Ice storms suck sour frog ass

E.D. Note: For those who actually aren't us, Mickey spent the majority of December in the grips of the major ice storm that hit the northeast. He lost power for ten days and didn't have internet for another week. I already explained the essentials to those who are us, and if you're not us, I'm not going over it again. Just pick it up as I go along and stop whining. I just watched some of that one cheerleader movie with Marcy Rylan on E!....I'm in too awesome a mood to argue with you right now.


I can't stress this enough:

The neighbors that took us in during the power outage have nothing but my admiration and appreciation.

That doesn't mean they should get it, though.

These people are nice enough, and have always been great to my family. In fact, they took us in during a previous ice storm (Though we only stayed a few hours.....a move that in hindsight, was worth the next 24 hours+ we stayed in our freezing house).

Back in my younger days, I spent some weekends with my aunt Carol and Uncle Eric. I find it hard to remember the fun things (The camping, the bowling, etc. )because these people were insufferable (That, and Uncle Eric was CREEPY). There couldn't have been two people more wrong for each other. They bickered constantly, ruining any possible fun that could have been happening. By the time I was in my teens and the visits stopped, I don't know if I was more relieved that I had those weekends to myself or that I didn't have to listen to those two anymore.

That was pretty much our experience there. My mother said of them to a friend "These people shouldn't be married. They shouldn't be allowed to live near each other. They shouldn't be in the same country". Which ironically enough, that's usually the case (Except for the married part). They're one of these couples that spends the majority of their time apart from one another on different trips (Wonder why?).One particularly memorable moment from our stay: (The names have been changed to protect the Canadian)

Joe: (Asleep and snoring)
Ellen: Oh my god, can you believe this? JOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!
Joe (Jumps out of his chair)

(The following monologue rivals anything thats ever been on Letterman)

Was I sleeping?
Yes
Was I dreaming?
Yes
Was I content?
Yes
Was my headache FINALLY going away?
Yes.

Am I sleeping now?
No.
Am I dreaming now?
No.
Am I content now?
No

IS MY HEADACHE BACK?
YES

Yep. He went through the whole list. Unfortunately, none of the other exchanges were as entertaining as that.

Joe wasn't a cranky old man. Just when his wife was around.

I suppose Ellen's biggest problem was she just didn't get it. For instance, when getting water from the lake (As we called it. fetching water from the crick), she'd get enraged when she'd find leaves and sticks in the water. Now, yes, that'd be a huge problem when it's drinking water, but seeing as how this water was for flushing toilets and we had bottled water for drinking, doing dishes, etc....there's worse things that go down your toilet than leaves and sticks... And they usually do.

She had a real problem with the fact that nobody was showering. OK, I guess I can't argue there...no one likes stinky people. But when you're in a situation where EVERYONE stinks and you can't really do a thing about it......you want to go t a public place to shower, fine, do it. But it's not an emergency you should hold people hostage for. Take what you can get when you can get it. I only got one shower in the entire ten days (And it was pretty damn creepy, as I was in my mother's hot boss's bathroom). Oh and I'm also a guy....as much as I'd like to change my clothes every day so at least part of me doesn't stink, I don't have that many clothes.....in fact, I even had to steal a pair of new pants out of my Christmas presents so I had something clean to wear for a couple days.

The lack of noise was driving us crazy. We finally get a hold of a radio, and the first thing that happens when she hears it is she asks for it to be turned off, as she hates background noise. OK, it's their house, fine, there's nothing wrong with that. But guess this: They have a little black and white portable tv that runs on batteries that we've been using just to watch the news to save batteries. Guess what she does? She watches the entire season finale of Survivor and episodes of Entertainment Tonight......I can see how that's important during this time. (For the record, it wasn't the lack of noise driving me crazy, I had my Walkman anyway, it was the lack of actual light. It was making me physically sick).

My least favorite though was her over-bearingness. Now granted, in small doses, that's not a huge problem, and in some cases, like when we first got there, is appreciated. But when the main part of town is back up and running, you want a sense of normalcy. You want to at least partially feel like you're in control of your life again. So excuse us if we wanted to go out for lunch and dinner every day instead of having you cook whatever you can find that hasn't been spoiled or what you were able to get out in the garage in the early hours of the aftermath of the storm on a tiny barbecue that's hard to get going because it's outside in single digit temperatures. Either that or we didn't want to go to the shelter to eat because we feel that things set aside for the less fortunate should be reserved for the people it's set aside for.

As it turns out, that last sentiment Joe agreed with. But (As a sign of how difficult this experience was) he wouldn't dare admit it around her. He would only say it when she left for Virginia three days before the power came back on.

They're nice people and definitely very generous...I feel incredibly guilty for bitching about them. But it's just...you don't know people until you live with them.