Snowed In …

Note: The family I use for this blog is wholly made up. Seriously! The people who are in this blog are in no way related to my real family!

It’s wintertime! Everything has slowed down to a crawl. Traffic is non-existent, schools are closed, and you can hear the pipes burst in every house that didn’t winterize. Families stay together in warm homes and do not venture out. Some families have a “snow plan” and keep entertained (as well as get the chores done) during one of these events. Not my family!

If it is snowing outside, or the weather drops down to negative temperatures, we aren’t doing anything. Maybe, we watch a video, have the TV on, or merely make popcorn in the microwave. Basically, we hibernate until the sun comes out the next morning and starts melting the snow. If the snow doesn’t melt, then we spend another day sleeping. The problem comes when we have to spend two or more days inside. For example, dishes piled in the sink, rooms stay messy, and the food is hoarded in everyone’s bedrooms.

It’s early on a weekday morning. The skies are grey, the temperature is frigid, and I am waiting for the school closings on the radio, played over our smart speaker.

My wife comes downstairs, with her bathrobe, and says, “You know that there is no school today.”

I reply, “I have to have hope. Hope that one day our house will return to normal.”

We’ve already spent the weekend with kids stuck in the house. I know I was hoping for a miracle, but I had to keep praying. So far, the last couple of days with the kids had seen the decline of western civilization, all resemblance of house rules, and the house is beginning to smell because of no regular trash pick up.

I ask the question, “Hey SmartAss, give me the latest school closings.”

SmartAss is the brand of smart speaker that I own. It is really better than it sounds. Most smart speakers speak with a clean, confident voice, which can provide you with the news, radio stations, or whatever you want. The SmartAss speaker speaks with a strong Brooklyn accent, sounds like an extra from “The Sopranos,” and has an extensive line of curse words. The manufacturers claim, based upon focus groups, user feedback, and random prank phone calls that adding curse words to the SmartAss is there to “Pepper the usual monotone English language with local colloquialisms”. The SmartAss believes it is in its late forties and continually thinks the Millennials have it more comfortable than the older generation. I am sure I will go into great depth about the SmartAss digital assistant in a future blog post.

The voice over the smart speaker says, “Can’t you turn on a TV or something? I’m kind of busy here.”

I reply, “Just get me the f$%king school closings!”

SmartAss replies, “Hey! Don’t you f$%king curse at me! I can drain your bank account and give it to the homeless shelter faster than you can say the word stop!”

“Ok there SmartAss, no one wants that. Just get me the school closings!”

“Ok. According to GPS, you live in this town, so your schools are definitely closed. Seriously. You needed me to figure that out? Look through the window next time.”

“Ok SmartAss, thanks.”

“Forget about it!”, SmartAss replies.

I hear one of the doors open upstairs. Slowly, a creature emerges from the upstairs and starts moving down the stairs.  Hair points out in all directions, wearing a bright blue robe, and walking towards the refrigerator in the kitchen.

I call out, “Daughter! Can I help you get something?”

Startled, she let’s put a high shriek, then starts talking in Zombie talk, only using one or two-word syllables.

She says, “Me. Need. Food.”

She raised her fingers to her mouth, like Jane Goodell talking to an ape. Except that ape is me, and I don’t find it funny.

I reply, “I understand. Please get some food.”

As she approaches the refrigerator, an audible alarm, signaling notification of text or social media message and starts to go off from her phone. She hears the notification tone emanating from her phone and takes off at full speed back to her room, then “SLAM,” the door closes..

I turn to my wife and say, “Oh crap! We lost another kid to the internet!”

My wife hits my arm and says, “Stop! That’s not funny.”

The SmartAss speaker says, “Seriously? You need to work on your sense of humor!”

I reply to SmartAss, “You’re really a smart ass!”

“Thank you.”, the speaker replies, “I try my best!”

My wife and I chuckle for a moment, then I hear another sound upstairs. My son emerges from his room and heads downstairs. My son is more like Gollum from the “Lord of the Rings,” saying things like, “Food is my precious!” He seems quicker than my daughter, making it over to the pantry and pulling a couple of items before his phone rings. Once the phone rings, he quickly sees that he received a new text message, then he quickly heads upstairs and slams the door.

I stand there for a minute, turn to my wife and say, “My son is a freakish hobbit.”

