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Snowmageddon 2014

So, yeah. It snowed. In the south. Let me bust your myths about that. And let me start by stating that I lived in upstate New York for 3 years where it snowed from October to May, then NYC for four years where it snows less than that, but still quite a bit. So I know about real snow. It was part of the reason we moved back to the south.  The south does not get much snow, particularly in central Alabama.  We don't have snow plows or a salt reserve or snow tires.  No one has chains for their tires, and unless they are transplants to Alabama, very few people know how to drive on snow. So when it snows, southerners panic. Contrary to what I've read on Facebook, this does not make us idiots. 

Yesterday, we heard that a town two hours south of us would get a couple of inches, but that the most the Birmingham area would see was a light dusting. Schools were not delayed. We had four schools in our theatre at 9:30am for a show.  At 10:00, a teacher from one of the schools got up and left the theatre. She told one of our staff members that her school needed to leave. They'd just gotten a text that their school was closing and they needed them to bring the bus back.  I stopped the show and got that school out. We finished the show for the other 3 schools who were there.  At about 10:30, I went outside to see a steady snowfall.  I immediately talked to my boss and other staffers and we decided to cancel our second show of the day. We ended rehearsal for our show opening next week and sent everyone home.  I got in my car at 11:00.

The drive was a NIGHTMARE.  Traffic was very heavy on the interstate. People were slipping all over the place.  Tons of cars got stuck. Trucks jack-knifed.  I saw so many cars with spinning tires.  Had I known road conditions were this bad, I would have stayed at work and walked to a friend's house that evening or gotten a hotel room.  I kept going carefully. I crawled down the interstate.  I sat still a lot, which allowed me a chance to text with Marcus and friends.  I made it just over the county line before I had to get off the interstate.  I heard from Marcus and the radio that the highway leading to our house was closed.  Thank God one of my work friends lives just off the exit where I got off the road. She is 9 months pregnant and her husband was stuck in town, so it worked out well that I ended up at her placce.  It took me 2 hours and 45 minutes from the time I got off the interstate to get to her house (about 3 miles), but I made it. I was hungry and cold and terrified and freaked out and I REALLY had to go to the bathroom, and it's a miracle I didn't run out of gas.  I left my car at a gas station because she lives up a very steep hill, which I hiked up. Ok, truth be told?  There were some teenaged boys sledding down the hill and I had one of them kind of pull me up the steepest part.  My friend greeted me with a warm blanket and a boatload of chocolate.  I had been in my car for six hours by the time I stopped, so I was absolutely starving and exhausted. She made us a lovely pizza for dinner and I slept like a log in her guest bedroom.  I left her house around 1:00 this afternoon, figuring it was then or never.  It took me just about an hour to get home, but I had the good fortune of getting on the interstate behind a scraper truck (a little crane clearing one lane), so I followed that truck all the way to my exit. 

Now that I'm home and safe, I keep saying, "No big deal." But it was a huge deal. It was so scary. Some people are still stuck.  One of my actors left her car on the interstate and walked a mile to sleep in an office building where the heat was broken.  Another friend slept in a Walmart. Countless people were trapped overnight in their cars.  No one knew it would be this bad. 4000 children were stuck in their schools overnight. I cannot even imagine that as a parent.

So if you think we southerners are silly about snow or that we overreact, that's why.  Next time there's snow in the forecast I certainly hope they have the sense to delay openings or cancel schools altogether.  I, for one, will proceed with more caution.

Thank you so much to all those who checked in on me, especially during the last couple of hours of my drive yesterday when my  phone had died. I'm staying put for the next day or two.

Days like yesterday

Days like yesterday make me extra-nostalgic for NYC.  You see, the Tony Awards were last night.  I remember the excitement felt by the Broadway community during Tony time, the buzz around town about who the winners would be, and watching several of my actor friends get dolled up to present awards.  Watching that ceremony made me want to walk through backstage at Lincoln Center, taste a hotdog from a street vendor and sit under a tree in Central Park.

But if I were still living in NYC, I would have missed a day like yesterday.

Meredith's sweet baby Henry was baptized yesterday. I was fortunate enough to spend some quality snuggle time with him before the service.  I was also there when his grandma dressed him in his christening gown, an heirloom worn by his grandpa, his great-aunt, his mom and uncle and all their cousins.  I was standing next to his family when he was baptized.  I"m so happy I was able to be a part of that special day.

This weekend, my parents will come visit and we'll go pick our own berries at a farm up the road.  My parents would not have visted NYC. My mom would have liked it once she got into a rhythm, but my dad probably wouldn't have made it out of the airport. (He doesn't like big cities and crowds much. He also doesn't like petting zoos, but that's another post altogether.)

Even though it's approximately 4000 degrees outside and only getting hotter, relocating to the south definitely has its perks.

I could still go for a vendor hotdog, though.

(Lucky for me, BlogHer 10 is in NYC!  I'm going to eat 8 meals a day while I'm there.)

Comfort Food Saturday: Potato Logs

As you may have already heard, I'm looking for recipes and guest posts for some upcoming Saturdays.  If you have a great comfort food recipe, whether it be a well-known comfort food or just something you and your family like to eat, email me--I'd love to feature you here! 

