Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Nice to Snow Ya

Yes, it was snowing again when I awoke this morning, to no one's surprise. What WAS surprising was it never stuck to the streets. It did stick to my porch, though. I think we ended up getting the predicted two inches. I swept and salted my porch before heading over to Dad and Uncle Ken's to do this week's laundry session.

It wasn't easy getting to Dad's. The path where the train tracks are had added an additional foot of snow since the last time I was back there. It ended up being a heavy slog. I got tons of snow in the laundry basket and soaked my boots.

I have not felt well all day. I woke up with a runny nose that was soon joined by a pounding head and stuffiness that just would not go away. I thought it would help to get out a bit, so I volunteered at the Oaklyn Library, the first time I've done any volunteering in almost two weeks. I'd gotten out around quarter of 12, though, and I had work at 2 and laundry in the dryer. I didn't do much more than a cursory glance over the DVDs and kids' books.

I didn't feel like slogging through the snow on the path again, so I took the long way home down to West Clinton Avenue and up Manor. I was feeling even worse when I made it to the house, but a box I saw on the stoop improved my mood ten times over. My order of The Birds, the Bees, and the Monkees: Deluxe Edition had finally arrived from Rhino! Apparently, this 3-disc CD set that's only available on their limited edition "Rhino Handmade" label was so overwhelmingly popular, they had to go into a second pressing, pushing the shipping from the 8th to the 12th. I'm thrilled to have it. In addition to the original songs from the album (including my favorite Monkees song, "Daydream Believer"), we have both the original mono and stereo mixes of the songs, as well as a plethora of unreleased and cut songs - so many, most of them are on the third disc. It came with an awesome booklet with lots of nice pictures, a cute pin, and a 45 record single of Mike's "St. Matthew" and Peter's "Lady's Baby."

There was no time to do much more than glance through the contents to make sure they were all there. I had a hasty lunch of the last of the tuna salad, celery, and a Banana-Honey-Coconut Muffin, then rushed to work on my bike. Thankfully, by this point, it was sunny and in the mid-30s. My ride was still a little harrowing due to the snow and ice clogging the curbs and the Black Horse Pike sidewalks, but at least Mother Nature didn't add more.

Rushing ended up being almost pointless. Work was steady-to-dead all night, just busy enough that the time went by fairly quickly. Good thing, too. I still felt awful, and it didn't get much better throughout the night. I had full-blown chills by the time I got home, and not just because it was cold outside.

I was going to hit the Haddon Township Library tomorrow, but if I still feel this bad, I probably won't be going anywhere.

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