SNEAUX DAY(S)!

Snow in the Front Yard

If only you could see it twinkle.

So it has been brought to my attention that I don’t really talk about anything on my blog outside of wine.  With that being said, I thought I’d add a few boozeless tales to the mix.  So, snow or how we in Louisiana like to call it, sneaux.  Snow…what a wonderful and beautiful and delightful and graceful and cold and dirty and slippery and mushy thing.  So a week ago we got our first snow here in Valenciennes.  It was somewhat snowing when I went to sleep Monday night, but when I woke up Tuesday morning and walked to the bus stop, it was a bona fide winter wonderland.  Everything, including the roads, was just covered in this beautiful, glittery snow.  Every step I took created a footprint because my feet were the first ones to walk in it.  It was cold but glorious.  Seeing as I’m not used to snow AT ALL it was super exciting.

So I made my way to the bus stop and waited.  No bus.  Hmm…so I thought, I’ll just continue to wait.  Thirty minutes later and still no bus.  Another fifteen minutes later – nothing.  So I decided to walk home and check the Transvilles website (the bus company).   No buses because of the snow.  I contacted the school and informed them that I would be unable to make it to school.  Shucks.  So I was snowed in.  The upside was getting to go back to sleep and be all warm and snuggly in my bed.

So here’s the downside of snow.  It melts, and when it melts…well…it’s a mess.  My boots are not made for this kind of weather and my toes are really starting to hate the fact that I haven’t bought new boots yet.  Melting snow adds to the problem because it soaks through the shoe quickly and then I have cold wet toes.  Not good.  Also, people walk through that stuff and it can get right down nasty.  When David and I were in Lille on Friday all the snow had melted and all that was left of the perfect, beautiful, white, shimmering snow was what looked like sand.  Yuck.

Another fun fact, when snow melts but then it drops below freezing before evaporating, yeah, you get ice.  Yesterday I was slipping and sliding down the road to the bus stop.  Got there and wait about 15 minutes before deciding that the buses probably weren’t driving on ICE.  So I texted my teacher to let her know I couldn’t come in.  Day two of missed school due to cold weather.  Nice, but she definitely wasn’t understanding of the fact that if I miss bus number one and bus number two, there’s no way I can show up for school on Monday (seeing as I only work from 7:50-8:50).  Bus one comes at 6:39 and bus two comes at 7:09.  The buses didn’t start running until after 10.  Hopefully she and the principal will understand that this is out of my control.  I can’t help the fact that it takes me an HOUR to get to school.  They don’t seem too concerned with that.

So, this whole snow thing is just kinda spiraling out of control, but oh well.  I’ve decided I’m going to have to stay in Paris the night before I fly home (poor me, right?) because I don’t want to take a chance that the train I need at 5:30am Wednesday morning won’t be running due to snow/ice/whatever the hell. 

OMGGGGGGG just 8 days till I come home!!!  8 days from now I will be preparing to take off and fly home.  Oh boy!  Oh boy!  I’m getting REAL excited.  I just have to finish Christmas shopping, pack, clean my room, call AT&T and get them to turn my phone on while I’m home (that’ll probably take all day), prepare lesson plans on Christmas with songs and games, and be ready to roll out by Tuesday at around 6pm.  So much to do in such little time.  Oh yeah, and Allison and I are going with Annabelle to Belgium on Saturday.  It’s not Germany, but it’ll do! Everyone keeps saying that they just want me home for Christmas so I hope everyone is really ready to get whatever random shit I have found.  This is hard.