Two Days Before The Day After Tomorrow (hey, that's today!)

[dodger_sister]

Bonus Points if you get my subject line.


One week ago it was 17 degrees below zero out.
Then it was suddenly 25 degrees out.
Then, holy shit, Friday and Saturday, it was 50 degrees outside, you guys. FIFTY!

Today, we dropped back down to 25 degrees. They said we could expect about three inches of snow over the course of the afternoon and nighttime.

We got three inches in less than three hours. We've got almost three more since then and can expect another three before tomorrow morning is over.

On top of which, the slush that we had leftover from our bizarre warm spell has now frozen all up - and it started sleeting. And sleeting. And sleeting. For about three hours straight. I have the TV on and am on the other side of the room from the window and I could hear it all night long, tapping against the window.

The Nephew spent the night Saturday (yay that!) and wanted to play outside but it was too windy. So after church this morning, he went and played on the playground. Then he went and had lunch with my grandpa and within that one hour from when he was running around on the playground until he finished lunch, it started snowing.

And by the time my sister drove them back across town to our house, it was snowing so hard we realized that we would never get him home. (The Nephew lives about an hour away).

So, guess who is asleep in the living room right now?

Thankfully my sister has tomorrow off, so she will take him home in the morning...but seriously? What the hell, Weather?

The Nephew woke me up to tell me it was "snowing like crazy outside" and I was like, "Okay, buddy" and got up and holy shit...the kid was right.


In other news, we got him a play-tent and a sleeping bag and a flashlight set (Buzz Lightyear) for Christmas and we thought it would be fun. I had no idea it would be practical as well, because he sleeps in it on the living room floor (with the couch cushions under him) and it blocks out the sound enough that I can have the TV on in my room or go out into the kitchen and make food and he never wakes up (which is good because if he wakes up in the middle of the night, he is convinced it is morning and wants to get up).

Also, he picked out our movie for Movie Night (he took a shopping trip to our favorite store, "Target", because our appropriate movies for four year olds is sorely lacking) and he picked How To Train Your Dragon.

THIS MOVIE IS MADE OF WIN! Craig Ferguson is hysterical as one of the voices. The plot is great (animal lovers unite!). We had a big talk about how people should try to get to know each other instead of fighting and they might find that they can be friends. The animation is awesome. Astrid has kick-ass clothes and is made of awesome! (yes, shut up, everything about this movie was awesome). During the big climactic scene, The Nephew starts yelling out the names of the Hero and his Dragon in like slow motion voice, "Nooooooo, Hiiiiiicup. Toooothleeeeeeeesssssss. Nooooooo."

He also rambled in my ear a lot about whether or not he would rather ride to school on a dragon or on Appa from Avatar - and then did a lot of , "Remember when Aang and Sokka did this and remember when Sokka..." I was like, "Dude. I'm glad you are into Avatar now, but I've never seen this movie and I'm trying to watch it. I want to find out what happens to Toothless."

"Oh," he says, and starts to tell me how the movie ends.

Also, he didn't want to call his mother and tell her goodnight, but he did want to call my BFF and wish her good luck on the Bar Exam. He thought a school test that lasts two days sounds like madness.

And we played X-Men action figures and because we didn't have a Professor Xavier (I know, I am lame) we had to have a vote to see who was in charge. Cyclops won but only because we have two Wolverines and they both voted for their BFF Cyclops. It was a close call. The Nephew got upset because he wanted Sabertooth to win and I explained to him that this is what we call a democracy. Then Cyclops got mad because no one would do their homework.

This was my weekend. It was pretty good, if not exhausting. Hopefully tomorrow there will be enough time after taking The Nephew home for me to go get my new glasses, so I can better see the TV and thus kick my sister's butt at video games.

Provided we can get out of our house in the morning and that there aren't wolves escaped from the zoo and floods and Jake Gyllenhaal on our doorstep (I would be okay with that though, honestly).

In the amount of time it took me to spell-check this, the sleet has started up again and is shaking the windows (part of that is the wind but still, it's like tiny little gnomes are using their Parker-esque thieving tools to tap their way into our house. Gnomes scare me).

