We're still stuck in winter wonderland. Surprisingly very little snow is melting even though the sun is out. We are just hanging out, dreaming of spending our weekend down under in Australia watching tennis. Now we just have to decide how much we want our Sunday night pizza.

Ryan is still counting on cancelled classes for tomorrow. I have to admit that I wouldn't mind another day off either.

Snow storm of the Century II is underway here on the east coast. Just as much excitement as the one in the midwest. Just as many warnings scrolling across the bottom of the news. Just as many closures and cancellations.

The only difference is that this time we aren't in a real blizzard. We aren't even in anything close to a blizzard. It's barely below freezing and we have about two inches of snow.

However, the sidewalks had an entire layer of salt spread out yesterday afternoon almost twelve hours before the snow even started. And they are predicting full closures of schools well into next week.

After four years of tromping through feet of snow and sub-zero temps to get to classes and work, it sure feels good to have the day off because of a light snow fall.

And let me tell you the kids around here are going crazy. They are in heaven today. Even though they already had the day off.

We just wish the roads were cleared of all the snow and crazy drivers so that we could go experience Christmas on the beach.

I know its not a huge achievement or anything.

But for us its still a big deal.

Happy 6 month anniversary, darling.

I can't wait to share many, many more months (and years) with you.

My husband received the following email in his inbox today:

Subject: Photo Shoot

Thanks Ryan.

Please plan for:

Friday.

Should take a half hour.

Dress: business casual.

I'll send color suggestions and final confirmation shortly!

Thanks!

The college interviewed him to be featured for some marketing material or something like that. Now they have scheduled a photo shoot to finish off. He says it's just because "I'm awesome."

Don't you just love the part about color suggestions? They want him well coordinated I guess. I think I might just have to take the day off and tag along to watch. I know my mom will be jealous.

I finished the laundry, made dinner, AND baked banana bread after work today.

Wow. I'd better be careful or somebody might get the wrong idea about who he married.

Messages from above (or maybe from below)

This is a special guest post by the aspiring esquire.

Sometimes in life we receive friendly little reminders that something bad is about to happen if you don't act soon. For example, a computer flashing 5% battery remaining, emails reminding you that a bill is due, or the ding of the oven timer.

Today as I was driving down the road a similar occurrence happened when I heard the following message over the radio. "Today would be a terrible day to have your car battery die, so come into any of the over 2000 locations across the country where you can get a free battery test, and purchase an interstate battery to replace your old battery."

Well, unfortunately for me I received this message a few hours too late. Because today as I was getting in the car on my way home from my last class, I was welcomed by a unpleasant clicking sound, soon followed by no sound at all. Yes, it was a dead battery. Fortunately, I was able to call one of my friends and "jumping" the car seemed to do the trick. But if there was a trick involved it was definitely on me, because after driving the car around for a while (to let the dead battery recharge) I parked the car, and then to make sure everything was still okay I turned the car off and tried to turn in back on. Again the sound of silence, the battery died a second time. Obviously I was dealing with a larger problem that I had originally anticipated.

Fortunately, one of my friends allowed me to borrow his car in exchange for bringing him to the airport. It was on my way back from the airport in his car, that I heard the aforementioned commercial. As you can imagine my reaction to the commercial was not exactly gratitude. It felt as if a power higher than myself was deliberately mocking me.

Despite this direct humiliation, I was able to start the car again a few hours later and drove it to an auto store to get the battery checked. With the help of my friend Sonny (yes that is his real name) who came with me to the store, we got the battery out. Tested the battery finding out it was indeed dead, and bought a new one. Ten minutes and a hundred dollars later, the new battery was in the car and everything was working (Yes two law students could indeed put a new battery in a car so please save the jokes), just in time to go pick Geron up from work too.

After almost two weeks of bright snow, cold wind and lots of card games, we're back to our very quiet apartment. We are happy to be home again, but I've found myself often turning on music to fill up space. I was starting to get used to all of the cousins and nieces and nephews with their constant activity. Now we are definitely missing everyone. And, I'll be honest, we're definitely missing all of that good food.

Unfortunately, vacation is officially over. Ryan's happy to get back to normal classes again. The second round of exams is way too far away to worry about now. (He did fantastic on all his exams last semester, by the way--he never had any reason to worry).

We're both excited for a new year, hopefully this one won't be quite as eventful as last year. We're still looking towards lots of changes, though. Good ones hopefully. And starting to count down the days till summer. But you probably know that I'm basically always counting down the days till summer, especially in January.