Before the kitty litter, I tried to shovel the car out, but my tires kept sinking into the cement-like snow. The day before, Muskegon was hit with what is hopefully the last bad snow for the winter. This has been a wild winter, and Michigan weather is unpredictable all by itself, so nothing is certain.
My brother has a plow on his truck and I watched him try to maneuver the huge clumps of snow that evening, but the driveway is becoming more and more narrow. I can still see our house, but it is sandwiched between the snow on the ground and the snow on the roof. Like something out of The Shining.
Water damage is inevitable, and we have noticed the interesting, cloud-like shapes on the ceiling. Nothing paranormal here; but new spots are being found everyday, in ceiling corners and around the skylight in my bathroom. Some plaster has fallen into my shower, followed by water leaking. The kitchen light is surrounded by water stains, so we're not using that light right now. However, our damage is small compared to some other homes around town. At least our roof hasn't caved in from the weight of the snow.
I haven't been blogging as much because I've been working on another book since last month. A sequel of sorts to The Last Girl, because I always wanted to write a series with Sonya Neslund and her high school pals. Between working and writing, I'm staying preoccupied.
K-Mart hasn't changed, except I have a new general manager. I don't know about you, but whenever there is a change of the guard, other changes follow. The anxiety wrought by The Secret Shopper is only making things worse. Those people have camera phones, and they're taking pictures of the filthy restrooms and other messes we don't have time to get to because we are now understaffed and the company doesn't want to hire more people. Maybe I've been spoiled, but I don't like having new demands placed on me while I have two full racks of women's clothes to put away on the floor. People who have worked in retail know what is expected; to pack in as much work, as much result, in as little time possible. Four-hour shift, eight hours worth of work. You can never do enough. The company I work for does not have the money to update the store with self-checkouts and extra electric wheelchairs for disabled customers. Sears Holding Company, owners of K-Mart, have been struggling for years.
The customers seem depressed and exhausted by winter, unhappy with the store's depleted supplies of snow shovels, salt, and kids' snow pants(those things are like gold). Valentine's Day weekend was a mess of lingerie and women's clothing, candy in heart-shaped boxes, cologne, and jewelry. However, the store was up fifty percent in sales that weekend. I've been feeling the pressure as far as working miracles in four hour shifts, because the store closes an hour early during the winter, so less time to work. The store was still messy, things disorganized and scattered on the floor, when I worked Sunday night. Bad weather hit on Monday, so more snow. I had already called in sick last week, and there I was, begging off for another day, another precious four hours lost. (I work for minimum wage and I get paid by the minute)
I feel sorry for my mother and our animals this winter. Mom already slipped and fell in the snow once in the driveway, but she was just sore for a day or two. A small walkway has been shoveled on the back deck to the steps so Patti Page, our dachshund, can use her ramp to get on the ground to go to the bathroom. As a dachshund, her legs are short, so Mom shoveled a spot on the ground. The area around this bathroom-spot, over the winter months, looks like a snow monolith constructed by ancient peoples. A Snow-Henge. On the icy ground, urine stains and frozen feces ruins the mystic quality.
The cats, when not inside, find shelter underneath the back deck, where Patti Page sometimes follows. Mom and I have managed to keep the cats inside when the temps drop, but the two males like being outside, their sisters wanting to stay in. These two enjoy playing, banging around in the living room at two in the morning. We also have an older female cat, Grayson, who chose to move in with us over the fall. The other cats don't like her, so she stays in Mom's room most of the time. We believe she was a stray, but she's a nice cat, seems healthy. Anyway, Mom is now The Crazy Cat Lady, with Patti Page and I as her assistants. Thank God the females are spayed.
I woke up this morning and I see sunshine, the snow melting. My brother plowed out the driveway last night, so we can go to work and do our shopping. When the rain comes, flooding is expected, but the sunshine gives me hope, because winter is always followed by spring. :)