Comments

[wernier.livejournal.com]

I'd seen one or two parts of X-Men series and I become a fan of them.

[dodger-sister.livejournal.com]

Are we talking comics or tv cartoon or the movies?

The Nephew is four, so he is just old enough to start watching the cartoons - though somehow he has been obsessed with The X-Men for more than a year. Just from playing with my action figures. :)

[denig37]

Your nephew is hilarious :-D...I want one like that in the future :-D

[dodger-sister.livejournal.com]

I hope you get an awesome nephew someday too - but maybe yours will be less strong-willed and stubborn. lol, 4 year olds are exhausting.

[vikingprincess]

Hearing about your nephew makes me really glad that I am strongly influencing the reading tastes of my brothers' kids -- because your nephew sounds like a ton of fun. So far, I've given them Harry Potter, Percy Jackson, So You Want to be a Wizard, Hardy Boys, the good old school Nancy Drew, faerie tales, and so on. Otherwise I fear that they would be very dull people, like my brother and his wife. Hopefully they'll grow up with imaginations and creativity.

[dodger-sister.livejournal.com]

My nephew is made of awesome - thank you. His mom is pretty cool too. His dad used to be, when I had more influence on him, but now he is all history military buff and that's not really appropriate for his kid just yet. His mom and I go to the Narnia movies and the Harry Potter movies and she's into SPN, so that's a good influence. It's my older brother's kid I am most worried about - they live in Canada, we see them once a year and my older bro and his wife only watch reality tv and she doesn't watch Star Wars or Star Trek or anything because, and I quote, "I don't like space."

You are doing the Hardy Boys (talk about incestuous brothers - wait, we weren't talking about incestuous brothers? - my bad, lol) - that's old school, I salute you. What is So You Want To Be a Wizard?

[vikingprincess]

So You Want to be a Wizard is an amazing series by Diane Duane (who also wrote some of the very best Star Trek TOS novels) that predates Harry Potter, has epic battles of good versus evil, teaches responsibility/science/history, creates the most amazing world within our own, and is STILL being written! It also covers pain and loss and sacrifice, but without preachiness.

I like HP, but I ADORE this series more than can be adequately expressed. (There are cat wizards. And alien wizards. And whale wizards!!)

[dodger-sister.livejournal.com]

Shit - I think I need to get this book series - The Nephew is currently obsessed with both Aliens and Wizards. Like, he decided that there were aliens that could only be destroyed by a magic wizard wand and so the X-Men had to go find it. (yes, we play action figures A LOT!). He would like this book, I think. Well, maybe when he is a little older.

I'm not horrendously obsessed with HP, but I like it surprisingly more than I expected to. Narnia is my children's series of choice and The Nephew is really into that.

[vikingprincess]

Narnia and The Lord of the Rings were the first fantasy series I ever read - I don't remember how early I read Narnia, but I know it was before LoTR, which I started at, um (does fast math) age ten. So I guess the Hobbit was before then, too.

The Narnia books are the only ones out of what we've mentioned (except the first Wizard book) that are actually the RIGHT length to be made into a movie without leaving out the good bits!

[dodger-sister.livejournal.com]

My mom read us two or three of the Narnia series every year growing up. I remember sitting in on those readings as young as four. I started reading them on my own in the second/third grade.

I am ashamed to admit that I did not read The Hobbit or the Lord of the Rings until I was like 20. Remember those tripped out cartoon movie versions? I had reoccurring nightmares about Gollum and The Black Riders (Idk why my mom thought it was okay to let a seven year old see those movies, just because they were animated - but this is the woman who let her 6 yr old see Beverly Hills Cop, so...)

Anyway, I tried to read The Hobbit in like the fourth or fifth grade and out of nowhere, when I reached the part with Gollum, I started having nightmares again. It freaked me out. I didn't pick it or LotR up again until the movies came out and my sister called me and told me she would buy me a DVD player if I would read the books.

Now I am LotR obsessed!

I was also big into The Bobbsey Twins series and The Princess and The Goblin series when I was a kid.

Yes, and maybe that is one of the reasons why the Narnia movies have been so good.

