Let it snow

Well sheesh. It appears that I let a month slide by without blogging. Well, it's the holidays and all, and I think I lost my readership anyway. But hark! This clickety-clack is the sound of me trying to pull it together and type a blog.

What's been going on for me lately, you ask? A lot, but that's always the case. Work is going well. I've finally started doing things that real lawyers do, instead of just typing documents. I'm keeping myself busy here, and enjoying the heck out of being a real live lawyer.

Baby Joey turned one month old on Christmas day. He's growing exponentially, and if this rate continues, he will tower over the buildings of Benson by next fall, and will cause a lot of damage around town just by crawling. Shudder, mortals, for the day of Joeyzilla draws night. In all seriousness, he's doing fantastic.

Christmas this year involved some travel, but not as much as usual. On Wednesday night we drove from Benson to Taylors Falls, MN (where my Grandparents reside). We made this trek in the midst of SNOWMAGEDDON 2009!, a much-hyped winter storm. The drive was pretty intense, but we made it without too much difficulty. We had a lovely Christmas dinner, where I successfully avoided eating any lutefisk (ish). We stayed until Christmas day, and made the trek back home.

The drive home was worse than the drive there. At first the roads were just wet, but by the time we were within 30 miles of home it was complete crap. Four-wheel drive and a speed of 30 mph got us home happily, and I discovered to my great joy that our neighbor across the street had cleared my driveway. I love my neighborhood.

It continued to snow, and I woke up the next day to the sound of a motor, and glanced out to see that once again, my neighbor had cleared my driveway. I didn't see which of my neighbors was the awesome one. I decided to pay it forward, and went over to my parents' house with a shovel in hand. This was Saturday, and they were returning later in the afternoon.

That was the worst time I've ever spent shoveling in recent memory. It took me close to 3 hours, and part of it involved cutting through a chunky wall of snow that was well higher than my waist, piled against the end of my parents' driveway by a series of snowplows. I seriously should have left that there, because it would have easily repelled looters or hordes of orcs. I feel that I singlehandedly destroyed my parents' fortifications, but such is life.

Yesterday, I once again heard the sound of blowing snow. I sprang from my bed like a wildman, intent on catching Mr. Awesome mid-snowblow. I was successful. I ran out the front door and found that it was my neighbor from across the street. I thanked him profusely for his kind act. I went inside and collected a large plate of Christmas cookies, and then brought it over to said neighbor's house as a thank-you gift. I love my neighborhood.

After that, Kerry's parents and some other relatives came to our house for Christmas Two: Electric Boogaloo. We had a great day, filled with food, beer, wine, mead, merriment, and more presents for a very excited three-year-old. I think that Gwen is now convinced that it's going to be Christmas every day.

Welcome to the world!

The evening of November 24th was fairly quiet. Typical evening here in Benson, without much going on. We put Gwenner to bed at her normal, reasonable hour. Then Kerry and I watched a little TV, and we went to bed. I read some more of Dan Brown's latest, The Lost Symbol.

At 4:10 am, Kerry said, "HONEY!" I've never woken up so quickly in my life. "WHAT????" I replied, bolting upright. "I think I'm having contractions," she replied. "How far apart are they?" I asked, not daring to hide the panic in my voice. "I don't know," she said.

Now, when Kerry says "I don't know" in the context that she did, it really means "you don't want to know." In this particular situation, it turned out to mean "ten minutes", but over the course of the next half hour, that number decreased to four. With a 30-minute drive to Willmar, MN in our future, that number was too close for comfort.

It was snowing outside. My parents rocketed over to our place, and we were out the door around 5:30. I can't really recall the time. There was some dilly-dallying in there. I was more than a little panicked.

We made it to Willmar somewhere around 6. Just like last time, I remember being really annoyed at how long the triage takes. Seriously folks, this lady is having a baby...can you move it along a bit?

Kerry's contractions were very painful by this time, and all she really wanted was an epidural. Unfortunately for her, this wasn't going to happen. She was too far along, and had to just power through it. I reassured her to the best of my ability, and off we went.

We were in our room at 6:30. The baby was born at 7:29. WOW! A little over 3 hours of labor sure beats the 22 hours for Gwen.

SO, welcome to the world, Joseph Dennis Wilcox! 7lbs, 12 oz. 22 inches long, cute as a button.