We have absolutely no plans for the weekend. Well, that isn't exactly true. The cable guy will be here first thing in the morning with a new and improved cable box, one that will allow us to get more high-def channels. Actually, if it works at all, it will be an upgrade, since the old one gave up the ghost weeks ago. They are also supposed to bring a new modem, one that is not missing the battery. I'm sure you all wanted to know about our cable box problems, right?

Anyway, there really isn't much news from here. Yesterday, the weather was nasty. We woke up to a little light rain. It was no big deal, certainly no reason to leave early for work. 10 minutes later, there was lightning and thunder, and it was absolutely dumping ice pellets (official meteorological word of the day = "graupel"). By the time I left for work, it was snowing steadily, and all the slush on the roads had frozen into a sheet of ice. The lightning and thunder kept going. It was thundersnow! I have learned that Iowa has all kinds of crazy weather, and Iowans have all kinds of words to describe it. You just need to take any two different kinds of weather, and combine them to form one word, the scarier-sounding, the better. Along with "thundersnow", Iowans like to talk about "snownadoes," "thundersleet," "gustnados" and "ice fog". I guess all (or most) of these are actual weather terms, but they sound funny to me. Before coming here, I wasn't even clear about the concept of an ice storm.

There was a small grass fire in the field across the ravine behind our house on Tuesday. We had no idea until we looked out the window and saw the burned area the nest day. It was not a big deal at all, but there were a few pictures in the paper today.

Today, the sky was blue, the birds were out, and the snow has pretty much melted. Baseball season is just a couple days away! The grass is starting to green up, and shoots that seem like they might lead to flowers have begun to appear in the yard. Since it is our first spring in this house, we have no idea what is going to sprout up. The seeds Asher and I planted last Sunday have mostly sprouted and seem to be doing very well. Asher had quite a week. Although he was talkative before, he has turned into an absolute chatterbox in the past few days. He is constantly describing and/or questioning everything. He is becoming incredibly independent. He won't accept any help getting in or out of the carseat any more. He really is changing so fast!