Day 12.021: That Friday feeling

How I feel when I realise there is just one more work day before the weekend:

Day 12.020: Icy falls

Not falls on the ice - although we have experienced and heard of several of those - but these falls at the mill that were looking quite icy on Saturday morning:

After a few inches of snow overnight last night, we have some cold air moving in tonight with a predicted low of 2°F (-17°C) and a high tomorrow of just 14°F (-10°C). Nothing compared to what is happening in the middle of the continent of course - but enough to form some more impressive ice near running water I suspect.

Day 12.019: Snow and COLD!

The National Weather Service just upgraded our Winter Weather Advisory to a Winter Storm Warning, but a few inches of snow is neither here nor there compared with what is happening in the Midwest right now.

Here are two weather maps I downloaded yesterday. The first shows expected temperatures for tomorrow morning. You can click to enlarge, but the whitish area in the middle has temperatures dipping to -36°F (in case you're wondering that's almost the same in °C!).

the second includes the windchill and has a value of -62°F in the middle. I can't even imagine.

We have visitors at work at the moment - I usually feel sorry for them when the coincide with a snow storm, but since they are here from Wisconsin and avoiding that crazy cold, maybe we did them a favour!

Day 12.018: Official review

Here was a moment of high drama from Saturday night. As the Roller Derby bout came close to its end with the trailing team making ground on the leaders - an official review was called.

Here the coach (near the middle) is making her case to the officials - including the very tall men looking even taller on their skates:

But then, as if to remind us that this is Roller Derby and not a terribly serious sport, the two opposing coaches did a bit of dancing to the music while the officials reviewed their previous decision and made a final ruling:

Day 12.017: Exile #2's Sunday Column #235

Exile #2 writes...

As Exile #1 mentioned, we went to the Roller Derby yesterday. We arrived a little early, which was good because it gave us time to read the helpful crib sheet in the programme, explaining how it all worked. It did feel a bit like trying to understand the rules of Quidditch, but by the time the teams were ready to start, we knew our jammers from our blockers. The skaters’ names lived up to expectations, with Velocity Raptor, CupQuake, and Slayoncé amongst our favorites in this face off between the RIP Tides and the Calamity Janes. Even the coaches and match officials got in on the punning action - looking at you Meow’n Em Down and Cary Zawhistle.

Exile #3’s dance company came out at half-time to perform a couple of their latest pieces, including their suitably fierce Modern/African Jazz-style number. They did brilliantly, Exile #3 even managing to keep her composure when the sticky surface of the rink caused her to lose a shoe. She came and joined the rest of us in the second half to watch the exciting conclusion. We’ve often joked that this might be Exile #4’s ideal sport, involving as it does, rugby-style maneuvers on roller skates. Seeing it live did nothing to dissuade us. In fact, we even spent some time deciding what her roller derby name should be. At the moment, we’re going with a nickname that she had for a while at school because of her accent, but which would take on a whole new meaning in this context: Crumpets!

Day 12.016: Roller Derby

We had a fun evening out at the Maine Roller Derby Winter Classic today. We were really there for the half-time show (more on that another day), but the roller derby action was great:

E5N1 got into cheering on the winning team and went out to high-five them all at the end:

Day 12.015: Getting the band back together

At E5N1's prompting we played some family Rock Band last weekend and it was so much fun, that we selected it as our Friday night family fun tonight too.

Here's everyone but me in no way pretending to play for the sake of a photo after we finished and turned the Xbox off!

Day 12.014: Beware of the sand sharks!

Day 12.013: The things you find out years later...

The girls were looking at the side of the fridge where their old artwork magnets are displayed.

Exile #3 said, "She has an imaginary friend that's an elephant - that's why she has a shadow but the elephant doesn't."

We were all impressed - having not been aware of this detail. Not to be outdone, Exile #4 looked at this colorful but fairly impenetrable creation of her own:

and said simply, "The butterflies are playing ping-pong." Which is quite clearly what is going on - but apparently we had to wait ten years or so to find out.

Day 12.012: Wrap up warm!

There's nothing like a walk on the beach to remind us of the seasonal nature of life here. The pier is closed and part-boarded up:

Wherever boats are stored they are shrink-wrapped against the winter weather. Buildings however, are not generally shrink wrapped. Occasionally though...

The view from the other side confirmed that there is probably building work underway:

I suppose when you have a seasonal business, you have to get improvements and repairs done in the off-season, however inconvenient it might be to keep the work area in workable conditions when the temperatures are plummeting to near 0 °F.

Day 12.011: No weather today?

Yesterday, I took this screen grab from my phone:

Apparently, the weather predicted for today wasn't much to look at?

Actually, the truth wasn't much better - there was indeed some new snow and some blowing snow and it was quite cold:

Day 12.010: Exile #2's Sunday Column #234

Exile #2 writes...

So, on the plus side, we didn’t get the 20 inches of snow that we might have done. It was more like 6 inches. It was, however, 6 inches of tiny (and heavy) ice pellets, and it’s still falling.

Our church decided to experiment with holding an online service, so that everyone could stay safe at home. It turned out to be surprisingly successful with, we estimate 75-100 people joining in. There were even some pajamas and dressing gowns in evidence. We snuggled up under blankets to join in and Exile #1 and I sang a version of In the Bleak Midwinter as a (slightly wry) nod to the snow day.

Having had family movie night last night (we watched the quite lovely Coco), today we tackled the next stage in our long-term board game of Pandemic Legacy. It’s not looking good for the world right now. If you’re a resident of Essen, we particularly apologize, but hopefully we’ll turn it around next time.

Day 12.009: Calm before the storm

It was cold today as we waited for the snow storm that is just getting started as I write this. We managed two outings - one for four of us to get haircuts (Exile #2 had one recently but the rest of us were due) and a few items of shopping (not pre-storm larder-stocking!). The second (for three of us at least) was for a walk on the beach.

The sea was calm, but the wind was very cold. Still, it was good to get out and about.

Day 12.008: Globalocal

We had a fun evening at a dance show in South Paris at a school called Oxford Hills - Maine is an odd place!

Exile #3's dance company did two dances and Exile #2 and I sang a few songs about Maine in the intermission:

We also enjoyed lots of other wonderful dancing from our favourite local dance companies.

Day 12.007: New York birds do what?

I've mentioned before the sometimes wonderful, often strange automatic creations of Google Photos. This is what it did with some pictures of our bird feeder outside our window in the Exiles in New York days:

I could watch this junko  house finch  junko  house finch  junko all day.

Day 12.006: If you've been waiting for winter...

From the National Weather Service forecast discussion for Sunday's storm:

Sounds like fun!

Day 12.005: Maine in the news

I get pretty excited when I hear stories from Maine in the national news. It doesn't happen very often (especially if you exclude national politics stories featuring our state representatives).

Recently I went full fan-boy when I heard one of our local public radio presenters doing a slot on NPR's Morning Edition - so much so that I couldn't remember what the item was about (it was not about Maine).

Today, Maine is once again in the news - this time because of a large disk of ice in the river in nearby Westbrook. In fact, as well as several national news outlets, even the Daily Mail picked up on this visual-friendly story today. Sadly, my schedule didn't allow me to get there to bring you my own coverage.

Day 12.004: Holey State Flag (Batman?)

...actually, it's a seaman and a farmer - both seem to have lost their shirts (maybe at the Oxford Casino?):

In any case, this particular flag has definitely seen better days.