[flawed-x-design.livejournal.com]

Your nephew sounds too cute!
Lmao at your X-Men action figures game. I'm so jealous.
Wolverine and Cycloops being BFFs is so trufax <3

You're getting new glasses! Mine broke yesterday! (one of the arms fell off but I was shopping so I lost the screw) haha they are currently sitting pecariously on my face and giving me a headache lol

[dodger-sister.livejournal.com]

Wolverine and Cyclops are BFFS - didn't you know that? lol It's totally canon trufax and stuffs. And we totally convinced a four year old child of this as well - that Cyclops and Wolverine are the bestest best friends who ever lived. ;)

Today The X-Men were attacked by aliens. The Nephew said that Nightcrawler had to go 'poof poof' around the Queen Alien to distract her and then the rest of the guys would sneak up behind her and throw Spiderman's web on her (yes, Spiderman is totally friends with The X-Men, you know.) I was impressed with The Nephew's expert offensive tactics.

I didn't make it to get the new glasses. The Nephew was here until 5:30pm. Now he is at my mother's house across town because his parents still can't get here to get him. They lost power and heat at their house from the storm, so The Nephew is still stuck here in town.

I have just like $10 reading glasses that I wear to read, but my eyes get tired by the end of the night, I find I have trouble seeing the tv when I am watching or playing video games - so I figured why not get distance glasses for when my eyes get tired. Maybe next weekend I will make it to get the new glasses.

haha they are currently sitting pecariously on my face and giving me a headache lol

Oh no. lol I would bet you can get that fixed for pretty cheap. ;)

[flawed-x-design.livejournal.com]

*sage nod* Wolverine and Cyclops are totally canon trufax BBFs4LYF *insert their secret handshake here*

Spider-Man is actually in fact friends with the X-men (in the comics) so your nephew's plan sounds fool-proof. That's pretty impressive.

I know, they’re actually just my old glasses, but I like wearing them, especially at home because they’re lighter and more comfortable, but the newer glasses are prettier lol. I just thought it was a funny coincidence.

[dodger-sister.livejournal.com]

Wolverine and Cyclops are totally canon trufax BBFs4LYF *insert their secret handshake here*

Hahaha, next time we play I am totally going to make them have a secret handshake (for some reason Gambit was really big on high fiving everyone this weekend) lol

Spider-Man is actually in fact friends with the X-men (in the comics)

I have some of the Spidey and Friends series. They are a little more appropriate for younger kids to read than say a Wolverine comic, so maybe in a couple of years when he starts reading on his own, those will be the first comics I let him read. Though he isn't a big fan of The Hulk these days - The other superheroes are always telling Hulk that he can't come over because he has a tantrum problem. lol

That's pretty impressive. - hee, he is a shockingly smart kid.

I just thought it was a funny coincidence.

It is, because I haven't had prescription glasses since I was a kid. Odd timing.

[flawed-x-design.livejournal.com]

lmao! Poor Hulk

[vikingprincess]

A bitty gold safety pin is a halfway decent stopgap for when you have a screw missing from eyeglasses (though it's marginally more dorky than balancing an pair of glasses lacking one arm on your face!)

[flawed-x-design.livejournal.com]

Haha!
Luckly they were only my old pair that I usually wear just at home because they're lighter and therefore more comfortable :)
Thanks for the tip though, and I like your icon :)

[tringic.livejournal.com]

Just popping in to say that your title reminded me of the Muppet christmas carol ("This is the night before the dawn before the day of Christmas!") but that's obviously not it.

And I'm jealous of the play tent.

(I should probably go to sleep now...)

[dodger-sister.livejournal.com]

It's not me, right? - you do have a thing about The Muppet Christmas Carol, right?

Sorry though - you lose. It is South Park actually. They did a spoof on The Day After Tomorrow where they were all freaked that global warming had brought on a new ice age.

"I have new calculations. Global Warming will be here two days before the day after tomorrow."
"Hey, that's today!"
"Oh my god, we didn't listen!"
"We didn't listen!"

As it turns out, there was no global warming - the flood was caused because their children stole a boat and crashed it into the dam.

lol

It is an awesome play tent. One or two of the cats generally tries to sleep in it with him. And he had a habit of falling off the couch like a lot, so this erases that problem.

