Blogging Woes and Icicles

Blogger is breaking my heart and pissing me off. I have blogged everyday (Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday) and each time for some reason it doesn't post!
I am trying again. I have had some interesting experiences here close to the North Pole, but I am just not up to typing it all again for the fourth time!!!
Here is a slight recap -
Vermont is insane. The snow is on steroids. We had eight inches of snow in one night! But it's dry and powdery and sparkly like it has mica chips in it. It is exactly like department store snow (only colder.) I think Yankees are crazy as all get out for living up here, but I will say that the Yankee technology of heated seats in the Volvo has made me think nicely of them. Speaking of the Volvo, if cars can be sainted, this one needs to be. Saint Solida! No slidey slidey on the roads. Just crunch, stolid crunch all the way (three whopping miles) to Play School. I am trying to be a good sister and follow Tidget's instructions. I am dutifully taking 7- month old Thrasher to daycare everyday - but yesterday I had to PLUG the car in just to be able to start it so I could then warm it up enough to drive it. It was seven degrees. Seven. Degrees. And then someone at daycare said the wind chill was negative twenty. Negative. Twenty. (I'm not sure they weren't poking fun at me to see how gullible I am - but the seven I can attest to because that's what the house thermometer says.)
Crazy Things about life in Vermont-
-Spending twenty minutes to warm up a car to drive three miles. (Of course the alternative is to WALK those three miles.)
-Chiseling off the holiday decorations: lots of people still have their Christmas decorations (mostly wreaths but some house lights) up. My sister said she thought it was tacky until she tried to pry her wreath off the house and the paint came too. She said she's waiting for the next thaw! Yikes.
-Eating dairy products here: the butter and milk here are HEAVENLY. I knew they had a thing about cows but I had NO IDEA that there would be an actual difference in the butter and milk.
-Finding a church: I have to drive 45 minutes to get to a church for Ash Wednesday service! No lie. 45 minutes to get to a church! Back home, if I drive ANY direction from my house for 45 minutes, I promise you I would pass at least fifty churches (and at least five of them would offer some sort of Ash Wednesday service.)
-Putting "dry gas" in the car: the Volvo didn't start this morning (until a neighbor came over and helped me jump it) and at daycare there were several theories about why this should be. I got quizzed about how much gas I had, how long I'd left the car plugged in, how old the battery is and then someone asked me if I'd put 'dry gas' in it. Uh, don't think so. "Well, then," she said, "that's what you've gotta do. Just get over to the full serve and ask for some dry gas." She said, "There's probably too much moisture in the gas." Again, these Vermonters are very kind but they have a strange sense of humor. I really can't tell when they're poking fun and when they're being serious. The air is so dry that I spend half the day filling up the four humidifiers in the house and rubbing lotion into my hands. I realize there's snow and somehow that's moisture but even the snow feels dry! It's hard to believe that there could be moisture in the gas when there doesn't seem to be moisture anywhere else.
-Watching out for MOOSE: Moose are about as real to me as dragons. In fact, I've seen more pictures and read more about dragons and they are (supposedly) imaginary creatures! Still, I keep watching for moose. I'd love to see one. So far the moose are as elusive as dragons.
-Watching out for ICICLES: no one warned me about icicles! Beautiful. Alluring. Daggers of DEATH. These three foot ice spears hang off house edges waiting to crash down and impale people (who are innocently practicing the new sport of extreme photography by trying to get an 'arty' shot of them. I'll try to attach pictures below, but don't expect to see the arty shot. It was almost my undoing. Instead all I ended up with was a postcard gingerbread house shot and an 'after' shot of a pile of icicles on the ground at my feet.) The neighbor told me (too late!) that the icicles were less likely to come crashing down if the roof stayed cold. She asked if I had heated the upstairs room. Duh! It's freezing up there! Everyone else still has their icicles, and ours are garden spikes in a row in the front yard. Aparently in some macho Vermonter way this marks our house as the 'sissy house' on the block. Everyone has been very nice but I can tell that they think I'm not even close to being hearty enough to be a Vermonter. They cluck and start listing things even MORE dangerous and likely to happen than death by icicle. Still, I keep getting this mental picture of me in an Edward Gorey book: "L is for Lilymane surprised by ice. M is for Mortimer devoured by mice."

Blogger has disappeared my photos - grrrrrr. Sorry. I'll try later. For now I'm off to church - if the car will deign to start without dry gas. And if I can manage to avoid the Icicles of Doom.
Peace.