January 7th, 2025
Snow Day 2
Feeling crap… roll out to check texts from Elmer about the deadly Tibetan quake, check on Yali who had another nose bleed in the night but his fever’s gone, prep soft-boiled eggs, art direction for Patience’s panda eyeballs, discuss Puck’s frustration with running, start a load of laundry, show Yali how to paint and fold origami snakes for his art project, prep a bowl of popcorn for Yali and “Japanese-style” ramen for Puck with another soft-boiled egg… the whole time of which the sea chanty “Barrett’s Privateers” is running in my head on repeat
Feeling a little tired by ten-thirty, pause to read a Christian analysis of Mormonism and Jehovah’s Witness as “American religions”… my nose has also become a faucet
Oxbear, busy with video call upon video call for work, learns he will be flying to Mexico City for a few days in early May
Order Patience’s two hundred dollar (big eyes emoji) Irish dance wig in color #4… the shop in Kirkwood where I placed the order responds later with “should be in within the next two weeks depending on weather here and Scotland”
Afternoon brings a negotiation of fifty dollars for Puck to shovel the front walk, carport, driveway, part of the street, and de-ice all three vehicles… he enters a twenty-degree windchill with the snow shovel and ski goggles… gets through about half of the work in a couple of hours, saving the rest for tomorrow
Patience sits outside with him for part of the time, making snow dinos and teddy bears with her snow-baller pack, shyly watching the neighbor kids slide down their back hill, but turns down an invitation to join them
By three-thirty already 35 school districts closed for Wednesday also, and class at the studio is canceled for the evening
Evening is for popcorn chicken in the air fryer (an Aldi Instacart delivery helps)
Laundry spread out to dry in the storage room under oscillating fan (no going out that evening)
Oxbear “takes over” later while I browse the impoverished streets of Puerto Concordia, Colombia, on Google Maps, Yali’s birth town