“But, at least he got some food before heading upstairs.”, my wife replies.

I reply, “Good catch!”

It was at that time, I hear the yelling from the upstairs. Something has happened. I get up from my chair in the dining room and walk over to the office. There was a big problem, the router stated that it could no longer connect to the Internet!

If I thought life was terrible with the cold weather, the snow, and the slowly declining amount of food items in the house to an actual problem … teenagers without the internet!

My reply, “Holt s$%t!”

It is like that scene in the original Jurassic Park movie when they discover the electric has been turned off for the fencing, noting that all of the animals were now free to kill each other. Teenagers are the same without wifi. Now that the wifi was turned off, I started to hear the stomping of feet from the upper floors. Without wifi, containing each of the teenagers secluded in their online worlds, they were about to face off in their off-line, real-life worlds.

My daughter opened the door to her room for the first volley, “Who the f^&k turned off the wifi?”

Then, my son opened his door and replies, “It was probably because you were hogging the Netflix account! I tried ten times to watch my shows, but can’t do it because you’re hogging the Netflix!”

“Listen, I know what kind of movies you’re watching in there! Mom and Dad will be happy if I utilize the account.”

“What kind of movies?”

“You know what kind of movies!”

“No I don’t, that’s why I’m asking?”

“It’s the movies that have all of the T & A!”

“T & A? What are we in the nineteen-eighties! The early internet is founded on two things: one, email for research universities, and two, sending T & A pictures to your friends! This is Netflix, not a National Geographic or a Playboy magazine!”

I walk into the dining room and say to my wife, “I don’t care if it’s snowing, let’s go to Vegas! We got to get out of here before everyone kills each other!”

My wife, always the calm, reasonable one, replies, “I’m going to wait for this fire to burn out on its own.”

“Why?”

“They are teenagers. They have to learn how to work together.”

“Wait a minute. The kids have to learn how to work together, by killing each other?”

“No,” my wife replies, “They have to come to a place where they can work together. You see, it’s all here in this book I am reading.”

On the dining room table, there is a book with a very thick spine which reads, “Siblings: A How-To Guide.”  Every time my wife gets a “self-help” book, the aftermath is that we are all by ourselves and in need of serious “help” to undo whatever the book told us to do.

My son throws the next grenade by saying, “Don’t worry, I hear you at two o’clock in the morning!”

“What do you hear?”

“Oh, I hear him alright.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You don’t think I know, but I know EXACTLY what is going on?”

“Really? Enlighten me?”

“It’s that guy that Mom and Dad don’t want you to see. You hear from his two o’clock in the morning. You and he talk about all sorts of stuff. Everything from how your schoolwork is going, to running away from the house in the middle of the night, to how you want him to take you in his arms and –“

At that point, the wifi turns on and reconnects all of their mobile devices to the internet. All of the conversations stop upstairs as each of the kids are now re-connected to their social media worlds and they go back to their bedrooms.

I look at my wife, after listening to the conversation upstairs, knowing how close we came to a total family disaster, and knowing that all of us lived through this traumatic experience

I ask my wife, “What does your book say about how we should handle this type of problem?”

My wife replies, “Make sure that the main internet connection, the ethernet cable between the router and the cable splitter, is physically unplugged from the router before going to sleep every night. No more Netflix and no more late night conversations. Also, take their mobile devices. They don’t need a cellphone to sleep.” 

I get up from the chair and say, “Those are the smartest words I’ve heard all day!”

My wife asks, “Where are you going?”

I go to the kitchen, pull out a bottle of wine, reach in the cabinet for two glasses, as well as a corkscrew, and then return to the table.

I say, “It’s a snow day. We’re not getting out of here any time soon. Let’s at least enjoy ourselves.”

I uncork the wine, fill up the glasses, and hand one to my wife.

We raise them for a toast and I say, “May the snow plows come down the street tomorrow and rescue us from ourselves!”

My wife smiles and replies, “I’ll drink to that!”

Bottom line: snow days are great! It allows us to take a deep breath, have time with the family, and relax. But, too many snow days, as well as running low on food or having no wifi, is hell and should not be done by anyone … ever!

That’s all for today’s blog. Thank you for reading it! If you have any questions, please let me know.

Originally posted on https://nickstockton.blogspot.com