My daughter's croupy cough continues. The Hogabooms eat three healthy meals daily and get very good sleep at night; during this week as we wait for Ralph's job duties to resume we take walks in the chill and administer meals to those without power (two other families, last night). Meanwhile our local paper makes sure to report the various dramas (we did have three examples of smash and grab / looting - in a county of 36,000) while neglecting to cover in any detail the tireless work of emergency personnel and the PUD / Bonneville workers to which we owe our relative comfort.

Otherwise, P.S., a storm is just boring. I have discovered I only like sitting around doing nothing when there is the option to do other things. Our blackout provided for a lot of reading, a lot of snuggling, a lot of cooking and cleaning, and a lot of singing and playing guitar. On the second day I finally picked up a book many friends have recommended to me and in the last day and a half have thrown myself into cooking dishes therein - the basic beans, banana bread, chicken coconut soup, caesar dressing, 24-hour chicken stock (which had the benefit of feeding my cats and the 93-year-old neighbor's kitties with tender chicken goodness scraps), homemade cream cheese and whey, and sprouted almonds (for apricot bars). This morning I even started the day with a whey tonic (surprisingly refreshing), feeling silly and hippie-ish.

Tonight: sci-fi family movie night and yes, I'm looking forward to it.

Labels: family life, food geekery, weather