Day 2

Monday: We wake up feeling very mellow the second day, having slept longer than we usually do. We have what's left of the cold pizza for breakfast and decide to venture out into the marshmallow world that is before us. We open the garage door and to our utter amazement even MORE snow has accumulated during the night.  We check again for a shovel but still can't find one. Daniel is confident we can get out, so out we go. We back out of the driveway and get stuck once we hit the street. We can't go forward and we can't go back. One of the Barker's neighbors has a truck with chains on. He tows the car out of the snow bank and we are off.  We head to Joe's to see if they are selling shovels. They are sold out.  We go to WinCo to get some food. I think in times of crisis, survival instincts kick in because we bought too much food.  R&B can eat some corn dogs when they get home. We will leave them in the freezer.  

We get back into the car and discuss trying Fred Meyer's for a shovel.  Then Daniel tells me that the neighbor that towed us had just been to Fred Meyer's and they didn't have any.  Desperate for a shovel, we start driving the neighborhood looking at all our friends houses. Not a one of them had a shoveled driveway, thus giving us little hope they had a shovel.  Finally we come to Trevon and Michelle Jacobson's house and steal the shovel they left on their porch. We left a note.

Finally making it back to R&B's, I get out of the car and open the garage door so Daniel can try to get the car up the driveway.  Again, he gets stuck in the street. This time, a different neighbor helps push the car forward.  It took 3 tries, but we got the car in the garage.  With my absconded shovel, I set to work on the driveway. The snow is in 3 layers: powder on the bottom, a perfectly smooth layer of ice in the middle, and more powder on top. It's like a wintery oreo cookie.  After an hour or so, the driveway is clear. (Daniel felt really bad about me doing the shoveling, but his right ankle is still in an aircast and his shoes have bad traction. I wasn't about to let him fall down and get hurt again!)

I go inside and Daniel is bored. I suggest reading one of the many, many excellent books R&B have. Daniel chooses "Fellowship of the Ring" and dives in.  I take a hot shower. 

We call the Jacobson's to make sure they know we took their shovel. They say that's fine and invite us to dinner.  We get ready to head to Red Robin.  Trevon drove their Montero and we carpooled. There are only 2 word to describe that ride: White Knuckle.  Trevon is also driving us to the airport Wednesday if they don't cancel our flight.  White Knuckle is still better than taking the train at 4 A.M.

Dinner with Trevon and Michelle and their 3 daughters is a hoot. The place is jumping because most of the other restaurants in town have closed due to the bad weather. (just an aside here, if this much snow fell in Utah, NONE of this would be happening. Everything would be open and working. The streets would be clear and the airplanes would be taking off. Oregon just can't handle this because the state government sucks.)  After a dinner of burgers and strawberry lemonade, we go back to their place to watch "Wall-E".  They hadn't seen it before and they loved it. 

We got back to R&B's late but decided to watch one more movie before bed. We watched "Chicken Run".  It made me sad that R&B don't have any chickens anymore.