A terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day

I woke up this morning but my voice did not. I sound like a boy going through puberty, like Bobby Brady in that Brady Bunch episode where they are singing in a talent competition. It's funny on the Brady Bunch but not so funny in real life - my voice frightened the children. Zeca looked at me strangely and Miguel asked me not to speak to him at school because he was afraid the other children would laugh at me. He said he didn't want me to get my feelings hurt. I suspect I might be embarrassing.

It was in the 50's here over the weekend and we didn't have to wear coats. This morning, it looks like this:

I took that picture out of my front door at 6 a.m. this morning. It has only gotten worse since then. At 7:30 a.m., I checked school closings and Lake Country was still a go. So, I bundled the children up and headed out to the car. It was snowing and blowing but I saw no bushels of fun. By the time I got both children strapped into their car seats, there was a 1/4 inch of snow inside the car. By the time I got the windows cleared and got back into the car, my head looked like a puffy white dandelion. Miguel mentioned that I should have worn a hat. There was not time to explain vanity. I just kept thinking, "How did they not cancel school?"

I took off towards school but could barely see the road or anything else for that matter. Cars were creeping along, people were walking in the streets. I made it 4 blocks before I decided to pull over and clear the windows again lest I run over something or someone. I also took the time to make a phone call - "Luisa, are you sure they haven't cancelled the schools?" Nope, so, I decided to proceed. I tried to pull back into the snowy ruts in the road but, you guessed it, I was stuck. I considered my options: crying,walking home carrying my 23 pound daughter and dragging the 4 year old behind, cursing, calling for help or burning the remaining tread off of my tires. I opted for the cursing and burning tread. Ten minutes later, I got back in the road and Miguel exclaimed, "Good girl!" I thought he was talking to Zeca because she had finally stopped screaming (she had been raging a protest since leaving home). Turns out, he was talking to me. I did him proud with my fine driving. We made it to school, I dropped Miguel off, got stuck once more in the parking lot but was on my way after another tread burning experience.

I managed to make it the 4 miles to Zeca's day care, parked the car, dropped her off and then went to catch my bus downtown. The bus was so crowded that I had to stand pressed against strangers, some of whom were just plain stinky. I got out of the bus a block before my stop because I couldn't stand it anymore and walked to my office. My socks had come off in my boots and my pants were falling down. I got to my desk and the phone rang. School was cancelled.

I think I'll move to Brazil.