let's talk about the weather.

a haiku:

dark, cold, ice, wind, snow
depressing, crappy, weather
i despise winter

i should have known it was too good to last! we haven't had a proper family vacation for years. granted we were able to enjoy some time in nauvoo illinois last summer, but as i was working most of the time...

things at work have somewhat settled in, and there are lulls during which i can take vacation. the new variable is that my five year old is now a kindergartener. his school is year-round. naturally, my knee-jerk reaction to this was what it had been when i was in school. "that sucks!" but now, i'm a working adult. i'm not a teacher, like both of my parents, so i now realize that the traditional summer vacation is over-rated!

the lesson du jour for us is coordinating my work schedule with five's school track schedule. i had a real break at work, but five was on-track. five goes off-track here, but i'll be swamped at work. etc. etc. etc.

finally he has a break that cooincides nicely with some down time for me. what to do? we have had glimpses of spring the last couple of weeks, so naturally our "spring fever" has reached the critical phase. we want to be outside! we want to go camping. (we can't afford to do much else...) it is still rather cool most days, and downright cold at night. what to do? where to go?

i start tracking weather in southern utah. if we went south, say to zion national park, they are occasionally hitting 70 degrees! it's almost always in the mid to upper 60's, and the overnight lows are tolerable. ok. this could be a plan!

enter the unpredictability of utah weather. just days before we have planned to leave, the extended forcast shows snow. statewide! we keep watching and waiting, hoping it will clear out soon enough. everyday, the extended forcast shows another storm, continued cold, and snow.

so here we are, a couple of days into our "vacation" and we're stuck at home. zion n.p. had a record 8+ inches of snow the day we were hoping to arrive there... of course, five goes back to school monday, and his next big break will be during a pretty busy time for me at work. hopefully we can get work things out for a few days. but for the next few months, we'll have to try little weekend activities.

so you can see there is no denying my feelings, since, once again, my loathing for winter is justified and further fueled.