Hope things are going better for you, bb. /licks you/

[tringic.livejournal.com]

No, it's not you, it's me :P I can literally talk along with every single sentence in that movie *dork*

Southpark, I would never have known; it's one of those things my parents wouldn't let me watch when I was younger, and even now I still feel guilty if I leave it on too long. I've moved on to That 70s Show /o\

Play tents in general are just really fucking awesome. I never had one, but we did have chairs that we could turn into a tent by throwing a blanket over it. And my mom would always put the green sleeping bag in front of the tent, because that was the grass *nods solemnly* Those are good memories.

Not yet, but working on it....

[ranua.livejournal.com]

Aside from the weather, it sounds like a perfect weekend. Your Nephew has got to be the best Nephew ever. :)

Is How to Train Your Dragon really good then? With The Boy being older we don't see that sort of movie much anymore and I miss the animated kid stuff. Is it worth it to find it cheep on dvd or netflix it?

[dodger-sister.livejournal.com]

Well, the thing with The Nephew is that we get him like once every six weeks for about 24 hours. So we kind of spoil him and play with him and do whatever he wants. By Day Three of him being snowed in here, we were like, "Buddy, we just need a half hour to check our emails. Can you play by yourself for just a little bit?"

But honestly, it was nice to see so much of him and it was kind of cute how willing he was to stick around. Most kids if you had told them they were stuck someplace not their home, would have been crying that they wanted their mom. He was totally cool and in fact stole his dad's phone today to call us and check in - I guess two days is now suddenly to long to go without talking to us. lol

He is seriously an awesome kid. He is like a little fanboy, it is so cute.

You know, How To Train Your Dragon is good enough that we are going to watch it again without The Nephew here (he really does talk during movies a lot because he gets so overexcited) and we actually want to like watch the movie - so yes, it was good.

Now I don't know how your boy feels about animated movies at his age though - some kids at that age are like, "Mom, I'm not a baby. I don't watch cartoons." but if he doesn't mind animated films, I actually think you would both like it. It really is about animal rights, I feel. And about parental relationships and listeining to your children. Plus, did I mention Craig Ferguson? Very funny.

[ranua.livejournal.com]

The Boy does still enjoy the odd animated feature, tho I'm not sure if it's only ones he's seen before, (he can re-watch a movie till the dvd wears out I swear to all the gods). I know he liked the How To Train Your Dragon books back in elementary? school.

Sounds like someone is doing a good job raising The Nephew if he was still fun to be with by day three. At least you weren't stuck with that cliche whiney, crying kid.

[dodger-sister.livejournal.com]

If The Boy read the books as a kid, then I would say you should def rent How to Train Your Dragon.

The Nephew is neither whiny nor crying. He is however very, very stubborn. And he has a listening problem...in that he doesn't listen. Like we were doing a puzzle and he decided he was done and started taking it apart. I said that I was still doing it and he started throwing a fit. He didn't want to do the puzzle anymore - how dare I keep doing it without him! lol I just let him throw his fit and kept doing the puzzle and eventually he rejoined me.

But honestly, I prefer that to like crying fits. Had one of those screaming tantrum kids at the daycare I worked at in high school - kills the eardrums. ;)

[matchboximpala.livejournal.com]

I loved this. I was never great at playing with my nieces because I'm one of those adults whose imagination seems to have shriveled up with time. Not surprising, that's why I have a hard time imagining writing fic.

What nightmare weather! I hope you and the sis and snug and warm and the nephew made it safely home.

[dodger-sister.livejournal.com]

I started working at a child care when I was in the eigth grade and I had that career for ten years. So my imagination never got a chance to shrivel up. For some reason, I was always in with the preschool/toddler age kids and if you don't have an imagination in there - you will be eaten alive!

The weather cleared up slightly and then got worse and then cleared up again. The Nephew made it back to his parents but it was several more days before they got back to their house because of the power outtage. Schools were shut down for three days (some of the outlying schools for four days) this week. It's madness. I think - /looks around shifty eyed/ - that it is finally settled down now.

Hopefully.

But we are all safe and warm, so that is good. :)