My friend Amy recently posted in her Facebook status that her husband, one of my best friends from college, didn't know what a potato log was.  After about 20 comments from Amy's friends, we figured it must be a Mississippi thing.  Anyone NOT from Mississippi (or the south, for that matter) heard of these?  They are kind of like the potato wedges you can get at KFC now, a baked potato that's been breaded and fried until crispy and perfect.  They are delicious with fried chicken and are usually found in a deli.  My mom likes to tell about when I was a little girl and we'd go shopping at Kroger. At the end of our shopping trip, we'd stop at the deli and pick up chicken legs and potato logs for lunch.  When I was travelling home from college, I'd stop at a little gas station and get a few potato logs for the road.  Now that we have a deep fryer (Lord help my cholesterol), I imagine we'll be introducing Dean to potato logs in the very near future.

POTATO LOGS

• 4 baked potatoes (the longer the potato, the better)
• 1/2 cup bread crumbs
• 1/4 teaspoon Paprika
• Garlic powder and black pepper to taste

Cut previously baked potatoes (with skin) into 4 pieces, lengthwise. (Make wedges.)  Mix together bread crumbs, paprika, pepper and garlic powder.  Coat potato wedges in bread crumb mixture. 

Deep fry until golden brown, either in a deep fryer or a skillet with oil.

EDITED TO ADD:  I made these Saturday night and here's the deal.  Deep fry them at 375 degrees for 8 minutes to achieve PERFECTION.  Next time, though, I"m going to bread them with flour instead of bread crumbs because I wasn't nuts about the texture.  They were dang tasty, though.

Southern-Fried RUDENESS

A lot of people have the misconception that NYC is a place full of rude people.  That is partially true.  The cab drivers smoke when you ask them not to, talk on the phone while driving, blast horrible music and grunt at you, store clerks never say thank you, barristas yell at you for not knowing EXACTLY what you want the second you step up to the register, and waiters often glare at you for making special requests when ordering food.  However, the NYC I knew was also full of very kind people.  The guy at the Italian deli across from our apartment gave us free food the day we brought Dean home from the hospital.  Uncle Louie at the Italian restaurant knew my voice when I called for take-out.  The chef at the Chinese restaurant down the block knew that Marcus liked bean sprouts in his fried rice, so she always threw in a few extra for him.  People spoke to us on the street.  If I struck up a conversation on a subway platform or in a store, the othe person would usually speak back. 

I tell you all this because one of the things I was really excited about when we moved back to the south was how polite the people are.   I have memories of growing up in a slow-paced place where everyone from the post office clerk to the man at the gas station knew my name and talked to me each time I went there.  People spoke on the street and waved when you let them pull out in front of you. 

My, how some things have changed. (NOTE: The south is still a wonderful, warm place almost all the time.  However, some days, things like this happen...)

This morning, I took Dean to the library to get some new reading material, play with the puzzles and maybe, just maybe, meet some other moms and kids.  The children's section was packed.  There were 7 or 8 kids playing and reading and two moms about my age sitting at one of the tables talking.  I smiled at them and said "Hi" as we approached, then started helping Dean put a puzzle together.  A little boy who was exactly Dean's size came up and started playing with us.  I spoke to him and we even read a few books together.  Then suddenly, the litle boy ran to the stacks, swept all three shelves of books onto the floor and climbed to the top of the bookcase.  As nicely as I could I said "Oh, goodness, where's your mommy?"  No volunteers.  After asking loudly 3 times "Who's this boy's mom?" I grabbed him before he flung himself to the floor, only to realize he had a rank-smelling poopy diaper.  I'm talking the kind that's been sitting for a while. (Moms, you know what I"m talking about.)  Still, no mom surfaced.  The two women at the kiddie table were still talking, never looking up to see what the 8 kids, who all seemed to belong to them, were up to.  I heard one of them exclaim "I have to paint the nursery before I get much more pregnant with this child because it is absolutely unacceptable."  The other concurred.  I went about my business of picking up after Dean, who found a huge puzzle containing approximately 500 pieces, all in the shape of bees, and looking for books.  I overheard one of the women say "Yeah, people with ONLY CHILDREN don't get it.  They barely qualify as mothers. Hahahahahahahhaahhaahaha."   Not even a "bless their hearts."  DUDE.  I quickly gathered up my toddler and our books about sheep on a ship, gorillas on a space shuttle and various Eric Carle stories and high-tailed it to the checkout counter.

As I was pulling out my library card, I heard the grandmother in front of me telling the clerk, "Yeah, these are our grandsons.  This one's really good, but the other one must have some learning disability.  It's really hard for me to take him anyplace.  I keep telling him he can't read these books to himself, so I'm not getting them for him any more.  He's a lot of trouble."  OH. MY. DEAR. LORD. GOD. IN. HEAVEN.  Please give him to me to adopt right now. RIGHT NOW!  Because if that's the best you can do?  That's SAD.

I don't expect people to come out of the woodwork to be friendly to us when we go out, but c'mon people.  A quick smile or a "hello" or a "gee, thanks for saving my toddler's life when he tried to kamikaze jump off the bookcase" isn't too much to ask.  I'm sure I've ignored kind people before, but I hope I've never done anything so bad that someone had to go home and blog about it.

So next time someone smiles at you in the store, take a second and smile back and say "hi."  (Pronounced "Hah" if you're me.)  Who knows?  You might meet someone fabulous.